Jersey Girl

Houseboat update, Thursday, August 9, 2018 -- I'm back to work on Jersey Girl. Here you can see I have started construction on the aft deck seats and stowage areas. The hatches that I have plunge-cut with a circular saw allow access to below-decks, where I will keep water and fuel tanks. I will cut similar openings in the deck on the port side. The openings will be surrounded by wooden dams to divert water away from the openings, and the decks will be covered by hinged seats that will also serve as hatch covers. When these panels are fiberglassed and glued and screwed into place, they will help to provide considerable stiffness to the hull.

Houseboat update, Thursday, August 30, 2018 -- I am dry-fitting the support posts for Jersey Girl's aft deck roof. It was quite complicated to cut the below-deck portions of these posts to accommodate for framing, and it will require some bit of nipping and tucking before everything is shipshape. Ultimately, these posts will be chamfered along the corners, to make them lighter in both appearance and weight.

Houseboat update, Saturday, September 1, 2018 -- When I said I had to do a little nipping and tucking to make the aft deck roof posts fit properly, I wasn't kidding -- except for the "little" part. As you can see, there are quite a few irregularly sized and shaped notches that have to be cut to make sure this post fits perfectly around the below-deck framing and still stand plumb in relation to the hull. A circular saw is good to start with, but to really make it fit, I had to fall back to more traditional tools -- a hammer and chisel, a hand plane and a Japanese pull saw. The fit is now perfect, but before I can install it, I have to fill any imperfections in the wood with epoxy putty, sand everything smooth, cut top and bottom dadoes to receive the upper and lower horizontal rails, and cut the corner chamfers with a router. Then I will be able to install the first of six such posts. Now I understand why it takes so long...

Houseboat update, Saturday, September 1, 2018 (Part 2) -- Here's how I cut the dadoes in the roof support posts for the railing tops and bottoms: First, I scribe where I want them with a pencil. Then, I use a circular saw with the blade set to a half-inch and make cuts within the scribed lines. In this case, for a one inch wide dado, three cuts are enough. Next, I use a hammer and chisel to knock the waste blocks down almost to the depth of the initial cuts. Finally, I use the sharp chisel blade, by hand and without the hammer, in the manner of an ultra-low angle block plane, to smooth the bottom of the dado.

Houseboat update, Friday, September 7, 2018 -- Today was an important day. I laid out the basic shape of Jersey Girl's roof line, using a flexible batten bowed between the two aft-most outer roof posts. First, I used clamps and plastic squaring forms to make sure the posts were absolutely plumb, relative to the hull. Next, I did the same for the two inner posts, which will be fastened to the transom. Then, I fastened the batten to the 35-degree sloped top of one of the outer posts and and bent it in pleasing curved shape to the top of the other outer post. Where the batten crossed the faces of the two inboard posts, I scribed lines with a pencil. I will use measurements I derive from this setup to lay out a work-table jig to guide me in laminating multiple roof beams that will exactly replicate the curve you see here. But that won't be the final shape of the roof. As you'll see in future log entries, the central portion of the roof will be raised by about six inches. To do that I'll cut each laminated roof beam into three parts -- but I am getting ahead of myself. Stay tuned, and you'll see.