Header photo (detail) courtesy Michael Eudenbach

Monday, August 8, 2011

More progress


Once the keel was laid and the stem attached we realized that the stern post had sprung and no longer would work for the boat. We didn’t have the oak to replace it right away so we moved on to the next step of attaching the molds in place and squaring them up.




Our oak showed up last week, so right away we went to work bending a new stern post.



It took 4 tries to get it right, but we got it.






Final stern post ready to cut it’s rabbet.




With all the oak in we moved forward milling the oak for the 100 frames we need to bend.




Jack and Rachel getting oak stock ready for milling.




Jeff and George determining the right length to cut stock.






While everything else was going on, we still found time to start spiling the garboard planks. In the above photo you can see them resting on the molds waiting to be finished.




all photos and captions courtesy Gina Pickton




Well, as you can see here, things are moving along at the Workshop. Gina has once again told the story rather smartly. Looks as though planking will have begun as you read this or soon after, as the garboard planks are already cut. I'm hoping to hear from Geoff McKonly soon on the New York team's progress.

Thursday, August 4, 2011

Building Progress

We’ve made some progress on the Whaleboat in the past few weeks. Going has been a bit slow as we have been waiting for our oak to be milled. We’ve made jigs and patterns in preparation.



Vincent and Salim are working from plans to make patterns.




George Clark is working on the pattern for the rudder




We’ve shaped the keel...




and attached it to the Strongback in place



Mystic Seaport sent down planking cedar and green oak for the stem and stern posts and the next couple weeks were filled with milling the cedar.


Jake Davidson and Alex Miller getting the cedar ready for resawing




We’ve also posted a video of resawing the cedar with the jig that Jeff designed.


Once the mess from the cedar milling was done, the crew got to work on bending the stem and stern posts


Stem and Stern post bending jig.




The whole crew gets in on the steam bending action.




While on the jig we drilled and riveted the posts to help them keep their shape.





Nick Pagan and Charles Bernstein getting ready to attach a strap to the post to help it keep it’s bend over time.





Charles Bernstein and Jeff Huffenberger attaching the stem post to the keel. Jeff welded up a bracket to help support and keep it in place while the build happens.



all photos courtesy Gina Pickton





Thanks to Gina Pickton for this update on the progress of the whaleboat build. The captions are all hers and pretty much tell the story. This I think brings us up to about 2 weeks ago, as I can see that work has gone beyond what's seen here, with molds in place and planking to begin soon.
You can follow the progress on a daily basis by visiting the webcam. More soon!

Originally posted @ Whaleboats for the CW Morgan