Turn up the Volume

The last two weeks have been great.  For the first time ever, Beth and I got to see both our families for Thanksgiving.  The Harris family assembled the weekend before Thanksgiving in Salt Lake.  My sister Afton instigated the whole thing and everyone was able to make it. 

We had some snow in the valley a while back and I had to get a picture of this wave sliding off the back of some broken down car near the shop.

The family was eager to see/work on the boat, so here we all are.   I'm trying to figure out what to have everyone do.

Beth continuing the endless job of sanding.

Afton was here in SLC for longer than the rest of the family and helped out a lot on the boat. She finished all the varnish work on the drawers/doors,  They look awesome.  Thanks, Afton!

This was our sample of the 2 part polyurithane foam that I bought to insulate our ice box.  Dylan mixed  the minimum amount that the cup could measure(maybe 4 oz.) and it turned into this giant mushroom.  

The product says that it will grow at a rate of 20:1.  We found it to be growing a little more than that, which meant that the two gallon kit that I bought would create 50+ gallons of insulating foam.  We thought for sure I had bought too much.  I mean you look at the cavity that needs to be filled and it just doesn't look that big.

This became one of those times when you just can't believe your calculations.  Here is how it goes.  Dylan calculated the volume of the space the icebox would fit into at around 20 cubic ft.  Which seemed high, but not too bad right?  Then he determined that the volume of the icebox was around 7 cubic ft.  So the area that needed to be filled was around 13 cubic feet, which still sounds reasonable.  All we had to do now is convert 13 cubic ft. into gallons and we would know how much foam to use.  

Now seriously take a guess at how many gallons fit into a cubic foot.  A 1' by 1' by 1' box.  Don't look down, really think about it.  We thought that it was pobably 2-3.........

Ice box, I hope I don't regret the shape of the opening.

Still need more foam

When I was figuring out my water tank capacity I found that it takes  7.48 gallons to fill a cubic ft, which at the time I convinced myself was true.  But now I looked at the seemingly small area that would be filled with foam and couldn't believe that it would take upwards of 100 gallons to fill.  After measuring five gallon buckets and other trusted containers we accepted that it was true and we didn't have nearly enough foam.  

We poured what foam we had and it ended up filling up about 60% of the cavity.  The numbers don't lie!  The foam had such lifting force that the it took three of us to hold the icebox from floating out of the space.  

Good times down at the shop.  

Upgrade-itis

We started off with good, or should I say different intentions than what is now happening on the boat.  People often tell you that the interior, particularly the finish work takes a huge portion of total boat time.    Of course our response to this was to say that we would simplify the interior joinery and just have painted drawer fronts and formica countertops.  Well it hasn't worked out that way....

This is where it started, instead of simple painted drawer fronts we decided to do VG Fir trimmed with mahogany with a stripe of Fir.  This as you can imagine is a considerable upgrade in appearance and labor.

Beth has been doing a great job varnishing all the drawer fronts.

Upgrade-itis is now in full effect, its just so easy to say "we have worked so hard on the rest of the boat and it isn't that much more money/labor".  But it is! And we can't stop.  Its a snow ball effect.  Anyway here is the latest, copper coutertops, above I'm glueing the countertop to the sheet of copper.

And here is the finished product.  I bent the copper up for a seamless backsplash and added striped mahogany rails around the edges.  Another upgrade was to under mount the sink.  Where will it end?

Beth and I caught one of the last sunny fall days and went on a short hike up Little Cottonwood.  This is the Lisa falls area the creek forms multiple waterfalls and pools down the narrow canyon.

Ok, this is not an upgrade, this was planned all along so maybe we are slowing down.  This is going to be our icebox (built in cooler). I am using the same "stitch and glue" techniques that beth used to build her dinghy.  

After I got it all stitched together i hung it in the same fashion that it will hang in the boat and put thickened epoxy fillets on all the seams.

By using copper wire I don't have to remove the wires after the glue dries, as copper won't rust and become a mess.












In the end we are happy with the upgrades we have decided to go with.  Its just so much more fun to build something that you really think looks good.  We figure if you can't have a lot of counter space or drawers you might as well make the ones you've got really nice.