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Visual History
The Building of Aslan
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Visual History
The Building of Aslan |
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Here, the lumber yard man is resawing No. 2 Douglas Fir 2x12's into
1x12s. Three 2x12x14' were resawn into enough 1x12 lumber to do the
keel and all the stringers, with some left over that may be used for the
rudder box and rudder, or other parts. Resawn lumber does have its
drawbacks: you pay a resaw fee ($12 in my case), the boards are not
uniformly sized in thickness, and the resawn sides are "rough" that require
a bit of sanding.
The resaw fee is worth it, because the resulting lumber is about 1/4 the price of kd fir. The non-uniform thickness of each piece is the most troublesome, as you have to make sure each piece of each of the three laminations is the same thickness (or power plane them down to the same thickness.) The rough sides are easily dealt with by lightly hand planing at a 45 degree angle to the grain to knock off the really loose stuff, then sanding with 60 grit paper. |
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The resulting 1x12x14s at home in my garage. My log of costs shows the total I spent that day at Thompson Lumber. These independent lumber yards provide more services, and are easier to work with than the super stores like Home Depot. They are often very competitive in price, so make sure you check with them for everything, including plastic resin glue, stainless fasteners, etc. |
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Keel pieces cut out and trial fitted, along with SOME of the sawdust I generated cutting it. I haven't used a skill saw so much since I built a patio cover! But the plans are right, if you follow them you can get some smooth curves out of a skill saw. |
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I read the label, and found out the Weldwood urea-resin glue is a hazardous
material, so I made Kristy mix it.
Just kidding. Mixing this stuff is interesting; they say to mix it to a pancake batter consistency. Add cool water a little at a time and stir well. Don't try to mix a new batch in the same container as an old batch; it will get lumpy. I bought some disposable foam brushes at Harbor Freight Tools, since there's really no sense trying to clean this stuff off of anything once its set up. When it is still wet, you can wipe it off with a wet towel, but once it sets up, you have to chisel it off. |
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Here, Kristy and I are brushing glue onto the keel surfaces. The glue brushes out well, but you'll note this is before the cheap disposable foam brushes . . . those nice brushes are going to be what they call a "lesson" in just a few minutes: there was no way I could get the glue out of them. |
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Leah, my oldest daughter, is applying glue now. She's a bio-chemist, having graduated from the University of California Irvine this past spring, so this is pretty "low brow" work for her. But she enjoys it too, so if that diploma ever becomes worthless, maybe she can get a job gluing keels up in a boat shop.. |
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Kristy is using my cordless drill to drive in 1 1/4" screws into the keel. I predrilled the holes with my power drill and a tapered, counter-sinking bit (similar to the Stevenson's "Screw Mate" bit.) |
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The sternblock is the final part of the keel assembly. The brown material is the Weldwood glue mixed with sawdust to act as a filler material. This is also to soon become what is known as a "lesson," as this stuff is as hard as a rock, and hard to sand off. I ended up using a jack plane to smooth out the places where I used this mixture. It does work, but it is TOO MUCH WORK. |
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Here's the bow eye I installed in the stem, to help winch the boat onto the trailer. The bow eye was under $5, and came with a 5" bolt on it. The large grey patch of material just up from the bow eye is a waterproof, structural marine filler, which I bought after my "lesson" with using Weldwood and sawdust as a filler. To install the bow eye, I cut a 1 1/4" hole with a hole saw (which leaves you with little discs of wood) in the stem where you see the grey filler, then drilled through the front of the stem, inserted the bolt, and fixed the washer and nut on it inside the hole. Then, the little discs were trimmed to accomodate the bolt, nut and washer, and the structural marine filler was used to make a watertight patch. The filler material has long strands of fiberglass in it, which works well for this type of patch. For a finer patch, you can obtain a filler with "short strands" of fiberglass in it. |
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