Wednesday, March 28, 2012

More to a Boat than Plywood and Epoxy.

Although plywood and epoxy are used extensively in building Gardens of Fenwick, there is much more to the project than those two materials.

Gardens' sail-plan will be a gaff yawl rig with three sails: jib, mainsail and mizzen. Encouraged by my success sewing the lug sail for my Goat Island Skiff last year, I've decided to sew the sails for Gardens. A kit for the mizzen sail has been ordered from SailRite and should be here early next week. Since I can only sew one thing at a time, it didn't make sense to me to order all three sails at one time. I'll order the jib next and finish up with the main sail later in the spring.

Also ordered this week: inspection hatches to be installed in Gardens' seat-fronts and decks and an assortment of cleats. And, while I haven't ordered it yet, I was pleasantly surprised to learn the recommended roller-furler (Ronstan RF76) is much more reasonably priced than I expected. I've also been studying detailed instructions for fabricating a suitable home-made roller-furler - so I may not be ordering the Ronstan furler after all.

Thinking ahead to the mast and spars, I've been reviewing the plans to determine what materials and hardware I'll need to order before too long. Thinking further ahead, there will be materials, parts, line, gear and equipment to decide upon and order.

There is a lot more to building a boat than plywood and epoxy.

3 comments:

  1. Perhaps you've seen Joel's furling design?

    http://navigatorjoel.blogspot.com/2010/12/how-to-build-roller-furler-for-under-40.html

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  2. Yes, it is Joel's design I've been studying.

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  3. Sveza Birch plywood is high quality light weight multi layered plywood panel made throughout from machine composed birch veneers and faced with a natural whole piece birch veneer of 1.4mm thickness.
    Plywood

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