New Sailing Blog

I have a new website about sailing our John Welsford Navigator.

Just visit http://lukefoster.com/dauntless/ for the latest sailing photos and videos.

Cheers!

sailing Dauntless

Well after the tropical cyclone passed (which prevented any sailing on launch day) we had four great weeks of summer holidays to sail in.

(The holiday and the subsequent knuckling back down to study have been the reason for the long delay in posting).

We’re wrapped with how the boat goes. I’m very happy we chose the Navigator. And especially glad we had the big race rig.

We’ve tested her in all kinds of conditions up to a gust of about 30 knots (which was more than I liked). Four crew in 15 knts and she just goes! Any more wind and you have to start reefing, but we’ve got two big reefs which work well.

We were concerned about how lots of the systems would work, but for the most part they were really good. Apart from the rudder which we tore off twice. The first time was beating in 15 knts in a good chop. Frantic reactions from Zac and me were all that kept us upright, and got the sail dropped.

We’ve had the gennaker up about three times. Not in too much wind so far, but looking forward to more of that, as it could be fairly exciting!

launching Dauntless

today's the day

After 2 years and 8 months, today’s the big day.

They say the time it takes to finish any job will expand to fill the allotted time. We've been pretty busy with finishing off this last week. And I have to admit late last night we were still gluing, and I have to get out there now and do a bit of coating.

All the systems on the boat have had much thought and discussion go into them, but we'll find out how they work this afternoon.

One of several shopping trips.

The foils got their final coat.

Last weekend we dragged her outside again to stand the rig.

Yes, and the forecast for today is 25kts, gusting 35!

Come 4 o'clock we'll find out how she likes the water. I'm a wee bit excited...

nearly finished

The long lack of posts has not been because we've stopped working on the boat, it's because we've done little besides work on the boat. We set the launch date for January 19 and have since been working our little hearts out.

The coamings ready for action.

The gunwales ate an enormous amount of time; sanding them flush with the deck without scratching the deck, and plugging them.

Dad and Zac re-built the trailer they built for the old Frostply dinghy.

Fitting the trailer to the hull.

Varnish begins. The first coat of many!

Outside for the first time. We had to take her down to the riggers to get the mast stood and the stays and spreaders fitted.

Spreading the mainsail out on the lounge floor was scary! We started wondering if we really needed the racing rig.

More painting and sanding. (The story of the Christmas holidays.)

The cockpit masked up, ready to apply the non-slip particles.

the deck

Finally it's time to add the deck. We've left it as long as possible so that we didn't do it any damage while building and painting. It's going to be bright finished Fijian Kauri, and every mark and ding will show.

Marking out the first piece. 4.5mm 3 ply bends nice and easily.

I'm pretty pleased with how it looks.

The bottom of the deck is epoxy coated before we glue it on. We're currently debating whether it needs painting or not.

Since we're varnishing the deck, we've taped and papered it while we work on it to avoid making any marks. Epoxy with glue powder will leave a stain that you'll never sand out. (A lesson I learnt the hard way when I replaced the deck on my Starling dinghy a few years ago.)

We cut the deck oversize and screwed it to temporary battens along the side while the glue dries.

1:30 this morning, getting pretty tired!

myth busters: special home edition

The Myth:
That you can successfully steam bend timber at home, using little more than an old brake fluid drum, a weed burner and the draw bar that’s waiting to be welded into your boat's new trailer!


Up till now we’ve managed to bend all the timber onto the boat using only brute force and sheer ignorance. It’s mostly worked; we’ve only broken a few stringers. And a couple of pieces of ply on that over ambitious reverse curve in the bow.

But when we had a quick try with the top outer gunwale we realised there was no way we were going to get it on. It’s Fijian Kauri 35mm by 18mm, and it curves in both directions. A bit of research told us that others either cut it in two or slowly bent it round tightening it a bit every day. Neither of these appealed to us.

Steam bending has always seemed like the next frontier of boat building to me. Like it was a bit beyond us, in the realm of serious boat builders. We did a bit of reading, but I doubted that we’d cobble together something that would work. Even if we managed to get the steam going, whether we’d get that tight curve in the timber would be another thing.

Come Saturday morning, here’s what we had sitting on the drive.

It took us a while to get things working. Once the water in the drum was boiling, we found you need a decent incline on the chamber to get the steam coming through. The chamber had to be hot before we could do anything, so at the start we hurried it up with the gas torch and a heat gun ;o) .

The temperature measured at the far end of the chamber.

Seeing this is myth busters, at this stage I’d say:

There’s a 3% chance we’re going to create a massive explosion and just blow everything up.
There’s a 40% chance we just make the wood warm and wet.
A 25% chance we scorch and burn it.
A 10% chance it works out successfully.
A 20% chance of Zac seriously burning his hands.
And a 2% chance we actually get to go sailing before Christmas.

Yes! After about an hour we got a nice steady supply of steam.

We decided to put a practice piece first (although it was difficult to sacrifice a nice piece of Fijian kauri).

Dad stokes the fire.

After 35 minutes we pulled the practice piece out. It bent round very easily, although it was thinner. The problem was all this black stuff from the inside of the steel section.

We drew rags back and forth through the chamber to try and clean it. We also cable tied these bits of hose to the timber to try and keep it from sitting on the surface.

Here's the piece sitting ready to go in. You can also see our scarf cutting jig, each gunwale has one join in them.

Having the chamber at this temperature worked really well. We steamed them for about 45-50 minutes each. They say you have 5 seconds once the timber comes out to get the shape in it, and that was definitely the case for us. You could still move it a bit as it cooled, but it was only easy for the first few seconds.

That time limit makes things fairly intense! We still had to apply plenty of brute force. And it was quite frantic getting the clamps on as well as protective blocks of wood.

Here's a vid of the last piece going on. This was by far the calmest (least yelling) and most successful. You can see how we get the bend in it as soon as we pull it out, as we carry it down (this was rehearsed, several times).

In the end it worked remarably well. The plan now is to leave the clamps on for a couple of days while the timber realigns. We'll have to take them off while we glue the deck on, and then glue and screw them on the following day.

This myth is proven!