Messing about

Posted on April 29, 2015 by cartersboat

Remember Tom Sawyer whitewashing the fence? All day long before they escaped to the river rafting. Today’s version was fairing putty for the aft cabin. To one bucket, add: 4 pumps of epoxy resin, 1 pump of hardener, a half scoop of Cabosil and a scoop and a half or so of phenolic micro balloons. Stir and add balloons til just past runny. Smear on walls, bunks, cabinets, overhead, etc. Repeat process when bucket is empty. Over and over :)

Peeking in the porthole later, it looks kinda like whitewashing the walls. However this leads to sanding tomorrow! And probably a second, finer coat of fairing compound. All in the name of GETTING TO PAINT – the new big goal.

After the cabins get primer paint, we’ll bond in all the wood trim pieces. The foam panel to wood seams will get touched up, then the finished wood gets masked off for the final paint. So all that wood trim is getting epoxied now.

Every piece has a number written on the back for placement, as they’ve all been cut to size. Lots of little busy work and not much to show you here on the website for a bit.

The bike trip last week was great inspiration for this fall. Rolling down the pacific coast highway, thinking about sailing the new boat on a parallel path soon!

Big rain eliminated the 5Th day leg to Santa Barbara, but we enjoyed 300 miles anyway. And we learned that strenuous biking burns about 5,000 calories over a 75 mile day. So we of course chose to eat like kings. Bill attacks tri tip and linguisa in Santa Maria…

Thanks for the good company, my friend! And to Mark, Dave and Steve. And especially Fred for driving the suitcase car :)

We feel your pain

Posted on February 24, 2015 by cartersboat

It’s just plain not fair that our kid and friends in the East are nailed with all this cold, when out West it’s full-on sailing season.
But keep working hard Colin, while Dad is out messing about with boats. Today the workshop went dark for a little on water R&R thanks to Charlie’s F27 and her new screacher. We did a lot of hanging out in The Slot watching these guys.

Really interesting watching both Oracle and Artemis Americas Cup teams trying to keep the boats up on foils thru the tacks and gybes.

And it was great fun to have accomplished multihull designer Richard Woods aboard today. Check out his boats at Sailingcatamarans.com
Smart boats that are kind to the builder and a joy to sail – the way they all should be!

Watching the boats practicing hot sailing gives another shot of energy to the build shop this week. Sorry Keith it’s so darn cold in PA that your boats can’t come out to play :(

Very motivating…

Posted on September 4, 2014 by cartersboat

… Seeing another builder’s boat get launched! Saturday was the first dip for Andy Miller’s F22, christened “Dart” at the Alameda crane launch pad.

His project took about four years from purchasing the plans, with very impressive dedication in the off hours from his busy engineering career. It was fun watching Dart go through the build stages and it’s very inspiring to see the finished product – makes me want to get painting!

Dart floated well above her waterline (before we stacked 10+ humans aboard), the new engine fired right up, the beams unfolded perfectly, and the Ballenger rig looks fantastic. Andy has some used f24 sails to modify and use before making that one more big purchase. Can’t wait to get out sailing on this speedster :)
Great work, Captain Andy!

A license to Sail

Posted on July 7, 2014 by cartersboat

Who would have guessed? The Missus is the one Carter who actually went to sailing school and earned a keelboat certificate!

Jeanne and friend Leslie Parsons attended Modern Sailing Academy in Sausalito, sporting handsome gear and scoring 94 of 100 on the written exam (to make Arlene proud, right?). Ted and Valda took us out on the Catalina today and the new drivers spent long stints at the helm learning SF Bay currents around Angel Island.

Back in the shop we had a good visit with Geoff who was down from Puget Sound. I saw photos of the 60′ tri he built – wow – and we traded tips and ideas. Makes me eager to learn more about the Wallas diesel stovetops, to pair that fuel source with the diesel furnace/water heater we bought a while back. Still looking for someone who’s actually cooked on one of these Wallas stoves. Also thinking of skipping an oven which could really improve the galley layout. Maybe carry a solar oven when cruising.

So not only is Jeanne exciting her husband by driving the boat, she came in to the shop yesterday and admired her new daggerboard. It’s in paint steps now; pretty great to have a big important part all done, and very rewarding to not have paid the $4k estimate to have one built for us (although we do have a solid $500+ in supplies in it).

Not having labor bills helps get the mind ok with ‘splurging’ on the good stuff in materials. And with all the time put in the dagger, there’s no way I’d use anything but the best possible primer to permanently epoxy encase and prevent water intrusion to the glass or wood.

This interlux two part system is designed to sit under the two part LPU topsides and hard-style bottom paints. The primer claims a unique overlapping stacking system that forms tiny continuous barriers like shingles sloping down a roof until the waters flows over the edge. At $119 a gallon, we better not have to see the dagger’s primer layer for a long time (never, ideally!)

A big thanks here to Colin for repositioning the main hull yesterday in the hot afternoon and hoisting the port aft beam back in place on the boat so we can build the outboard motor mounting system. Next step is to either get the shell of a 20″ shaft old outboard or get measurements online and make a faux motor shape. I’m noodling over the swing-up brackets attachment points to the back of the beam. It’s all a little trickier than popping the motor on the transom of an F31, but in the end I think we’ll really appreciate having the motor tucked 5′ farther forward, pushing right on the heavy beam structure. Anyone with ideas / cautions, send them thru!
Thanks

100 holes

Posted on June 29, 2014 by cartersboat

I wrote some time back about not wanting a couple hundred holes in the hull for little bolts to hold the trampoline net lashing eyes. But it was surprising how many hours – close to 100 – went in to affixing, fairing in, and hole-notching these 48 attachment points for the nets along each side. And of course the same thing was done on both sides of all four beams, with the float decks still to get theirs. This is one of those tasks that gets a single paragraph and small drawing in the plans but will have taken us a month in labor hours all-in. Yikes

Here’s how it looked after drilling holes 3/4 thru from the top then finishing the hole upwards via the pilot hole extending thru the 1″ hollow hole saw. This hourglass shape then needed to be cut on the perpendicular using the multi-tool saw blade. The point is to get a Vee shape so the lashing lines can enter and exit the tubes at 45 degree angles. The lines will wrap around a skinny fiberglass rod placed inside the tube.

We took a break today and visited the Master Mariner’s wooden boat show at the Corinthian in Tiburon. Colin, Jeanne and I each had different favorites. Origami raced against Yucca many times, and getting to meet Hank Easom aboard his lovely, fast war machine was great. We toured Eros, the 105′ schooner rebuilt by a marvelous couple through their 60’s and 70’s, and now touring the Western Hemisphere. Jeanne wants a light prism in our boat, just like big Eros’ cabins.

Perhaps the best part was meeting the owners and seeing the pride they take in caretaking their ships made of wood.
And I think we’ll lift an idea right off the oldest active sailboat in California. The Spaulding Wooden Boat center has just relaunched Freda after an 8 year rebuild – those volunteers and staff took the entire boat apart to repair extensive damage/rot.

The ah-ha was seeing the cabin top grab rails. I’ve been fretting over needing them but not wanting another bulky looking element on deck…

Thinking the modern version of these things on Freda would be sleek carbon anchors every three feet and some nice grey no stretch dyneema line. Thinking about it, anyway.

But the best part of the day was watching Mrs. Carter take the helm as we went out sailing this afternoon, and show Colin and I what she had learned in her May/June ASA sailing course. The bay kicked up a steady 20kt wind, 5 big cargo ships, 4 ferries and a LOT of sailboat traffic to mess with the driver, but she plowed ahead like a champ. Practice makes perfect, so we’ll be bugging Dad to get the Catalina30 out more often :). Go Jeanne!

How about silver?

Posted on August 28, 2013 by cartersboat

Got a ride aboard Rick’s Pelagic Fantasy as we watched the first head to head race of the LV Cup. It’s fantastic to see these boats up at speeds and power like airplanes near airports. Hard to explain. The racing is better viewed ashore, but it’s exciting to be afloat among all the support and spectator fleet. Plus the very close access to the docking maneuvers. I think Luna Rossa is spectacular looking – way better in person than TV. But not so sure our home afloat cruising boat would wear well in reflective silver!

And then went back a week later to show Mom around Americas Cup Park. This silver isn’t bad

Ok, enough messing about, and lets get back to the shop.

Farrier F36/F39 Ravenswing – Trimaran Sailing

Building & sailing a Farrier F36 trimaran, upgraded to Farrier F39 specifications

Category Archives: Inspirations in sailing