"Like Sugar" (Cont'd)
My plans arrived late December 2009
and by that time I was very excited at the prospect of
building my own Mahogany-planked classic powerboat. Since
ordering my plans I had been pouring over the Glen-L website
soaking up as much information as possible and purchasing the
recommended books pertaining to cold-molded construction and
engine installation in order to educate myself on
construction techniques and boatbuilding materials.
For a living
I build, renovate and alter domestic dwellings so I have a
fairly comprehensive workshop and a good selection of tools;
I also love working with wood. Over time I have accumulated
and stored some fine quality timbers always sure that one day
they would be put to good use so it came as little surprise
to find that I had enough material to build the Monaco frame.
I have used a combination of Kauri Pine, Coach Wood, Hoop
Pine and Douglas Fir. All fabulous boat building material -
old and dry, clear, straight and quarter sawn. For my engine
stringers I elected to use 6x2 LVL (laminated veneer lumber)
engineered plywood. As a builder I use this material
regularly and know it to be strong and true. Along with all
the boat timbers the LVL has been sanded, filled and triple
coat epoxy encapsulated using the West System. Dressed
quarter-sawn Sapele Mahogany has been purchased for the keel
lams and for the outer planking. For the deck I will use
Tasmanian Blackwood for the finishing boards and probably
4" wide Kalantas for the planking with ¼"
wide Australian Beech fill strips; should work well.
To date the project has taken 425 hours, with help from my
team, from sawing and dressing the frame timbers to a fair
bit of head scratching and pondering to final faring in
readiness for ply stripping. I have taken the time to be
exacting at each stage of the build which, I feel, has paid
off with very few frame adjustments needed. On good advice
the building frame was built around 12" higher than
recommended to enable access to inside the boat during the
ply fixing/gluing process.
My boat will be named "SUCRE-COMME" which is
loosely French for "Like Sugar" or
"SWEET-AS" in English, because that's exactly
what she'll be…………..more
photos to come.
See photos of Tim's progress here
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