Wow. I can’t believe it’s been almost a year since I last posted here! So, what’s been happening? Quite a lot, really, but also, until recently, in some ways not a lot. Let’s dig into it all and get caught up, shall we? The classified top-secret job in the city was over, and I’d moved back home. Most of what […]
Part 7 – What’s the holdup?
25th of May, 2021 So, you may have noticed it’s been a while since I posted anything. Why? In a word, funding. Just as I was thinking to myself that I could really use a cash injection to get things moving along, a work opportunity came up. One that I can’t really say much about. All I’m allowed to tell […]
Part 6 – The aft buoyancy tanks
29th of January, 2021. Ahhh. the buoyancy tanks. Now there’s a tale for you. Man. I still can’t believe just how much hassle these gave me. Or in other words, how I managed to mess them up. Twice. You’d really think such simple objects would be, well… simple. As it happens, there are at least three different ways to assemble […]
Part 5 – Holy cow, it looks like a boat!
28th of January, 2021. The first job on the agenda today, was a little bit of trimming. Those paying attention at the end of the previous post may have noticed that there was a slight ‘bump’ or mismatch between the outer edges of the forward and aft bottom panels. In the plans, this was considerably worse, as the dimensions from […]
Part 4 – Stitching the bottom together
27th of January, 2021. Stitching? I thought you said this thing was made out of plywood, not fabric? Yup. I did. One of the techniques for constructing boats from plywood is called “stitch & glue.” Basically, holes are drilled at regular intervals around the edges of the panels, and the panels are then “stitched” together using either pieces of stiff […]
Part 3 – Construction (finally) begins!
After a series of adventures involving, amongst other things, moving all our stuff into storage, several weeks living in a small 1 bedroom apartment whilst house-sitting a menagerie of pets (comprising of a deaf cat, an overly aggressive (and loud!) lorikeet, a blue-tongue lizard, a Japanese Fighting Fish, a catfish, and a bunch of other minor fish; thankfully the two […]
Part 2 – Lofting and cutting the panels
Early September, 2020. So now I had the plans, and the plywood. But I also had a wee problem. My housemate, the primary tenant in the house we rented, had just purchased a house out in the country, and had given notice to the landlord. I was in no position to take over the lease by myself, and had no […]
Part 1 – In the beginning – dreaming of a dinghy
Around a year or so ago, having decided I wanted a hard dinghy for the junk-rigged Benford Sailing Dory I plan on building, I began investigating my options. It turns out that new dinghies aren’t cheap. You can buy a reasonably decent secondhand car for less! So I began seriously considering building my own. After all, I intended on building […]