Believe it or not, I actually made it to the boat today and I actually did something that pushed the project forward. That's a good thing because the spring launch is 10 weekends away.
Without going back to the blogs, I think I spent about three weekends putting up the winter shelter. Without going back to the blogs I think I might have done about three weekends worth of work on the boat.
For the past few weekends I have been busy with snow removal and VIP guests which has left little room for boats. The time off was actually a good thing. There was definitely some burnout going on there; feeling the pressure to keep moving forward even when conditions were not in my favor. Taking a few weeks off and not worrying about the boat meant that I came back fresh and eager to play again.
Between the poor economy of a boat shelter and the benefits of a little time off, I am convinced that next year I am going to spend half a day stretching a tarp over the boat and then I am going to walk away for the winter and not worry about getting projects done. Less work and more time off is good for the soul.
That all said. I have ten weeks before the boat splashes again and I have a mountain of things I want to do.
First of all, I wanted to get those settee fronts out of my basement. The immediate improvement in the saloon cosmetics was nice. And then I found my first setback.
When I glued in the pieces that the access doors rest against, I forgot that the shelves in the lockers were flush with the rest of the supports. The settee panels want to lie flat on the supports but the pieces I glued in intrude into that same space.
I am spatially challenged and I hadn't considered what those pieces would do. My first thought was to cut back the front lip on the shelves but the problem with that is the lips are screwed in on the edges. My cutout would separate the lips from the edges where they were secured.
I didn't want to see screws in the lips when I was done so I removed the only other option. I made cuts in the pieces the doors lie against. (what are those things called..)
Its not terribly beautiful but I didn't spend a month re-engineering the doors either. In any case. I plan on keeping the doors closed most of the time so the miscalculation won't be immediately obvious. Next time I would forego the panels and use solid wood framing. Live and learn.
After getting the settee panels to lie flat where they were supposed to I found out that I didn't have the right lengths of hardware and my only source of good stainless hardware closes at noon on the weekends. I was out of luck there.
So I switched to mounting the lid for the trash bin. I screwed in the lip for the lid to rest on.
Then I decided I could no longer make my cheapie right angle drill attachment work and I needed to buy a new one. Then I found out my smaller drills were all missing or too small for the pilot hole for the weak brass screws I had for the hinges. That ended the day.
This morning I came back with new drills and mounted the trash bin door lid and handle. Then my boat neighbor plugged in a few extra extension cords to the same electrical outlet block and blew the breaker. That meant no lights and under the winter cover that means midnight blackness. It also started to rain so I couldn't bring more materials out to the boat without getting them wet. I have already learned that letting a little rain fall on the cherry panels is a bad thing. The black stains don't come out easily.
So not a ton of work done but it felt good doing it anyway. I am looking forward to a lot more progress in the coming weeks.
Em Tasol Wantoks
