Friday 21 October

Harry and Kay got back from their holiday in NSW, having driven from half way across the Nullabor (Eucla) to home yesterday. They started at 3am and arrived at 6pm. JP and I were happy to see them and Harry joined us for morning tea and told us about the bumper crops he had seen and floods they had had to avoid.

The first job for me was fixing in the bungs in boat 1. I had to make sure I didn’t drill the screw holes too deep and go through the boat which is only 9mm thick. Then I opened the sikaflex tube and carefully put it around the base plate. It squeezed out on top but not down below just as I hoped, when I screwed the retaining screws home. I then decided now would be a good time to drill the bung holes in boat 2 so that they could get the three coats of resin the rest of the hull gets. JP walked in as I was doing this followed by JD. JP had come in to make the rowlock blocks from his supply of Sheoak. After working out how he was going to get 8 blocks out of the timber he went up to Harry’s other shed to use the table saw and the band saw.

JP’s rowlock blocks.

Later he started the process of sanding them.

Sanding made easy by Harry’s spindle sander.

JD had brought his modified jig to drill two parallel holes in alignment through the stem for the towing eye U bolt for boat 2 so we didn’t repeat the mistakes of the previous effort.

JD’s jig.
I held the jig while JD drilled through the bow stem.
Such a neat jig for this purpose, JP should patent it for future skiff builders.

At morning tea we opened the packet dark fruit cake which I had brought in days ago but had been upstaged by home made offerings at every previous opportunity. Harry and I hopped into it like forbidden fruit. Afterwards I removed the clamps on the gunwale and used the belt sander to blend in the outer rail to the gunwale. I then used JP’s orbital sander with 180 grit paper to smooth it off.

Gunwale sanded up a treat and note the new bung holes.

The final job for the day was to glue in the breasthooks which I did with a bit of difficulty. Very hard to get a clamp on them so I just supported them and held them in with masking tape.

Masking tape should hold it until the glue dries.

At the end of the day boat 1 is essentially completed and boat 2 is getting close to wood work completion. JD is going to tackle the drilling of the rudder pintle bolt holes. We discovered that the bolt holes do not line up in the stainless steel fittings so JD is going to fix that too. Great to have a perfectionist sorting this out. Thanks JD.

Have a good weekend everybody.

Cheers Dave