Still waiting

Not much has happened in the past week, as far as building the boat is concerned.

According to the USPS parcel tracking service, the material I've been waiting for to finish the boat was in customs clearance on Monday. Now I don't blame customs for the delay, since we've had a couple of public holidays this week, one on Monday and one yesterday. In fact I suspect it actually cleared customs on Monday afternoon and it's Australia Post that I've been waiting on. I know it's Australia Post I'm waiting on now, because I saw their delivery driver turn up this morning. He got out of his van, rearrange a few parcels, stuck a card in our letterbox, then drove off without bothering to come up to our door and see if anyone was home. Not that he needed to check anyway, he could have left the parcel on our front doorstep, like the guy that delivered a case of wine later this morning. So now I have to wait until 4pm so I can drive to the post office and pick up the parcel. As I'm going out for a paddle tomorrow morning, then working, it doesn't look like I'll be progressing much with the build until Saturday.

So, what have I done in the past week?

I put a bed sheet over the frame the other day to see how it would look with the skin on. I'm not too happy with the way the chines end up at the bow, they'll be a bit prominent once they're covered up, so I cut about an inch off each one and planed them down a bit. The picture below was taken last week and you can see how far forward it goes. It'll still stick out a bit now, but not as bad as before.



Until I get the seat fitted and some kind of backrest sorted out, I'm not sure if deck beam four, the footrest, is close enough. So, I've been cutting a piece of pine to size to fit as a foot rest in case it's needed.

The coaming ring has about three coats of marine grade varnish on it at the moment and is looking better with every coat. I'll put at least six on in total and see how it looks then.

One of the tools I bought off eBay to use on the kayak was an old Stanley spokeshave. When it arrived I tried it out and couldn't get the hang of it, so I haven't used it on the boat yet. I gave the blade a sharpen yesterday and tried it on a scrap piece of wood (I have lots of them now). The difference between a blunt blade and one that's had two minutes on an oil stone is amazing. When I made Donna's Greenland paddle, at the beginning of this blog, I made the handle a bit too thick. Yesterday afternoon, after I'd sharpened the spokeshave, I sat down on a little camping stool and started trimming the handle. I wish I'd had it when I first made the paddles, it's a joy to use once you get the hang of it.

The only other thing I've done, kayak-wise, is to start marking out some of the leftover 1/2" ply from the coaming for the cross-sections of Donna's boat. I'll be building her a Tom Yost designed Sea Bee 13. No rib bending to do with that design and it's a bit more roomy than a Greenlander. Donna has specified that she want's a boat that is easy to get in and out of and I think the Sea Bee fits the bill there.