Back to the Shop

We're back from our West Coast adventure. Highlights and points of interest included Sacramento, Calaveras Big Trees State Park, part of the California Delta and Costco!

It felt good to be back in the shop today. I used a small, old, portable table saw and the thickness planer to mill the bottom piece for the skeg.

The skeg blank was then glued up.

Cutting the blank to shape and trimming it to fit the bottom of the hull will wait until Gardens is turned over.

Using the small, old, portable table-saw was fine for today's purposes but served as a reminder that I want to order my new saw soon. After shopping around (on-line, at Woodcraft and Rockler), reading reviews (Jet, SawStop, Grizzly and Shop Fox), using a Jet saw (don't know anyone close by with any of the other saws) and comparing features and costs, I've decided on the Grizzly G0515P.

In other news… Gardens of Fenwick, the blog, logged a pair of milestones early this week: The number of posts reached 150 and the page-views surpassed 25,000 (hard to believe, really)!

I'll be home now for about six weeks before our next travels. Hopefully, there will be more progress on Gardens and in the shop.

Travelogue... Big Trees

After a slow morning - yesterday's wedding reception was most memorable - we headed to Calaveras Big Trees State Park. Yes, this is still one of my favorite places on earth…

These photos don't even begin to convey the beauty and majesty of the park. There is no way to capture the sights, the sounds, the smells or the feeling of the cool mountain air on your skin.

Guess we'll have to go back another time or two…

Away From the Shop... Traveling

I'm away from the shop for a few days as we are in N. California for my son's wedding today. He and his partner had the wisdom to have their wedding in Arnold, California - which just happens to be near one of my favorite places on the planet. Calaveras Big Trees State Park is just a couple miles up the road from us. Tomorrow, after today's celebration, Jan and I will immerse ourselves in the beauty and splendor of the Big Trees. Hopefully, I'll have some photos of these ancient and magnificent trees to share tomorrow.

Shop Space and Casters

No white oak to be found in the barn, so the skeg is getting a bottom piece of the same pine as the rest of it. The bottom piece has been cleaned but needs to be ripped to the correct width, which will have to wait a bit until I have access to a tablesaw at the end of the month. A full-size pattern for the skeg has been "lofted" onto foam-core and cut out. The new shop is evolving as I learn to dance the tools around the space figuring out what works well amd what doesn't. I am learning to be flexible with the shop layout. Thank goodness for casters.

Skeg Assembly... Delayed...

Yesterday, I cleaned up the oak 2x4s intended for the bottom of the skeg. Nice, good looking wood…

Nice, good looking red oak… but not suitable for the skeg - or any other part of a boat. So, subsequent work on the skeg will wait until I check the cache of wood in the back of the barn. As for the red oak, I'll use it in an upcoming non-boat related woodworking project.

Skeg Fabrication: Milling and Lamination

So, with the shop semi-functional, I got to work on the skeg. The skeg measures (approximately) 1720mm (67") long; 165mm (6½") at its widest/deepest point; and 70mm (2¾") thick. To create a blank measuring 70mm x 165mm x 1828mm (72" allowing for further cutting to size, I started with two rough-cut pine (species unknown - this is old wood that came from an old Michigan farmhouse) boards measuring 50mm (2") x 152mm (6")x 2140mm (84"). These boards were used to support lath & plaster walls so there were multiple shallow, small nail holes in the faces of the boards when I began to work the lumber.

These were milled with a thickness planer to 35mm (about 1 3/8") x 146mm (5¾"). This removed many, but not all, of the nail holes. The boards were then cut down to 1828mm (72") for gluing.

The boards were laminated using epoxy: a coat of neat epoxy on both boards, thickened epoxy lathered on one board, and then clamped together.

Once the lamination is cured, I will square up the edges and glue a hardwood shoe - maybe that's not the correct terminology - on what will be the lower edge. (Maybe it is a sub-skeg?) I have some found oak 2x4s that I plan to mill to fit the blank and form the lower edge of the skeg. After cleaning up one of those 2x4s, I think it might be quarter-sawn oak… If it is, I'll find different hardwood for the skeg and use the quarter-sawn oak for something that will be a bit more visible.

Once the blank is complete, I'll make a pattern, rough-cut the skeg to shape and work to fill and fair any remaining small, shallow nail holes. I'll fine tune the fit when it is time to install the skeg.

Tools in the Shop...

…sawdust on the floor...

…and chaos reigns!

Sure, I planned to have everything organized and in its place before starting to use the shop… right…

Order will follow in due course, but I'm enjoying the space already.

Miscellaneous Odds & Ends

Well, okay, I guess "Miscellaneous Odds & Ends" is a bit redundant but, here we go:

• Shop Space:
  • Floor: The floor is done but for trim/baseboards. It looks good and feels very solid. I am happy with it.
  • Work Benches: I know what I want to install and have a materials list ready to go. Tomorrow I'll see what's in the barn that I can use but I know I'll have to use some store-bought materials.
  • Tools: Now that I have the space, I'll begin filling it up… Almost everything will be on castors so they can be easily moved about.
    • Dust Collecter
    • Drum Sander
    • Router Table
    • Spindle Sander
    • Band Saws (yep, two: my old 12" Craftsman and my new-to-me 14" General Industries model)
    • Thickness Planer
    • Table Saw - that will come later this summer
• Skeg: I took measurements off a drawing and will begin milling the skeg as soon as the tools are set up.
• Spars: The wood is waiting… once the tools are set up, I'll begin with the yard.
• Color Schemes: After reading about Rik's digital color scheme sampling and receiving a color card from Kirby's Marine Paints, we've decided to do our own sampling. We'll download the line drawing of the Pathfinder and experiment with different colors schemes.
• Inspiration: I finally began reading The Dinghy Cruising Companion by Roger Barnes and, I must say, it makes me want to get Gardens done and outfitted so we can go sailing! (Of course we can take Karen Ann sailing… but Gardens…)