Bob,
From what all I've read, you are right about it being something of a cargo hauler. I have nothing to go on as far as the actual carrying capacity, but I'll be finding out. And for certain, I'll be having some ballast up forward when I venture onto the poling platform! In all the pics of the boat available, no one has been using the platform. The man with the pole us usually standing just aft of the mid-point. Well, one exception. Glen Simmons is depicted standing on the poling platform, pole in hand. But the boat is sitting in a field, a "photo-op," I guess. Narry a drop of water in sight.
Now, the update:
I don't know who said it, or why, but I have heard that, "Every day, you should do something that scares the h3// out of yourself!" (If you turn that "3" around and straighten up the two front-slashes, you'll have broken the secret code!) Well, today, that's exactly what I did. And this is what I mean:
I imagine most everyone on southernpaddler KNOWS what this is about. But for those who don't know, I wanted to do an "end-pour" of thickened epoxy, pretty much making a solid stem, which the boat doesn't actually have. I'm sure it would work without one, but for me, this is a safety item. I'll be off by myself, too many miles from anywhere, and I want to know that the bow will hold together. Besides, I might want to ram something!
So, with some help from my wife, who says her name is NOT Dementia, we stood it up on it's nose and filled that V with wood flour thickened epoxy. I'd done this once before, before the two bottom panels had been joined, but that pour was kind of anemic. So I tripled its size with this pour.
Once that epoxy set up, I was in a hurry to lay the boat back down. The wind was picking up and I was getting nervous! Once down, I used the same method to fill in a little gap on the inside, where the side planks met the bottom. (My bevel wasn't quite right.) Most of the time, this job is done with much thicker epoxy and is usually "piped in" using a plastic bag with a small hole in one corner, like a pastry bag. But I thought I'd try the "pour" technique. Worked out pretty good. Results below:
The pour is that brown line where the bottom and sides meet. Did this for both sides, and the bottom in the bow, where the hull has a sharp V shape. (That ties in with the first pour.) While this was curing, I went down the road to get some disk for the random orbital sander, and some chip brushes for the epoxy work. Figured I try a local hardware store to avoid a longer drive and more gas, going to the bigbox store. I'll tell you what I told the clerk when he asked if I found everything I needed. "Nope. I found what you had that I could make do with." Next time, its the bigbox store for me. Paid too much for what I got, and it was not what I really wanted.
Here's where it stands now:
Not where I
thought I'd end the week! The gunnel on one side and across the transom is glued and nailed into place. The gunnel on the other side is clamped into place so I can place my marks, and the piece at the bow on the near side with the C-clamps holding it on is a piece of scrap I'm using to sort out just how I'm going to shape and attach that piece. Looks like I'm going to go a little off the reservation on this part. More along the lines of some conventional stitch and glue.
And, the other end:
I did get the glass tape on the bow, just need to sand it a bit and do another coat of epoxy:
One thing that makes it much easier to move the boat around is this:
Yes, I did get around to removing the old rope-ends, those originally tied to some more of those orange nylon straps, turns out the straps really weren't needed.
Looks like I was a week off on my "prediction" of having it finished and varnished this week, and in the water next week. I think I won't make any more predictions. Apparently, I'm no good at it! Besides, I'd much rather get it right, than get it done on an arbitrary schedule.
Thanks for tuning in! Friday starts my "work week" and I've got to put my time in so I can buy more food for this guy, and his whole fam damnly!
He was up for the supervisor rotation, today.
Mike S. <----- who has a tendency towards being a little wordy and post too many pictures.
Spring Hill, FL
