To review, months ago we decided to launch with a gas outboard motor instead of an inboard diesel. But there’s been gnawing angst about having the permanent gas tank inside the main hull and all the associated piping. So yesterday during Anton’s first visit to the shop he dives right in to my current “roadblock” issues. On the gas tank, it takes a half minute of looking around to ask, “why aren’t you putting it in that big cockpit coaming box?” Brilliant solve!

We grabbed some quick measurements before hitting the fish taco place; turns out there are about 27 gallons in the cubic inches available. A custom tank could go where the green tape is marked.

After an hour of shabby mechanical drawing, we sent off the bid request to ATL flexible fuel tanks in NJ. They make tanks for racing vehicles, insides of airplane wings, spaceships and other tricky applications. The tank will wedge itself in and be very secure. And the fuel line will travel right next to the wiring conduit tube shown a few months back. Here’s what about 6300 cubic inches measures out like:

And for the future crew reading this, yes this means the “old” tank space under the galley floor just got reclaimed for beer and wine storage. Jimbo’s wine in a bag will be just right.

Anton and Charlie also solved the steering pivot shaft that would not drop in to place. First was inserting the $60 fancy German bushings.

Rather than trying to machine away a tiny bit of the stainless steel shaft, we made a sanding bore out of wood, tape and sandpaper, spun by the battery drill. With a half hour of messing about the shaft seated in all 8 bushings and the rudder swings perfectly (not a trace of slop / wobble)

Here’s the cassette holding rudder #1. Note the forward tilt mentioned in a prior post. And that the rudder hits the shop floor about a foot before it gets down in sailing position.

And the trim tab rudder #2 can’t have the tab swing unless the rudder is all the way down — that’s an interesting way to “turn off” the windvane effect in the future, ie just lift the rudder up a few inches.

And now to finish the steering, the turning arm was built.

The forward end gets the foam dug out to make way for the tiller to slide in.

A big wedge was then cut from the rear portion so the steering arm could surround the cassette.

So now all that stuff is ready for the tiller. The foam core got shaped with proper attention paid to the driver’s end – we experimented with shapes until finding the right size for Mrs. Carter’s hand. Happy wife, happy boat, right?

With Keith’s comments in mind, the hoop-strength carbon lamination is curing tonight and the lengthwise unidirectional carbon will be applied Saturday. By Sunday we’ll finally be steering the boat!