May 24, 2010
But it's not. Close though. Today we walked into the garage, our shop, feeling really good about these boats. Our eyes were greeted with the sight of two hand crafted wooden framed kayaks. With the ribs in place and the center keelson lashed down, it'd be hard to mistaken them for anything else. Except for maybe an elongated bird cage.
First we shaped our hull stringers, one on each side of the keelson running the length of the hull from bow to stern. After shaping and clamping them into place we again took to the mason's line and lashed them to every rib. Finally, we lashed the two stringers together to pinch in the ends onto the bow and stern stems.
Hmm. Now they really look like sturdy kayaks. We brought them out into the yard for their first glimpse of sun and saddled up. We wanted to feel the size and shape of the cockpit. We also wanted to pretend we were already paddling them across the short expanse of grass, wavy green blades and all.
Out in the sun we fitted, cut and doweled our deck stringers. Two just behind the cockpit for sitting on and two running down the bow directly in front of the cockpit. One of our longest days of work so far - and it felt like it - partly because of the 90 degree temps and humidity. As our last effort of the night, we weighed them.
Greg's boat: 29 lbs. Luke's boat: 30 lbs.
Time Spent Today: 10.5 hrs
Total Time Spent: 65 hrs
What's Next: Install the breasthooks on the bow and stern, build the hatches.
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