Pocketship in the desert: Before the Centerboard

It was a great Thanksgiving weekend. The kids were all here and we had a nice family day. As it turns out I was also able to sneak away from time to time to work on the boat.

Well, I may have been premature thinking I was ready to do the centerboard. I didn't anticipate some issues finishing the keel. In particular, getting the cap to fit flush on the lead and readjusting the pitch of the noseblock.

Here's the keel with the lead in but not capped. I found that my pouring was not as exact as I hoped. That 1/2" gap on top of the lead was not 1/2 " in places. Some less than 1/4". So I actually took a chisel and mallet and chipped away some of the lead. I know this was probably time not well spent, but I wanted the cap to have enough thickness. I did end up grinding the top of the wooden cap as well to bring it flush with sides

The cap is epoxied and clamped.

And weighted. And waited.

Next stop -The Keelson

I avoided the scarfing issue for as long as I could. So I read and reread several articles and did a practice run on some scrap plywood first.

I stacked 3 boards here

I used a block plane mostly and a little bit of the jack plane. No sanding necessary.

It worked!

Then I did it on the actual pieces and it came out well enough- not perfectly straight but acceptable. I had also stacked 3 boards but this shows just one of them.

I then glued up the future keelson

Here is the picture of the joint after curing, but before sanding. It was flat, smooth and strong. (Pat myself on the back).

Next laid out the keelson on the scarfed wood.

I cut out the keelson but when I dry fitted it I discovered a problem.

The nose peice had too sharp an upward flow at the nose causing the keelson to swoop upwards towards the bow. I was afraid this might wrongly influence the hull pieces.