Lots To Blog Today Busy, Busy, Busy

Well what a busy day.

First I brushed off the roof that was gritted yesterday.  I think the pictures say it all.

 

 I'm very pleased with the finish, paint it next

Then I set too with gritting the port gunwale.  I had previously marked the line so this morning it was masking.

The masking and shaping took about 2 hours believe it or not, this was shown live on the new Live Stream at the top of the page.  More on that later.

All then needed to do was to apply the paint and grit.  

This time course carborundum

Later in the afternoon my brother turned up to add some more stone surfaces to the boat.

The first job on this was to make a support to take the cantilever of the breakfast bar.  This was done about a week ago in preperation.

First I drilled 4 x 20mm holes in the work surface and made some hooks from 10mm studding.

 The hooks then passed in to the holes

The hooks were then used to anchor down a length of 4 x 2 which was also glued down.

So all that was left to do was put the stone on.

Cladding

Then a pre-made ply infill was screwed onto the the surface of the cladding.

On to which the top surface and the finished breakfast bar was glued.

Da Dah!

I have to confess to breaking a bit of the thin cladding.  But my brother managed to re-join it and it won't even show. Clever sod!

Then to the bedroom. 

Cimstone (man made stone)
with mother of pearl & tigers eye flecks

There is one of these each side and there will be some upstands to be fitted later.

And so the the Live Streaming.

This is my iPad which I've made up a holder for it and mounted it on a tripod.

 Camera side

Screen side

New Blogger:- Fitting out a Widebeam boat: The adventure begins.

Fitting out a Widebeam boat: The adventure begins.: So. The adventure begins. Next tuesday will see us leave our Norfolk cottage, to spend a few months in a small caravan while we fit out our ...

See what I have spawned.  All the very best Ken, you will enjoy it. 

Gritty & Alterations

A wanted a break in the weather this week as I am having the Pram Hood altered to have the helm window and the large back window made to zip out.

While its gone I have taken the opportunity to grit the back end of the roof.  This involved a good rub down with 40grit DA then masking up.

Then a very thick coat of floor paint followed by a liberal sprinkling of grit.  There is 16.5Kg on there believe it or not.  I wanted a course grit and strangely I found exactly what I was looking for in a pet shop. Crushed Oyster Shells!!! Nice and course, and only 95p for 1.5kg.  Al last something cheap for a boat.

 

I expect to recover at least 10kg with only 5-6 kg stuck to the paint

It looks a bit hit and miss now but when the masking is removed and the excess is removed it should look nice and neat.

I have also prepared the gunwales ready for gritting and I've dried out the water tank ready for its final coating.

New Video Live Video Stream

In anticipation of the upcoming boat lift  on 16th March I have been asked buy a few people abroad to put a video up of it.  This of course I will do and in time lapse as well, but I will also attempt to stream it live as well.

Over the next week or so I will be testing the stream by broadcasting at various time on GMT between 10.00 and 17.30.

I would appreciate as much feedback to my email address kwade.01(at)gmail.com.  I will try to answer but not in real time if the chat box is open.

Water Filter, Steps, TV.

I decided to fit a water filter.  This casing can have a variety of filters including a 5 micron carbon filter.  I will start with 5 micron standard filters.

This required the water supply from the tank to be re-routed but this was pretty straight forward.

The large hole is for access to the air bleed valve

Serving will be by a removable middle step.  As this is fitted on the inside wall of the steps it was time to finish making the steps I started months ago.

The oak step tops should be ready later this week

The stone tops for the bedroom draws are coming on Wednesday all being well so I have fitted the bedroom TV as the HDMI cable runs behind where the top is going.

 View from the bed

Anodes

I fitted the anodes today amongst other jobs, 4 x 2.5Kg each side.  Another £200 done.

I'm now making the steps for the bedroom doors, confirmed the curtain order, re-doing the plumbing to incorporate a large carbon filter in the water supply which meant draining the water tank.  I started this with the kitchen tap, but after about 1/2 hour no noticeable drop on the water gauge so I got out the mains submersible.  That soon shifted it.  So its good to know that the water will not run out too quickly with normal use.  The one thing we both hated on the NB was the care we had to take with water with such a small tank.

Headoard & Kitchen Work

The custom made headboard was collected from the makers last Saturday.  I needed to finish making the bed base and once that was done I could fix the headboard in place.

The bed base lifts up to access a storage space.  Once I have the mattress  (Next Thursday) I can weight it and the base then I can get some gas struts made to the require lifting force to assist with and hold the base up when required.

I have been preparing the kitchen for the breakfast bar, while doing this it became apparent the island unit was pretty mobile at the end section.  This, in a stationary house is no problem but on a boat which moves about could be a problem especially as the weight of the worktops would act as a massive lever if the boat were to thing anything head on, or indeed if while being transported the lorry had to break suddenly.

A solution was needed.  Screwing through the end unit base would not be strong enough the load needed to be transferred through the vertical walls.  

I knew one day I would have a use for the really long screws that came with the engine crate.  

The head is 17mm AF to give it scale

I made a bracket to transfer the load through the vertical panel and some filler blocks to bear down onto once the screws were done up.

Glued and screwed

Stop blocks and 3 screws into the floor

The island end is now nice an rigid now. I will make a nice cover the the metal bracket to hide it in due course. 

Launch Date Is Confirmed

After several phone calls too and fro with all parties I can confirm the launch date will be:-

Friday 16th March 2012

====================

Launch Date

I think we have decided the launch date will be 16th March.  I need to check with all parties but this basically gives me 4 weeks to tie up the odds and ends.

I have now installed the drive shaft and tightened the bull flex down on the shaft, I have fitted the prop but only temporary for now.

 21 x 16 RH

Behind the prop you can see the weed/rope cutter and right above you can see the bottom baffle plate for the weed hatch which has also been fitted with its seals as too has the lid for the weed hatch.

On Friday my brother delivered the breakfast bar which will attach to the back of the worktop, and on Saturday we collected the headboard we've had made.

On order are the Oak stair treads and at the plating shop are the metal inserts that will form the stair grips.  We also have a couple of curtain makers quoting for the 8 large windows, 4 in the bedroom and 4 in the lounge.

There is a company around the corner that lines out vans and they have CNC routing tables and they have taken a scan of the temporary working deck I've been using during the build and will produce from that an accurately cut new deck from the Wisa deck flooring I have supplied them. Note the number of laminates which is all birch.

 I have chosen the hex pattern

While working on the boat I cut the side decks into 3 easy to handle parts for convenience but they will be one part on the finished decking.  The middle will still be in 3 parts. From the larger center board I can get access to all service areas.  If larger works are required the side boards will still easily come out.  The deck boards will be linked into the boats alarm system of course.

Back From Skiing

After a nice week away skiing, its back to the boat.

While I was away I had my delivery of curtain fittings from Jim at Jim's Engineering.  It's nice to know there are still artisan engineers left and business done the old fashioned way.  Jim even customized the fittings for me so I could invisible fix.

I chose the Stainless Steel option as I wanted the contemporary look.  They a beautifully made and look fantastic up and SWMBO is also delighted.

My new alarm system arrived while I was away as well.  Why have I changed already?  Well this system has leak detection sensors and a gas sniffer which all link in with the main panel wirelessly.  It also has all the other features of the other system.

Damp and water sensor

I have 3 of these sensors one in the engine room bilge set at about 60 mm and one each end of the cabin bilge set as close to the base plate as possible about 2mm.  Hopefully this will alert very early and prevent additional problems. 

On another note, we have had 6" of snow 5 days ago and temperatures have barely risen above 0c since if at all.  

I have been working in the boat and had the CH on at a nice toasty 20c. On the roof there is still a nice 3-4" inches of snow.  Proof if ever it was needed that spray foam insulation is well worth the cost.