Half a new dinghy

She's healing up fast...fortunately for her she lifts medium-heavy weight at a pretty serious local gym so she has a good stable musculature and she's used to the idea of active recovery and working through discomfort so I think she'll bounce back pretty well.

The plans are from B and B Yacht Design which is great for a couple of reasons:

1) I believe this is technically a yacht since that's what they design

2) in the medium term I plan to relocate put of Vancouver to a place with a proper shop (this should have happened last year but circumstances intervened) and I'm looking at one of their larger designs for a bigger build, and I wanted to see how thorough the plans were and what the support was like.
 
Should be working; instead making progress on the boat.



Whole lotta System3 WR-LPU goin' on...non-skid on the deck and lots of linked polyurethane!



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Not much left but the rigging and the lifetime of noticing everything I screwed up.
 
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WR-LPU and drill-fill-drill. Oarlock sockets on. Clamcleat on the daggerboard trunk for a snotter; loop on the mast step for a shackle. Box of love from Harken/Racelite arrived yesterday. Most everything is getting mounted on the spars though so not much to do with the little toys yet. Still waiting on pintle/gudgeon. Drew up a plan for a tiller arm; will laminate some stuff together tomorrow.
 
This thing will spend a lot of time on the hook in our bay so a boat cover is probably necessary to keep it from filling with water. My wife made a raincoat for it out of canvas and shock cord; it should work pretty well.



I haven't infra-gunned the black but there's been a heat wave here and it's sitting in full sun and there doesn't seem to be any problems resulting so that seems to be a non-issue. It'll never be this hot in any normal circumstances so I think that's fine.



The tiller I put a slight curve in for no particular reason; I just liked the look.



I was going to use kayak deck plates but then at the last minute I just decided to do wooden ones instead. They seal with neoprene tape so you push and give them a 1/8 twist and they're in there. They're not really intended for serious tie-downs or anything but I thought I'd make the handles work as cleats for light duty stuff, like tying off a fishing rod or tackle box so I don't lose it if I capsize.



Cutting the hatch holes was a pain; if I'd intended to do the sail version this year I'd have cut them out before assembling. Instead I had to drill several 1/16" holes really close together, then put a fine jigsaw blade through them and work it with a pair of vise grips. For whatever reason I wanted to use the cutout sections as the backing plates for the hatch covers so I had to cut really carefully to keep everything intact. No idea why I wanted to do it that way and it was a bunch of extra work. For some reason I just didn't want to waste the wood. I do drink a lot while I build so it's possible I made that decision while drunk or something.



One thing I discovered when the Racelite stuff arrived: part 337, which is one of two parts without pictures on the Racelite site, is actually not what you need. Where it says "RL337" on the plans, order "RL336" which is the other part without a picture and which I now need to order because RL337 is definitely wrong. It's a rudder stop, but not a spring stop. Or, I guess I could just look around for some stainless stock and bend it to work, but at any rate if you're doing one of these, you don't need RL337.

























 
Nah, I'm kidding. Rows well; fiddly bits fit although the hatch covers may need some tuning as they're a little tight now that all the corners have a few layers of epoxy and LPU on them.

I took it out for a bit solo to make sure it wasn't homicidal; it's like a jet compared to our current tender. I'd row for a bit and all kinds of stuff that was off in the distance would sneak up behind me; very unnerving. The long sweep of the oars is probably going to bite me in the butt in the bay but it'll be great for fishing and crabbing so what the hell. It literally moves at twice the speed of the boat it's replacing.

Obviously there was no need for the centreboard and tiller/rudder assembly for rowing but I dropped them in place just to see how they worked in the water. They seem fine so that's good.

Then I took the wife out for a spin; she's happy because it seems stable and easy to row. The water we're on here is the Fraser; really busy with commercial traffic so we got to take on a bunch of big wakes which this boat is much more capable of handling than our other one.

Absolutely cannot wait to get the sail sorted. Kit from Sailrite scheduled to arrive tomorrow and I PLAN to be at my island place on Saturday, although there is impending labour unrest at one of my jobs which is threatening my disposable income in the short term.

If I'm stuck at home I'll just laminate some SPF 1x3s into a mast because at that point I'll really want a boat that doesn't burn heavy deep vee carbureted V8 fuel.

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So close I can taste it! Will be at the island place the day after tomorrow; plan to cut the spars and rig it maybe Sunday. Should probably whittle a little gunnel guard that fits in an oarlock socket and gives me a notch to pull crab trap ropes in; maybe I'll get to that up there. The splash is done but the real launch is just a few days away and I'm going to be up there for a week or two so plenty of water time ahead for the little girl!



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Nice work. It's been a great read. A bit anti climactic in the removal from the building process however.
Yeah I really thought that would be a lot crazier. I had a stack of ropes ready to go and I was planning out landing zones and then my buddy shows up and looks at it and says "I'm sure that'll fit in your stairwell".\\

It made it by inches but it made it; we didn't even see a single person during the process so it was like it never happened.
 
Yeah I really thought that would be a lot crazier. I had a stack of ropes ready to go and I was planning out landing zones and then my buddy shows up and looks at it and says "I'm sure that'll fit in your stairwell".\\

It made it by inches but it made it; we didn't even see a single person during the process so it was like it never happened.
Except for the pictures.
 
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Tomorrow she goes to her true home at Ruxton, affectionately known as "double eagle island" on account of the preponderance of DE boats used by owners and my own highly questionable and margarita-dependent instagram account.

The sail is done; spars and rigging on the island. Will update after the coast guard rescues me trying to transit Porlier or mooch Thrasher Rock.
 
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