Building a Skerry

Day 61 (9/16/03) 3 Hrs: After spending a good part of the weekend cleaning up the shop, re-organizing the tools, and building a loft for my pile of scrap wood (I have gained about 15 square feet), I continued working on the rudder and the dagger board.

First, I shaped the dagger board, putting a taper on the leading and following edges. After it was at the proper shape and sanded smooth, I put a coat of epoxy on it.

I then started putting the rudder together by gluing the internal pieces and the cheeks together. Based on previous experience, I decided to screw and glue the internal pieces to one of the cheeks, then glue the other cheek to these. This made it a heck of a lot easier without all of the pieces sliding around.


Holding the rudder internals in place with screws	Gluing the rudder together

I applied another coat of epoxy to the tiller

Day 62 (9/17/03) 3 Hrs: Sanded down the rudder blade some more, to allow for easy movement when it is attached to the rudder assembly. When I was satisfied with the blade thickness, I drilled a 1/4" hole in the leading side to be filled with epoxy and re-drilled with a 3/16" bit. This hole is to attach the deployment line. I then coated one side with epoxy and filled the hole (after taping the underside of the hole).

Drill, fill, and soon to be drilled hole for attaching the deployment line

Shaped and sanded the yoke and drilled a hole where it will attach to the tiller. Then, coated one side with epoxy. Also drilled a hole in the tiller before adding the final coat of epoxy.

The Dagger Board, Yoke, and Rudder Blade getting a coat of epoxy

Shaped the rudder-head for a snug fit with the yoke. Then, glued the two doublers to the rudder assembly.

Day 63 (9/18/03) 2 Hrs: Shaped the rudder assembly by slightly rounding over the edges with sandpaper and sanded the entire assembly to 220 grit. Applied epoxy to one side (If I had an anti-gravity chamber I could coat both sides of all these pieces at once and cut the building time in half).

Applied another coat of epoxy to the dagger board, yoke, and rudder blade (one side only for each... of course).

Day 64 (9/19/03) 1.5 Hrs: Decided that I had better hang the rudder on the hull to make sure everything fits, before I get to far with the rudder, and find I have to back-track. This was mostly trial and error, and took some time.


Pintles	Gudgeons

The rudder is hung

Day 65 (9/20/03) .5 Hr: Today, I put some more work into the loft in my shop (not included in the running boat building time). As soon as the lumber yard up the street opened, I shot over and grabbed the wood I needed. Since it is less than a mile, I just strapped the load down across the racks, but didn't worry about forward or aft movement. I neglected to consider the down-sloping hill with a stop sign at the end. I stopped... but, the 2x4's didn't. There was no damage, and it reminded me of something that happened in High School, that I haven't thought of in years:

A group of us kids were putting on a Haunted House to earn money for charity. We spent an entire weekend building it. It was decided that Eric, Jeff, and I would take Eric's van and pick up the sheets of 8x10 cardboard that someone had donated. The stack was about a foot high and hung out the back of the van. So, Jeff was volunteered to sit on the stack for the ride back. All went as planned until the last intersection, which happened to be on a hill. Being, the upstanding citizens that we were, we stopped at the red light, half-way up the hill. The light turned green and Eric proceeded, giving it a little bit more gas to get up the hill. We never heard a sound. But, when I turned to say something to Jeff, he was gone. I will never forget the look on his face as he sat there on a stack of cardboard, in the middle of the intersection with cars honking at him.

I ended the day with another coat of epoxy on the rudder assembly, rudder blade, yoke, and dagger board.