Hulls

September 16, 2010

Most of the cuddy work in the previous two posts was done in the spring to mid summer. The hulls have been my latest obsession. Last year, I was thinking I would bring them down to the yard and work on them closer to home. After my experience working on the cuddy outside, I didn’t want to put them out doors without decks. It didn’t help that we had a very rainy spring and early summer. Driving north to work on them in the shop was the way to go. I have gotten pretty far on them lately. All the bulkheads are fully glassed in, the temporary forms are gone and the outsides are faired and glassed. I’m still working on the keel line and the false stems, but I hope to be done with that part soon.

view of the aft part of the hull forward. Some day, this is where the rudders will be mounted. And steps to climb up into the boat from the water or a dingy.

From Summer 2010

You can see a little of the both hulls. The second one is way off in the background.

From Summer 2010

A roll of my good friend, peel ply, will save me countless hours of sanding and filling the outside surface of the fiberglass.

From Summer 2010

I pulled the hull off the forms by myself and thought it would be fun to stitch a short video together of the move. I put a camera on a tripod and after each incremental move, I’d hit the shutter button.

stay tuned for core-cell mini keels.

Posted in Boat Building Updates, Hulls | 2 Comments »

Cuddy exterior

September 16, 2010

In addition to working on the cuddy interior when the weather is bad, I’ve been cranking away on the outside. I’ve got anchor locker covers.

From Summer 2010

I glassed the base of the anchor lockers, liberally sealed the rest in epoxy, and made some drain holes. All of this would’ve been so much easier had I done it before installing. Lesson learned.

From Summer 2010

It really starts to feel like I’m building a sail boat when I have winches, t-track, and other various boat parts laying around.

From Summer 2010
From Summer 2010

I’m drilling over sized holes and filling with them epoxy for everything that is being attached to the deck. This way if water seeps past the caulking, it will just drip on my head instead of soaking into the wood causing structural issues. It’s a lot of extra work, but I’ll feel so much better about it being done this way. If it’s a fitting that takes a heavy load, like a winch or cleat, I’m drilling and tapping the hole (in addition to backing plates) to distribute more of the load to the deck. Again, lots more work, but I feel like it’s worth it. The process is pretty simple, drill a hole, tape off the back, fill with thickened epoxy, drill and tap for the machine screw. repeat. repeat. repeat.

We even have an opening hatch, which of course had 10 or so holes to drill, fill, and drill. When we were on Richard’s Romany, I was amazed how much air would move through the front hatch, even in a slight breeze.

From Summer 2010

I’ve built half the dutch door, but haven’t gotten around to the top half yet.

From Summer 2010

This box looking thing will attach to the aft end of the cuddy and is the cockpit. It’s hard to imagine, but the corner closest to the camera will be where we’ll stand at the helm. I try not to spend much time thinking about it.

From Summer 2010

That’s about it for the exterior. I’m probably not going to paint until I attach it all together next season.  Stay tuned for hulls. Fiberglassing, fiberglassing, and more fiberglassing. Oh, and even a time lapse movie on moving a hull single handed!

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Cuddy interior

September 14, 2010
It’s been a crazy whirlwind of boat building this summer. I’ve done so many small projects that I can’t remember them all, but I’m working on a series of posts to document some of what I’ve done.
The cuddy was mostly put together, but then I had to go and spend time on Richard and Jetti’s Romany… so of course, I had to implement some of the additional storage ideas they had come up with. It was back to sawing, gluing, and all the corners to sand that come along. Once it was all in place and cleaned up, I put 3 coats of sherwin williams tile clad epoxy paint in all the lockers. This was neck breaking work to say the least, but it sure felt nice to get underway with the painting.
From Summer 2010
I really liked the protection the tile clad provided, so I decided to use it as a primer/base coat for the whole interior. If I had this to do all over again, I’d simply coat everything in epoxy before I put it in, but the tile clad is nice too.
From Summer 2010
From Summer 2010

Richard thought there may have been some flexing from the pressure of the mast forward of the king post, so I put in a wedge between the forward panel and the post…and of course primed it all with tile clad.

From Summer 2010

I also built up the area behind and above the sink in the galley. It’s mostly going to be storage for the normal galley stuff, but the panel near the roof of the cuddy (ceneterish on the photo below) is going to be where I’ll mount our electrical panel, battery monitor, and probably the VHF….and of course primed it with the awesome tile clad.

From Summer 2010

I suppose the mast beams would count as cuddy interior since they’re what attaches the cuddy to the hulls. The unpainted portion in the forward part of the cuddy is where the outer mast beams will be mounted.

From Summer 2010
From Summer 2010

Other non pictured interior projects I’ve worked on include a battery box to hold 4 Trojan T105s, an 1800 watt inverter that will be able to power our vita-mix, and lots of bits for for our fresh water system. Stay tuned for cuddy exterior…windows, winches, and t-tracks – oh, my.

Posted in Boat Building Updates, Cuddy | 7 Comments »

April 8, 2010

The answer to the first and most obvious question: sadly, no we didn’t finish and launch our boat. We did however do the next best thing and spent a week sailing in the Bahamas and south Florida with Richard Woods aboard his Romany. I’m pretty sure he felt sorry for me, since I’ve been building instead of sailing for a number of years, so he invited Heather and me to meet him in the Bahamas and sail the boat back to Florida with him and his partner Jetti.

We decided to fly in a couple days early and do a little exploring on Green Turtle Cay. It turned into sleeping all afternoon to recover from packing and traveling and then the next day we took a long walk around the island. We’ve been running ourselves a bit ragged lately, so it was nice to take a very slow easy couple days before we got on the boat… and it turns out we spent most of our time aboard the boat relaxing as well. Anyway, they picked us up Thursday morning and we were off. It was such a great feeling to be sailing again on any boat, let alone getting a chance to be aboard another boat of the same design that I’ve been working on for so long. I had taken a great leap of faith deciding on a sailing catamaran as I’ve never sailed aboard one. We encountered a variety of conditions and points of sail and I was absolutely thrilled at how the boat handled. There was a number of times that we would’ve been so uncomfortable and wet aboard our monohull, and Romany kept us (mostly) dry, level, and moving fast.

We slowly made our way through the Bahamas, before we sailed overnight across the gulf stream into Fort Pierce Florida. We ended up tootling around the ICW and met up with some friends who were carrying passengers in the market for a boat. They ended up coming to an agreement with Richard and Jetti and are soon to be the new owners of Romany. So, I guess we got aboard for a trip with Richard just in time. It was also nice to meet the new owners as I have a feeling we’ll run into them again at some point. There’s only a few Romanies out there, so we need to stick together!

It was an amazing trip, and I’m totally energized to get cranking on my boat again now that spring has arrived. There’s not a whole lot of new news on that front, but due to the early and warm spring, I’ve been able to get started a good month ahead of when I was able to begin last year. I’m putting some final touches and clean up on the cuddy before I paint and hopefully this will be a season of more consistent work on the hulls. The plan is to move them down to our yard for the season.

I have a lot of work to do until I can put my feet up and see another scene like this, so the one week is going to have to hold me over for awhile. Thanks Richard and Jetti!

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Heather’s son

January 29, 2010

When he called and asked me to “geuess what I got”, I thought for sure it was another wooden sword or a hockey stick. I don’t think those things could hold a candle to his very own library card. Yep, he’s heather’s boy.

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1945-2009

December 30, 2009

Richard “Dick” Clark Ilse, age 64, of Minneapolis, died peacefully at home with family by his side on Wednesday, December 23, 2009 after a four-year journey with bile duct cancer.

Dick was born in Duluth, MN, and lived there for 52 years before moving to the Twin Cities. Dick served in the Minnesota National Guard while studying geography at the University of Minnesota, Duluth. After graduating, he worked at the Duluth City Planner’s office, then went to the Arrrowhead Regional Development Commission where he was instrumental in introducing personal computer technology to small government units in the area. Dick was an independent information technology consultant until 1998, when he began working for the Minneapolis Urban League, where he worked to within the last two weeks of his life. He managed information technology, and is widely regarded as the most friendly, helpful and sociable “I.T. guy” ever. He frequently went above and beyond the call of duty in volunteer service to MUL’s many outreach projects, which included running the photo shoot for the Black Santa event, coordinating the parade for Family Day, teaching afterschool and summertime computer classes for youth in the Other Options Program Services, and making tax preparation assistance more accessible through the Accountability Minnesota Tax Clinic.

Dick had a kind, gentle personality. People were drawn to his humanity, inclusiveness, and compassion. He was known for his bright smile and self-deprecating humor in the worst of times, which especially shone through near the end of his inspirational battle with cancer. One of his gifts to the family he loved was his infectious and complete enjoyment of being in their company.

He loved observing Lake Superior and its shipping activity, hiking and bicycling along its North Shore, taking sailing and paddling adventures with family in the Apostle Islands and Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, babysitting his grandkids, and creating elaborate transportation schemes involving multiple vehicles (and perhaps a brother or two) to get kids, cousins, and/or pets from Point A to Point B. He had a propensity for telling Prairie Home Companion jokes at inopportune times and was prone to burning popcorn. He will be greatly missed by all who knew and loved him.

Dick is survived in life by his wife of 40 years, Sandra of Plymouth, MN; his dog, Gabrieli; children, Bryan (Sara) Ilse of Minneapolis and Jeff (Heather) Ilse of Minneapolis; grandchildren, Ethan and Lillian; brothers, Bob (Margo) Ilse of Duluth, John Ilse of Finland, MN, and Bill (Kate) Isles of Duluth; sister, Judy (Larry Heinis) Ilse-Heinis of Hermantown; mother-in-law, Carol Randall of Tampa, FL; aunts Doris Elg of Brainerd, MN, Betty Flax of Oro Valley, AZ, Josie Ilse of Virginia, MN; along with nieces, nephews, and cousins by the dozens.

He was preceded in death by his parents, Kay and Clark Ilse and father-in-law, Darrell Randall.

A funeral service and celebration of Dick’s life will be held Saturday, January 2 at 2:00 pm, at Grace University Lutheran Church, 324 Harvard St SE, Minneapolis, MN, 55414, 612-331-8125, www.graceattheu.org. Following the service, there will be plenty of time and space for sharing food, stories, songs, readings, or whatever you would like to contribute in remembrance of Dick’s life.

See www.caringbridge.org/visit/dickilse for more information. We have savored and appreciated all the stories, prayers, condolences, and notes of support left at Dick’s CaringBridge guest book.

Flowers and live plants are welcome. If preferred, donations may be sent en memorial to an organization Dick supported, Heifer International, which works with communities to end hunger and poverty and care for the earth. With gifts of livestock and training, Heifer International gives families a hand-up, not just a hand-out, empowering them to turn lives of hunger and poverty into self-reliance and hope.
Heifer International
1 World Avenue
Little Rock, AR/USA 72202,
(800) 422-0474
http://www.heifer.org/

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beams

November 8, 2009

the bulkheads are installed on hull #2 and I just finished the beams. It’s been a rainy cold fall, but I’ve been lucky to fit most of the work I want to do inside the garage. I’m still trying to finish as many of the little bits before winter comes, to make way for the hulls in the yard next season.

From fall 09
From fall 09

Posted in Boat Building Updates | 7 Comments »

Happy Halloween

November 2, 2009

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September 25, 2009

The cuddy is completed enough to get it out of the garage:

From fall 09

And the beams are underway. I have all the panels scarfed and I special ordered some 20′ lengths of clear vertical grain douglas fir. Very nice stuff.

From fall 09
From fall 09
From fall 09

I’ve also got the bulkheads ready to install and we’re heading to the shop this weekend to see how it goes.

From fall 09
From fall 09

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happy builder

August 19, 2009

I know this blog isn’t exactly boat building central, but I wanted to publicly state how happy I’ve been building a Richard Woods designed catamaran. Being an inexperienced builder, I was afraid I’d get into problems and not know where to turn with questions. I had heard from other sources that Richard is excellent with support, and that made me much more comfortable jumping into this project. I’m a couple seasons into my build, and I can say that I’m thrilled with both the plans and the support that Richard provides. On buying the plans, my expectations were that the designer would be available to clarify things in the drawings if I didn’t understand what they were asking for. Richard’s drawings are plenty clear in the first place, so I’m not even sure that kind of support has been necessary. He has, however, gone above and beyond by giving me the kind of building advice and support that only a person who has built many of his own boats can give, and that kind of direction can be so hard to find, when you don’t know whose ideas you can trust.

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