Saloon table prototype

I promise. We will only use this mock-up this year. Later we will build a new table out of mahogany and make it really sweet. I’m looking forward to it. But this mock-up tells us the real thing will be great. We haven’t decided where the pull-downs on the kerosene lamps will be fastened yet though.

The saloon table folded.

We will extend the back to enclose all the folded table top. Perfect for a heeling meal. Or just to put some stuff in it while sailing.

The saloon table, unfolded.

A clean table top for harbour use. Remember, this us ugly. This is a mock up. Yes, we will eat on it this year.

Other things that happened today: My father worked on the water system while my mother painted the aft cabin.

Progress pics

Some pictures of the progress:

Navigators bunk

This is a good illustration of how hard it is to take photos of the interior. Everything is covered in tools, and unpainted surfaces are ugly.

Steering station port frame.

8 mm stainless steel. 200 M5 machine screws. 13 mm thick polycarbonate. Will it hold up to the furious waves of the outer skerries of the Stockholm archipelago this summer. Probably.

The dinghy on deck.

The good thing about flush deck. The dighy takes up no space at all. Maybe we are going to take down the work bench while sailing, though.

Foredeck.

The bow rollers will be bolted to the mahoghany. We will need some sort of pulpit as well to be able to climb up the bow.

That’s all folks!

Fenix in the Summer Isles

A picture of Fenix, a junk rigged boat we met in the Summer Isles, west of Ullapool some years ago with our old boat. We were heading north up around the Orkney islands and Ben was coming south from the Faroes. Funny thing is that he lent out a cruising guide for Orkney to my parents earlier that summer when they met him, so we could return it, since we made some copies. Anyway, the boat seemed to sail real well. When we got to Ullapool some kind of border police interviewed us for quite some time about if we met some other boat in the Summer Isles. We didn’t give you away Ben!

Junk rigged Fenix

Fun with Makrolon ™

Sawed out the windows in Makrolon. The same polycarbonate as Lexan but the Euro-version. Interesting material to work with. We have quite a lot left but no idea of what to do with it. Here is a good source of all construction methods. It also tells how to make that cool looking dome. I see no use for it when we have an inside steering station, though. Maybe I could make an astronaut helmet. I could have that when driving my Vespa. Should be better than an ordinary helmet, no? More ideas about what to do with the left overs?

Fun material. Makrolon.

More bow rollers and deck house windows

Some pics from yesterday:

Bow rollers platform.

It actually looks thicker than it is from this direction. High quality mahogany is a really really nice wood to work with.

Portlights cut-outs in the steering station.

See my Festo jig saw on the work bench. I really love that saw.

Bow rollers

Think that you anchored at a place where the swell builds up and you need to leave. You let go the snubber line that holds the anchor, motor up to the anchor as you take in the slack on the windlass. Then you need to break the anchor loose, so instead of the crank you need to use the lever. Now, let’s say the anchor is stuck around some old railroad track or something else that doesn’t move. (A railroad track happened to us once in Skagen.) The bow moves in the swell. How much strain will be put on the bow roller?

I have no idea, but it should be a lot. So, to be able to sleap without bad dreams on board, we decided to try to make the bow rollers as strong as the anchor chain.

This is what it looks like at start. (Guess how many people came up with the same joke: Are you destroying the boat?)

Holes in the Bulwark for bow rollers platform.

Bow rollers hardware.

The platform is made of laminated mahogany

Portlights again

Time to show how it looks installed:

Looks good.

And we also made a fold down companionway door:

We will never have to stow that loose hatch.

Pictures and hole in the hull… and a surprise

Today we made a hole in the hull. It is always scary. But looked much better after we put a shining new portlight in it. Two pictures of the hole:

From the inside

And from the outside.

Quite often people want to see pictures from the interior. I normally come up with a really bad explanation that I don’t have any working digital camera except my mobile phone (which is correct btw). But the truth is that the interior looks really bad on photos. Often tools are spread all over the place, and since painting and hardwood trim goes on last, everything looks dirty and unfinished.

Like this:

A mess, no?

Here is another picture of one of the children’s bunks. It is big enough for any normal adult. But we made a special bulkhead to make it like their own little cabin. We also made some bookshelves. This will look much better when painted.

Did I say it will look much better with some paint on it?

And now for the surprise:

A sailing and rowing dinghy!

We would appreciate ideas for a name. Ida and Joel only created a list of 20 or so. Joels favorite name for the tender right now is “daddy” (but in Swedish of course). Personally I think it might lead to misunderstandings…

Aft cabin

 Some images from the aft cabin. (Sorry about the horrible quality of the images, mobile phone cameras are really really bad.)

Transom

Under the aft cabin bunk

Bunk

To make access easier we put hinges to get under the aft cabin bunk.

Companionway ladder used for climbing…

… converts to a nice seat!

… and the mast is off!

A couple of days with a dehumidifier and proper limber holes in the mast step did the trick.

Some pictures:

Bye bye mast.

Joel actually only calls boats with their sails up for sailing boats. When the sails are down he calls them “mast boats”. When boats don’t have any masts he gets confused.

Offending mast step.