The companionway hatch, the skylight and the forehatch are all built and are currently part of the way through their varnishwork. I have chosen New Guinea Rosewood (Pterocarpus Indicus) as the timber to use. The original boats of the Ranger class mostly had hatches of Queensland Maple, and I seriously considered that, but several of them have replaced the Queensland Maple with Teak over the decades. I decided against Teak for two reasons: one was the cost, at least 3 times as much as the Rosewood; and the other was that it seems that much of the money made from Teak finds its way to the gangster generals running Myanmar. New Guinea Rosewood has some important similarities to Teak in that it is a very stable wood once seasoned, and if the varnish is allowed to deteriorate and the wood discolours, both timbers can be brought back to looking new with a little work. Once Queensland Maple discolours it will never be able to look new again. I have nevertheless used Queensland Maple for the cockpit joinery including coamings, edge trim and caprails. I will just have to keep the varnish up to them. The rails on which the companionway hatch slide continue forward to become the sides of the skylight, and are dovetailed to the forward crosspiece of the skylight. The tops of the companionway hatch and the forehatch are of 95mm x 22mm (3 3/4" x 7/8") boards with glued plywood splines at the joints as seen below. The forehatch is planked athwartships and features a permanent opening for ventilation, like most of the rest of the class. This is not meant as a seagoing vessel, the hatch will be perfectly adequate for use in Sydney Harbour. As of today 4 January, the hatches have all had their interior surfaces varnished (3 coats of Awlwood MA plus 2 coats of Awlwood Satin). Their exterior surfaces will be varnished along with all of the other deck and cockpit joinery which I am now working on. The Spotted Gum upper sponsons are now bedded and fastened on, and the Spotted Gum toerails have been machined. Because of the full curves of the deck in such a beamy boat the toerails will need to be steam-bent, as will the rail caps outboard of the cockpit, and I have to take a trip out to Smithy's Boatshed West where the steam-box and steam generator are stored and bring them back. The cockpit coamings only have a slight curve and as you can see in the last photo they could be easily bent with deep clamps. The coamings are of 295mm x 22mm (11 1/2" x 7/8") Queensland Maple. I made a template from thin MDF of each side, transferred the shape to the Maple stock and bent them in and temporarily fastened them in an afternoon. In the last photo you can also see one of the removable panels fitted to the opening in the cockpit bulkhead. As usual I have been filming parts of the deck joinery construction and will put it up on YouTube after everything is varnished.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorIan Smith, Boatbuilder (ret'd) Archives
January 2024
Categories |