Lead soup?

We are deep into August, summer seems to have flown by and we are not quite where we had hopped to be by bow on the boat. Neverless, we are doing great progress and I would say we are in a good boat building phase. The past few weeks have gone on the theme of lead melting but I am happy to say that it is now done....well except for the trim ballast, but there is no need to think of it now.

First round, two loads to melt about three tons of precious lead. A big fire as heat source and a bath tub for a container, we needed something big to melt down two keels.



And this is where that lead went, contained against the hull. It's welded shut we can now forget about it.



Second round of the month, an other ton and a half contained under the water tanks to be.
We found the easiest way to do this would be to melt it right in the boat and ladle it hot in the keel.



Don't worry, I'm well protected. A mask with positive pressure a proper breezing air feed...I at least had that to cool me off. I also blow fresh air threw the boat to eliminate c02 and cool it off.

Well, that's for the lead. I also been working a few other details: water tanks, crap tank, mast collar....I'll try to post more but should really get to the boat now.

Portholes - Hublots

We received our super New Found Metals bronze portholes! Happy-happy!!!
It is exiting to get boaty components. Makes us feel that much closer to having a boat for not to much effort.

On a recu nos superbes hublots en bronze de New Found Metal! Wouhou!!!
C'est tellement exitant de recevoir des composantes bateau. On se sent d'autant plus pres du but sans trop d'efforts.

Little boat steps

I finally brought the new front hatch up on the boat, one less open hole for the snow to creep in. The hatch looks good but I'm not completely happy with it. It's to heavy and as I finished building it I came up with a different idea to construct it, that always happens.
I'm going to stick with it for now but don't rule out remaking a new front hatch, maybe of aluminum... an other item to my never ending to do some day list...




Every little piece makes it look that more complete. I started making the aft chainplates, as an easy in between projects project. Next, I think I'll make the main hatch.
I ordered port holes back in October from Newfound metals. Those are now doing there first cruise as they are on the ship as I type this. I should be getting them by the end of the month. I eventually will have a somewhat dryer boat. Up to now I have been pumping water and carrying blocks of ice out of the bilge each time it thaws enough to do so.

What about the boat? Et le bateau?

The boat hasn't floated away yet...Boat building in the winter is slower but keeps moving forward. There is no point fighting the elements so I concentrate on building bits and pieces that can be made in the shop and there are more than enough of those. Building the hull was a big step but detailing, even though not as heavy, I believe is more work. I concentrate on one thing at the time, otherwise my head starts spinning. My current project is the bow hatch/companionway and it's coming along well. It's nice to see some big piece come together, it gives me the visual progress motivation. I shouldn't sell the bears skin before I killed it, my hatch is not finished, I still hope that it will all come together as planned, the curves bring the trickiness a notch up.

Le bateau est toujours la...La consruction ralentit en hiver mais continu a aller de l'avant. Il n'y a pas d'avantage a combattre les elements alors je concentre mes efforts a construire ce qui peut etre fait dans l'atelier et je ne manque pas de travail. Construire la coque etait une grosse etape mais fignoler les details, meme si n'est pas aussi lourd, represente encore plus de boulot. Je me concentre sur un projet a la fois sinon j'ai la tete qui se met a tourner. Pour l'instant je travail a la construction de l'ecoutille avant et ca s'en vient bien. Ca fait du bien de voir un gros morceau prendre forme, sa me donne la motivation que procure un peu de progres visible. Je devrais faire atention de ne pas vendre la peua de l'ours avant de l'avoir tuer, l'ecoutille n'est pas finie, j'espere toujours que tout s'assemble comme prevue. Les courbe ajoute un niveau de difficulte.

It is all made of steel, but, like the rest of the boat, is meant to look like wood.

Tout en acier, mais comme le reste du bateau veut donner l'impression d'etre fait de bois.

A previous "project". The chainplate. I still have to build the ones for the mizzen and add a few fake bolt heads (all for show).

Un "projet" precedant. Les cadenes. J'ai toujours a construire celles du tapecul et a ajouter quelque fausses tete de boulon.

An orange squeezer handy! I installed three deck prisms and will order a few more. They add a lot of light and look really neat, even more so on deck. The ceiling liner will come down to the edge of the frame, the thickness of insulation made it for a tricky installation.

Un pressoir a jus! J'ai installe trois prismes dans le pont et vais en commander d'autre. Les prismes ajoute beaucoup de lumiere et on bonne allure, meme sur le pont.

Link to boat pictures