Florin {VACATIONER}

The best place for kevlar is in the bullet proof vests and the hell away from garage. That little experiment was not a good thing for us. You can't sand that stuff, so unless you keep putting resin on it to build it up and paint it, forget it. It was one of the biggest pains in the a$$ we've had with this boat (other than the gelcoat incident). As soon as I started sanding it the damned thing started fuzzing. You just can't get rid of the yellow fuzz no matter what you do. Then we sanded it off the keel. We've had a 6" strip all along the keel like a cap. It took a good 2 hrs to sand it off with the belt sander and 30 grit and because it was really awkward to sand I've had a back ache for 3 days. I almost burned out the motor on the sander. I also filled half of a trash bag with yellow fuzz. Everything was fuzzy in the garage, and it got everywhere including my shorts. I guess I've had a bad case of the yellow fuzzitis. My advice would be to stay away from it and just paint the keel, don't put on anything, but that's a personal preference; we used to have two layers of glass under the kevlar as well. Well, that got chewed up by the sander as well, so now there's just paint there which suits me just fine ... some guys actually got the stuff on and are happy with it. I'm happy without it. Good luck.

Johannah, Glad to hear that someone from this side of the pond made it to Romania. Most people don' t even know where it is. I used to work for an oil company years ago, and one of the geologists asked what part of England was Romania in? Had a good giggle about that. And even further, it's exciting to find out you guys visited my hometown. I haven't been back home since I came here in '84. One day we'll go. Maybe we'll sail there :-) Just kidding. A few years ago my wife was able to borrow some Romanian lessons on tape from the public library. They seemed allright, you might want to try that. We didn't bother teaching our children Romanian... didn't quite find a reason why, especially since it's not quite an international language. We had to study latin in grade 8, but I didn't find it to resemble romanian language at all. I found english a lot easier to learn. But that's maybe just me. Cheers

That's looking pretty good Dave. It looks pretty strong too. I like the idea of the coupler nuts. That rig should work swell. What hapens to the steel bands on the sides of the mast when the mast is folded? Cheers

We made our hatches out of 1/2" ply (the tops). We wanted to make sure they'll withstand the pressure of some of us who are a bit heavier. Unfortunately I was silly enough to make the sliding hatch out of 1/4" so there will be no walking on that one, I should have made it out of 1/2". I may build another during the winter out of 1/2" or just line the one I have with solid wood strips, maybe that will make it stronger. I just don't really want to take the time to do it right now. Cheers

Thanks Bob, The rest of the color scheme: between the rubrails, off white. Cabin top and sides forest green metalic (just like the hull), deck and cockpit off white. We are going with an off white because pure white is too bright in the sun, and is hard on one's eye. Haven't quite decided which off white we'll use. We didn't buy the paint for the topsides except for the green which is leftover from the hull. The spars and pretty much all the trim will be bright (red mahogany stain with spar varnish, so they'll probably be pretty dark). Our wheel was painted like that (and the bitts) and they look like bombay red cherry wood. Pretty cool. I just dislike the varnishing of so many coats....yuk!

Thanks guys! Hey Konrad, glad to see you back! Are you done decorating the nursery yet :-)? Must be nice to be able to look at someone else's turning pics and be able to laugh and think that's all in the past hehehe. Good luck with the baby! Cheers

I have a similar dilema. I have my hatch built already, the tracks are installed and the handrails are made and fitted. We will install the handrails after the topsides are painted. While modifying the cabinroof we wrestled the top ply on and managed to ("believe it or not") get compound curves on the roof (1/2" ply). So now the rooftop is curved from side to side and there's also a dip towards the middle of the roof (front to back). We didn't quite think that would be possible, but we managed to prove it can be done if you do it right... don't really know what we've done right in this circumstance. Anyway, now the sliding rails for the hatch have a dip in them and exagerated they would look like a ski jump. The problem now is installing the rollers which keep the hatch down (on the handrail). I've spent some 2-3 hrs looking at it (and with a 1/2 bottle of rum to broaden my horizon). I think I did have a solution, but it got drowned in the rum and I cannot remember it now. Any ideas?

Our seats are somewhat different... they are made using the same idea of the forward access hatch (or the lazarette hatch). There are two on each side. We made the hatches with "water stopping rails" on the seats and we built hatch covers as showed in the plans. Pretty simple to make, and they should leak no more than the forward or lazarette hatches. Having said that, we'll have to see how they work after we launch, but I'm quite confident they'll do just fine. We partitioned the seats in two. the forward lockers are both insulated with foam and lined with a cool fiberglass liner. These will be our ice boxes, one for perishables and the other for ummmmm beer? Or maybe we'll use them both for beer :-) Maybe I'll get a slap upside the head if the admiral reads this post :-) I'll have to drill a hole in each (to drain the ice water out) and install some sort of a plug. It's sort of inconvenient to have the water out of the cooler drain onto your cockpit floor, but it sounds simpler than installing a bilge pump in each cooler, or picking the water up with a sponge form each cooler box. I could take some pics and post them if required.

Steve you're right. I couldn't agree more. That stuff makes me sick to my stomach. The thing is where do you draw the line. I've wondered about that legalese myself and if I keep thinking about it I'll end up living like a hermit and not ever get out of the house because I worry about being sued (I know someone who does that). Our solution to that was to get their parents, or guardian to come along with the kid. Then they are responsible for the kid's actions (or reactions) :-) If the parent looks or sounds even remotely nervous or concerned, that would be a good indication that maybe they should be left waving to us from the docks. Florin

Johannah, you're about the only one so far that hit the nail right on the head. I was born and raised in Romania, in a city called ORADEA, a couple of hours away from ARAD. In fact we were minutes away from the Hungarian border. Ho would think I would end up building a sail boat coming from the middle of the prairies :-). Are from there as well? Cheers

Yep, you have to have a radius, I agree wholehartedly with the general concensus. I tried glassing over a small radius (at the chines) and it was a bugger to get that stuff to stay there... Make the radiuses as big as possible. Especially on deck... it's also easier to get the dirt out when you clean up.

They sure look good Mike. Hope they last forever. Congrats to Paul for making such good sails. I may end up getting him to make a set for me later on when we recover from these spending sprees during boat and trailer building. We've had another mishap a couple of weeks ago which set us back about $1500. Our washer and drier decided to croak within about a week of eachother. Talk about perfectly timed built in obsolescence :-). That kind of blew our trailer budget right out of the water (pun intended). No matter, that still won't stop us from building boats, the gelcoat didn't :-) Cheers

We did extend the lazarette all the way to the hullsides and sealed it up for the very reason you've mentioned. I can reach through the lazarette top hatch all he way to the hullsides where the steering pulleys are anchored. We took some precautions and modified the way the pulleys are anchored to the hullsides, basically beefed up the anchor points a lot to prevent them from coming off ...EVER. I now have to cut out the holes in the seatbacks before we fiberglass. I'll probably do that today. We'll make oval or elliptical openings there, two on each side so that we can store stuff there such as fishing tacle and rods, hopefully some paddles and pfd's. Later on I will have to make some curved doors to fit the openings, plus I have to come up with a recessed latch or locking mechanism to prevent theft. All these things we still have to do. I figure we can do all the stuff which is non essential later on after the launching, or in the winter time.

Mike, thanks for sharing this with us (as I'm wiping the drool of my chin). You're so lucky just to be there. No wonder you Alaskans put up with the bitter winters, only to come out from hybernation to these beautiful sigths. I'll bet it was hard to go back home! Florin

Thanks guys! You're right about the safety factor. We already have a set of by-laws made up for the boat... one of them is that everyone has to wear a pfd. We couldn't expect everyone should be able to swim in order to come onboard, but that would sure help a lot and would make me feel a lot better for the sake of their own safety, afterall being a captain brings on this sort of responsibility for your passengers :-). We have our girls in swimming classes now for almost 2 years and they're getting there. We wanted to make sure by the time we launch they can float as well. Just by wearing the pfd's you, or someone else can fish them out of the drink ALIVE in case of a mishap. We never wore pfd's as kids when I was growing up in europe over 20 years ago. After I move to Canada I got into waterskiing. At the beginning I thought the whole pfd deal was kind of a goofy and silly thing to wear... after a few serious wipe-outs, when I couldn't tell which way is up or down I began to understand why one should wear the silly things and what could happen if one didn't. After a short while the pfd became a household item and I couldn't feel safe on water without one. I see a lot of boaters (especially stinkpotters) parents with kids on the lake these days. The kids wear the pfd's and the parents don't. I wonder if they think they are immune or exempt from drowning, or they are jus being hypocrites, and if they ever considered how their children would make out after the parents drowned due to being silly and not wearing one. Just my opinion. Florin

A couple of months ago my 7 year old daughter came home from school and sayd "Daddy, we are learning about boats, and floatation and stuff...what can I show them since we are building a boat?" So, the Admiral and I volunteered to let her have the BOAT WHEEL and the BOAT ALBUM go to school with her for the duration of this short lesson. This was at least two months ago... A week ago I asked the Admiral to please bring the boat wheel back since I have to rig up the steering system.... So,.... I finally got the wheel back yesterday, along with the photo album, and the comments that it was dissapointing to have the wheel go away from the classroom (of grade 2's) and in exchange we got 32 ph#'s to call for when we launch, and they all want to be there, and get a ride :-). Of course the rumour got through the school (my wife works there) that we're building a sailboat. Now tey all want to come for a ride. The kids parents want to go too. Since then, we've had a bunch of kids and parents asking to come and visit the boat... Some came and we've had to offer tissue to wipe the drool, they sure like the green paint... They are just impressed that other people just like them can make something like this... Come on guys, we're doing something right.... We're not building VCR's... We ae making something with our hands(and expensive tools)! Something that it's hand made, so many people are impressed nowadays by handmade stuff, it's amazing. People forget that everything used to be hand made and we can still can do it. (I think we should start charging for the rides myself) But it going to be a busy rest of the summer after we launch. I don't know how, but Pepsy got hold of our adventure and they want to be involved. Maybe I can get them to pay for the trailer :-) and some of the trips we now have to make to give all those rides. I'm sure it'll all be fun. Cheers Florin

Mike, your rig looks outstanding, especially with those lines in the sails. Don't worry about the motor... It shows charracter if you don't have one... And if you get into trouble you can just blame it on the fact that you don't have one. It sure looks salty! I wish mine would look half of that. I can't wait untill you come over and we can sail some of these lakes around here... the news media will be all over us. You may have to move here :-) (you'd probably like it too) Cheers

Thanks guys, The beer was hiding in the beer cooler in the back yard (didn't want to get anyone under the affluence of incohol before or during the turning) We all had a good time partying after that. We started at 10 am and I think the last person left at about 5pm... Needless to say I didn't get anything done on the boat on Saturday, but I was really happy. I did spend about 5 hrs in there yesterday working on the coamings. Should have that done fairly soon. We're getting pretty close to fiberglassing the top. Maybe this weekend. No more gelcoat! :-) Unfortunately now I have to go to work so that I can pay for that expensive paint I chose, and the trailer I need to build. I should be flat broke by the time we finish... hehehe. Cheers Florin

It finally happened. We turned the boat yesterday morning. It went even better and quicker that the first time. No scratches on the paint to mention of. After we've had a picnick. Everyone had a great time. Now we can start at finishing the top. Here's some pics Half way there! And it's turned all the way. I think I may have my website full as well since I cannot load anymore pics... I'll have to start uploading on my other site now.. Cheers

Barry, It sure would have been nice if you would have kept that.... Now you could sure use it. Oh well, you can always plant another one and wait until it grows :-) Cheers Florin

Yeah, mine looks like a closet rod as well. It's a 1.5" hemlock round stock 7' long. I figured I can try that, and if it breaks I'll just replace it with something heavier, but I think it'll be ok for now, hopefully until we decide to go with jib sheets. We'll probably change to sheets anyway by next season. I just wanna get her wet now real baaad. Thanks

We're really looking forward to having her turned over tomorrow. We both think she spent way too much time with her butt up in the air. We'll take some pics and post them after. Meanwhile I made the gaff, the boom, the stub mast, the gaff jaws and the little guides on the side of the stub mast in the past couple of days. They are solid, and are laminated out of spruce using the plastic resin. We'll probably start ripping the staves for the mast after the turning though. We've still got a few loose ends to take care of before the turning. We'll keep you posted.

That looks simple enough and looks like it would work ok. Thanks

As things are progressing right now we are hoping for a late july, early August launch. Who knows, it may happen sooner, but I highly doubt it. There's still a lot of things to be done to her before she's ready. We are having our turning party tomorrow. After that there's still some fiddling around with the coaming, taffrail, still have to build a couple of hatches for the cockpit seats, install the steering and the rudder+box. While I do that we'll be fiberglassing and then, the admiral will be finishing. Oh yeah.... I decided we'll build the trailer since I can't find anything suitable just yet. One of my buddies is a welder an he put his foot in his mouth the other day, he said he would weld it up for me... I'd rather have him do that, for I'm not that great at welding anyway. I guess painting would be the last thing we do, but it still needs to be done. So finishing in a couple of weeks I think would be pushing it. But I'd love to get together with you guys if this was possible. We may end up going in the Spokane area or maybe Coeur D'Alene next summer though. I think we'll stick around Alberta lakes this year until we get used to the boat and possibly get some minor kinks out of it. Thanks

Yep, that one looks nice. Actually my new mast design was a combination of this idea and the hollow mast we are building. It's just a little more complicated and I didn't take in consideration the pvc tube, which is actually a good idea to keep the sail moving smooth. That way it still fits the looks of the boat and has the functionality of the newer masts. Thanks