While Googling about, I just pieced together that Thad is/was the Secretary of the Albert Strange Association, and was in fact the representative who vetted a young potential buyer of a historic boat called Tally Ho-none other than TH-cam's own Leo Goolden! Thad went up to Oregon a number of times to walk Leo through Tally Ho, discuss the restoration possibilities, and fill Leo in on the research that had been done, while Leo was deciding whether to purchase the vessel (for $1). Thad was of course also deciding whether to entrust Leo with that historic vessel, which seems to have worked out for the best.
The beauty and inspiration of watching these builds, restorations and refits of traditional style ships is watching young artisans learn from the older established artisans and the respect they show them. It is also the willingness of the artisans to pass along their knowledge to those they see as the new caretakers of the craft.
Very nice work on the deck beams gentlemen and very nice production quality in the video. Arabella is coming along beautifully. Thanks for this week's video, take care and stay well.
Dear Steve & Alex, I have been with you guys in ( in spirt ) from the very beginning watching ( up to the latest episode so far )fascinated by all the amazing work you have done & I’ve got to say your fortitude ,patience, skill & inventiveness has been a spellbinding watch. I have watched Alex develop his carpentry skills while coping with videoing & editing & marvelled at Steve’s forethought & inventiveness at dealing with setbacks like the glue not setting ( those clever light boxes ) Just to name one ( I love Steve’s laugh when it goes pear shaped ) On top of all that you contributed with typical American generosity from the boating community to the Costa Rica project , such a worthwhile project. I wish you all the very best of good fortune in your endeavours & I hope that you can carry on sharing your maritime adventures with us vicarious armchair adventurers. If you ever make to to little ‘ol Uk east coast like Yarmouth, I’ll buy you guys dinner !
Regarding the fore hatch location: it looks pretty tight up against the main mast. * Ideally you'll want to have room all around the mast to stand and work a halyard. At the very least enough so you can easily cross between hatch and mast from ps to sb. * The hatch hinges forward, for it to function as a passageway and not just ventilation I think you'll want more room to stand on deck. * If the hatch is open, the cover obstructs the way around forward. Don't leave yourself without a save, comfortable way to cross the deck when the hatch is open. While working the mast The hatch hinges forward, so between hatch and mast is where you end up when you go out that hatch.
👍 very good points. Building a sailboat and sailing one is a big difference. Haven't heard a word concerning a bowsprit either. They where used on serious open water (blue water) boats.
The reason the info on the plans and spec sheets is only shown once is that if you make a change you don't have to chase that change around the drawings and you aren't likely to have conflicting info from page to page
I'm sure you have already tried this but hitting a local marina (I'm sure they are not close) and walking around seeing other boats in the flesh and talking to the owners and stepping onto their decks getting a feel for how much room there is to work would be helpful. Very impressed with the progress and accomplishments you.ve made so far. Still a long way to go.
The form of a wooden boat is really a thing of beauty. Seeing Acorn to Arabella rise from the shed, step by step is both hypnotic and inspiring in equal measure. Loving what you're doing guys, thank you from the UK.
Arabella is going to be a museum piece! What beautiful craftsmanship. I'm thinking that you should make the cockpit as large as is practically possible. I have a 26' boat with a smallish cockpit and I always wish it were 2" wider...
Hey Steve - FABULOUS JOB YOU ARE DOING - On both the boat and your video channel. As a Bluewater Sailor with over 40k Ocean Miles and an Offshore Instructor...I would love to see you Rig Arabella as a Cutter...so much easier to "de.power" inboard and bring the center of effort closer to the center of lateral resistance. It's all about balance and a sea kindly feel; especially when laying down thousands of miles in a variety of sea conditions! Keep up the good work and I hope to visit before your launch date. I promise to come bearing gifts!! ;-)
Steve, Watching the difference between you and Satchel sitting in the cockpit was profound to me. You were present in the conversation. He was in his phone. I hope to be more like you. I am landlocked in Kansas but have loved watching this journey from “we don’t do beaches” central. Cheers.
In Satchel's defense...I think he pulled out his phone to look up the dingy/life boat Steve was describing. I think that...because it's exactly what I did at that moment. I could be wrong though.
I have been building boats for a lot of my 68 years on this planet. I wish I could jump on a plane and come help. A nice tender is great but I would also put on a life raft along with the tender. You never know when disaster strikes. An unsinkable tender still tide down to the deck will sink like the amount of lead ballast you have in your boat. Whale strikes, freighter ramming's and reef ramming's will sink a boat in seconds, not minutes. Have a secondary life raft. Have epoxy and boards to slap on in case of a puncture from an underwater object. I always carry a sea anchor in case of a tiller malfunction in a storm or hurricane. Looking wonderful, a dream project until you know the boat is too small and you build a bigger boat, LOL!!! Blessings and health to you your crews and families from northern Israel.
solid advice, dingy AND life raft. dingy is better light, cannot explain how many disadvantages for everyday use a heavy dingy has, that build sounds like weight is ramping up pretty quick, design your dingy, then talk to full time cruisers about it, soon find out if it is a good dink plan or has serious flaws.
There is something very satisfying about winding a screw home with a brace and bit also far more control than an impact driver. She is shaping up nicely Steve and I love the chats about the placement of the deck structure, it's just what I have done in the past and a few mock up's save regrets about placements in the future.
What an absolutely fun and deeply rewarding exercise to experience with your buddy! The imagination would be further stimulated, I feel, with the addition of at least one session of some unctuous weed of suitable excellence!
Some of the still shots from your guys videos are amazing, you should put together a big coffee table book to help fund the project, I'd buy one in a heartbeat 👍🏻
Not being a person who is blessed with Patience (WHAT??) I am very happy to see the deck beams put in-even if you will be taking them out and back in later. In my eye I can see the shape of the boat better.
Yes! This is a funny comment. I'm never going to build a boat. I probably won't even sail. I watch Steve (and Alix) because of his example of patience and delayed gratification!
@@frmoregon When the leaves turn red, i.e. yesterday! Given the backlog (based on Instagram photos, this video was shot in the beginning of September), it'll be a couple of weeks before we see him on camera, though hopefully he can return to narrating sooner than that.
👍👌👏 Very well done again! Thanks a lot for making teaching recording editing uploading and sharing. Best regards luck and health to all of you (including Akiva of course).
Hey Steve, I was intrigued by your idea sketches of a tender / life raft - maybe its quite feasible to strip build a hull off the boat - much like the blow moulded part of said plastic boat - and then foam the inside - to then finish the boat and put glass all around or basically start the strip building on top a app. shaped peace of foam thanks for letting us be part of your journey
Every sailor I've ever met has always wanted a lighter tender- easier to move on deck, easier to row, to haul on and off the beach, etc. Keep that in mind.
And it has to tow well, fit on the house and look good, which is something I cannot say about this Portland pudgee. It looks hideous and will distract from the beauty of Arabella. You can make beautiful tenders unsinkable too...
@@BabetteS beauty is a personal thing. A dinghy is a working boat- hauling groceries, water and diesel jerrycans, kedging muddy anchors, etc. A "wooden boat show" dinghy will not look that way for long. To me (very personal opinion) a "work-boat finish" has its own form of beauty on a dinghy.
@@paulheitkemper1559 I wasn't for a minute suggesting that a tender should be a "wooden boat show" dinghy. I do agree that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but I do believe the tender fit the yacht. From my point of view this PP does not fit that description by any stretch of the imagination. Besides, there is a lot more Arabella to be built before it's tender-time... Maybe the Arabella boys should write out a "design our tender" competition. I might even enter! ;-)
Easy to move on deck, easy rower, easy sailor and easy to fix while ugly/beat-up enough to still be there when You return to shore from the hike or beer-haul. That's not an easy task. That pudgy thingy excels any other tender I could come up with by far in the ugly-department though.
I owned a Tahiti Ketch. The Mizzen was stepped on a beam below the cockpit. The engine was below that. If you step the mizzen on the cockpit sole, it will only be supported by the standing rigging and be much weaker than the other way.
On the Mizzen, while I have not studied the plans with any great detail it looks to me as if Atkin (sp?) was using the two levels of beams as a cantilever so that the mizzen would be pushing at the top and pulling at the base when under load. This would take a lot of torsion off of the deck beams.
@@MyChannel-wg8ml Not really thinking of vertical load. A mast on a sailing ship is loaded horizontally when under sail, with wind pressure behind the sail and force coupled through the mast to the structure in order to provide movement. When a mast is mounted flush to the deck in a collar, the thrust from wind pressure causes the mast and mounting collar to rotate downward at the front of the collar while pulling upward at the rear. This causes a localized twisting force at the base of the mast which is transferred to the deck and/or supporting deck beams (hence, "torsion"). Back stays and braces are intended to relieve this pressure but all cables stretch under load, so not completely effective. Modern aluminum mast mountings accommodate the "twisting" under sail pressure by mounting the relatively lightweight aluminum masts onto a hinged plate that actually opens forward as wind pressure is applied. Wooden masts from older designs were "double-stepped" for this reason. By mounting the mast at two separate points with some distance between them the center of rotation moves to approximately halfway between the two mounting points Thus, the "twisting" force is split into a forward thrust at the upper mount point and a rear thrust at the lower mount point. It is true that "cantilever" is generally used for horizontal applications, but I could not think of an equivalent term when discussing vertical structures.
Hirakawa Dojo as a professional engineer, I immediately understood your comment. While the reply was valid, it was a prime example of spouting off information without know what the topic was. Good job at putting them in their place.
@@alexnelson8 It was not really a matter of "putting them in their place" so much as wanting to be clear. I have an engineering degree as well, but I have not used it much in the last 40-50 years. It turned out engineering was not my passion. As a young man I was very much into sailing and spent a number of years at sea, so things like this are buried in my head from long ago. The main mast on the plans is also "double-stepped"; with the lower end being anchored at the keel and the upper braced at the deck with that pair of nice heavy double deck beams Steve was sitting on. You cannot really anchor the mizzen to the keel though; that pesky engine is in the way ;)
@@MyChannel-wg8ml you have a point - as the mast is between two beams rather than on top of one, there will be torsional force taken by the two deck beams as a unit, but that will effectively be a downward force on one and an upward force on the other. I think the original point about the different deck levels still stands though, as it would add another bit of offset structure that can support that bending force from the mast.
I'm sat in a tent in a field in dorset uk & the wind is blowing 30mph 40mph gusts. Kayaking is out at the mo but acorn to arabella is in so all's good 👍.
The Portland Pudgy looks a good compromise between a ship's tender and a lifeboat. The sailing option would give you contingency in the event of a disaster meaning you have some ability of locomotion rather than drifting endlessly until a rescue eventuates! Good idea! Arabella proceeds apace.....!
Love the idea of an unsinkable closed-cell foam-core life boat/tender. Definitely with sail rig and oars. Maybe even a small electric motor with solor charging for the batteries if you want powered propulsion? A tent style shelter would be a wonderful addition for shade out on the open sea in a life boat situation. Maybe even some sort of desalination system if one exists in a small enough pakage to carry on a like boat? Would a "life straw" filter salt water to a drinkable state? Loving the progress on Arabella as well. The double beam adjustments look like some smart well thought out moves.
@@johnmiller8884 but some other water filters can. One cheapish filter can turn a can of root beer soda into pure water. Gotta replace the filter after that can, though. I forget the specific brand, was really common 20+ years ago.
Now Arabella is looking like a boat! What you are describing as a 'lifeboat' is a Boston Whaler. Two skins filled with foam, unsinkable even if cut in half, or filled with water and twice the stated passenger capacity. I have a Super Sport 15.
SV Seeker recently did a video showing all types of foam, it might help with questions about foam or email him. Great boat and you guys are doing a awesome job!
We bought a t-shirt with that printed on it for the new XO. We (the Ship's Office) also gave him a framed quote from Henry Ford about having the right people for the job and getting out of their way.
You can open up the foredeck a lot by getting rid of the sampson post and going to a couple of large cleats. Not as traditional, but more functional. You have plenty of structure to bolt them to. As far as a lifeboat/tender goes why not cold mold one. A cold molded hull will be as strong as a strip built hull and it will be much lighter. Also there is no reason not to step the mizzen or both masts on deck. Deck stepped spars need either a compression post or some sort of support below the deck. If you want a more open space below a ring frame or two can replace a compression post. My ketch has deck stepped masts and it has been sailing for 47 years that way with no issues. One consideration for the locations of the aft face of the house and the mizzen is the location of the companionway. You want to leave 18" or so between the aft end of the house and the mizzen if you have a centerline companionway or you need to be contortionist to use the companionway. That issue goes away if the companionway is off the centerline enough.
I have the old Stanley compass plane, and a record 120, and I've found they work better if the sole is removed and reshaped similarly to a Japanese wood body plane, to focus the pressure on the wood at the mouth edge in front of the blade. The Record was way out, hadn't been used much. the Stanley was not so bad, but needed some love. Instead of scraping like a wood bodied plane, I used a crosspeen hammer and anvil as you might to straighten a saw blade, only give the two spring steel pieces a little hollow stem to stern, but straight side to side. then stone the frog to follow. But I wish I had had the motorized Makita compass plane at times. Very handy tool for bringing out the beauty of wood and a pleasure to use when tuned.
For the past few months, work has been done, steadily. That, close, camera work, shows off all the varnishing, rivet, extreme angle sawing and the wood grain. We daydream, to see Her, sailing to meet other full keel boats, as Pretty as She is, inside and out.
It might seem to early to be thinking about cabin lights, but if you want to conceal the cables to the fittings, have a thought as where you want lights and where the wires might run.
A light weight dingy will be appreciated every day. An over built, heavy dingy will cause endless misery. Everything is a compromise. On our 40' wood boat, we ended up using an inflatable when cruising because it was so easy to handle, deflated it stored below decks and it didn't chip paint bashing into the hull when boarding in a heavy sea. The nice thing is that you can change dingys any time you want, you don't have to make a final decision.
Agree with previous post Be careful moving the forward hatch aft you will spend more time working on the mast than the windless and quit often you need to stand in front of the mast especially in rough weather. Plus the further forward the hatch the better the ventilation
@ Steve Acorn To Arabella Perhaps as you were talking about making the boat unsinkable you could put a few layers of 2.5mm or less Corflute between the hull & inner hull with 2mm gap between each sheet of Corflute. Within the 3 layers of Corflute you could could put Part A & Part B liquid closed cell foam in the gap between sheets which if say a ship or whale breaches the outer hull along with 2 layers of Corflute then both Part A & Part B of the closed cell foam liquid come together to seal up the breach. At the moment of a breach you could use two of those CO2 cartridges from a life vest to force air into the section of the breach at the top which would force both Part A & Part B to go to the breach & seal up the breach immediately. You would only need to make rectangle sections of Corflute below & just above the waterline that were 2mm gap filled with the Part A & Part B closed cell foam so that expansion would happen at the breach rather than within the wall. Having closed off sections of these vertical Corflute sheets sandwiched together with a fine layer of 2 part closed cell foam liquid would act as a safety barrier around the whole ship from under the waterline to above the waterline.
They are very useful. And most people don't really consider it, but it fulfills the role of a regular plane just fine. THE only caveat being that you need a good surface to calibrate it on and have stepped shims to raise however much you want to take off (because of how the design is made, some have monoblocks, like the one above, some are floating blocks, where the step raises and adjusts completely separate from the handle). I have 2 regulars sized ones, one normal from Hitachi, and a convex/concave one from Makita. And i really don't go for the normal one. At first i did, then this old guy that made doors for our restoration projects hinted me that if i keep a flat plate to adjust plane and shim plates for the step, i'll never need another plane. And i just use the Makita, because it works really well and i have 3 tools in one.
Did you hear about Arabella's maiden voyage? She hit a rock off the coast of Nova Scotia. The Coast Guard had to dispatch a survey team to correct the charts to show where the rock now sits.
21:07 The comments reminded me of something I read that was said of Knox-Johnston's Suhaili. Approximately: "Should she strike land on her return I would fear for England". (A web search has not turned it up, so I might not have it exact, nor the attribution)
I love the idea of the pudgy. One if you do need it your just not at float waiting for help you actually have a chance to get to land. My question is how sturdy is it.
I just found my grandfather's bit and brace the other day. I need to get some bits for it, but I look forward to not working with it nearly as hard as you are. :)
*I always found a Bit Brace to be faster, with more finesse and more power to get things just right, too. It just is that way. Besides, it feels so much better. It gives all craftsman a feel, a sensory/tactile connection to the wood. You can feel what the wood's grain is tell you through the bolts or screw. And it just sounds so much better with its click click in the ratchet latching mechanism. Old, well used ones are smoother feeling and sounding, because of the wear. | Music to my ears, that is for sure.*
Really enjoyed the discussion at the end. Seeing how the build progresses from week to week is awesome. But hearing how the decisions are made, the back and forth discussions. Well,... that's more awesomer.
put the power cord over your shoulder instead of tripping over it and rubbing it on the work piece keeps it out of the way and you know where it is if it snags and 3:30 you don't need 2nd hand to hold it and great video as usual
Yea, the topic of a design rendering and specification is always an interesting one. So often the specification diverges from the design simply because the designer/builder has a client with particular demands. It’s like a fork in software development. And then there’s the final product that has even more changes. So I guess the lesson is, the design rendering is really the dream of the designer and the specification is where the dream meets reality.
18:34 Steve, all those special-angle offcuts are documentable part of Arabella. As such they really ought to be up for sale. I'd give body parts to have a small piece of your boat sitting on my mantle. Or maybe I'd give a chunk of money - I need to keep all the body parts I have left. Just a thought. Gives me something to dream about, gives you some much-needed funds.
Experience has shown me that the cockpit well needs to be as deep as possible (with great BIG scuppers) while the engine compartment needs as much headroom as possible, easy to say, tough to do. Ventilation in the engine compartment is VITAL to a happy engine and a happy crew.
My sail dingy is foam and cedar. You use cedar stringers with foam between them. Ie foam cedar ,foam cedar repeatedly round the hull and glass each side, strong light etc.
When you talk about the 'samson post' is that the same thing we west-coasters mean when we say the 'king post?' Stout and supported enough that a windlass or cleat there can be used to tow the boat, good for mounting a winch, preferred attachment point for a traction kite if you lose your masts, etc?
I remember reading something about keel stepping gives you a free spreader, i.e. it stiffens your mast overall, imagine holding a 20' pole just at the end vs holding a pole at the end and 2' from the end.
Bonjour Stephen I follow your amazing project for a xhile, and more and more I have a question, seeing walking in the boat with the deck beams (I am just a simple model boat builder and do not visualize the scale of your plan with your hull) : what will be the headroom? Will you be able to stand up in the cabin ? Amicalement, Raphaël
Not unsinkable. Remember we shipwriights learned not to say that after Lord Pirrie of Harland and Wolf the belfast shipyard. Love that all the effort is paying off .
Read about Shackleton’s journey from Antarctica to South Georgia Island in a cobbled together boat. Never lost a man on the journey and was able to go back and rescue the rest of the crew. Didn’t lose a man.
I was thinking and I know it’s in the past but I’ll share it anyway… I think if I was trying to figure out where to put the hatch and deckhouse I would use an open space and dump some lumps of wood in the ground, saw them up and knock them together into rough sized hatch and deckhouse shapes and position them all as if in the deck. Then place the windlass and another lump to repres t the Sampson post and try and position yourself doing some tasks?
I know the floating dry dock your friend was talking about. I used to work on that very same dry dock in 2005 it's the biggest in north america named the TITAN came from BAE Systems ship builders in VA. aka was Norfolk ship builders.
Just noticed the engine called for in the plans is a Red Wing Marine one, good taste on the part of Atkin, if a bit of a demonstration as to the age of the plans.
At 10:00, you ask, "Why not just stick the mast on the deck?". to me, that implied that the mast will be attached to only one level of structure. I don't see how that would provide substantial resistance to the mast being rotated around it's base (unless it is kept upright by rigging). If it is held upright by rigging, I would still think that you need two levels of restraint to hold the mast when the ship is being rigged, so that a stiff breeze during the rigging work does not lay the mast across the gunwales.
I know it's a bit late but did think about building the interior of the boat before the deck beams are secured? Modern boat have as much as possible built in the workshop and placed in the boat before the desk is installed. The only reason not to build before the deck beams are secured is you haven't got the final hull shape. The units can be made with an extra 3 inches that can be scribed into the hull, later.
That works better for molded production fiberglass boats than for one-off builds. Large modern boats have the interiors added after the hull is complete. Check out Trinity Yachts.
Good, so long as you have two deck beams, between the mast and the hatches/house opening, you should be good. Hopefully someone with more knowledge will chime in and backstop me. A friend many years ago built this boat in wood strip epoxy. Unfortunately he went with solid wood masts. After the first real blow, he went with aluminum. Go figure. Best wishes, stay safe
Looking good! But pls explain again why you shaved down the thicknesses of some frames at the bow and stern locations? Would it have been better to just made notches in the shelves there?
Okay. I fell asleep watching last night. Sorry. But who is Thad?? He looks like the kind of man you could sit down and talk with for a couple years. What’s his story? Where is he from? Planning out the deck is such exciting content! Man this just keeps getting better and better with every episode. LOVING IT! Man Alix is missing out big time IMO.
While Googling about, I just pieced together that Thad is/was the Secretary of the Albert Strange Association, and was in fact the representative who vetted a young potential buyer of a historic boat called Tally Ho-none other than TH-cam's own Leo Goolden! Thad went up to Oregon a number of times to walk Leo through Tally Ho, discuss the restoration possibilities, and fill Leo in on the research that had been done, while Leo was deciding whether to purchase the vessel (for $1). Thad was of course also deciding whether to entrust Leo with that historic vessel, which seems to have worked out for the best.
That's really cool, thank you for looking into that for everyone.
The beauty and inspiration of watching these builds, restorations and refits of traditional style ships is watching young artisans learn from the older established artisans and the respect they show them. It is also the willingness of the artisans to pass along their knowledge to those they see as the new caretakers of the craft.
Thad is just so quietly comfortable with his skills. He knows it all, but doesn’t bowl over you with it. Such a nice man!
elizabeth koch
But you will still find know it alls in the comments saying he did this or that wrong
thad is the coolest alright, talks just enough to let you know he is listening and supportive of your ideas . . .
So amazing to see the deck beams start to define the final shape of Arabella! She has beautiful lines.
Very nice work on the deck beams gentlemen and very nice production quality in the video. Arabella is coming along beautifully. Thanks for this week's video, take care and stay well.
Dear Steve & Alex, I have been with you guys in ( in spirt ) from the very beginning watching ( up to the latest episode so far )fascinated by all the amazing work you have done & I’ve got to say your fortitude ,patience, skill & inventiveness has been a spellbinding watch. I have watched Alex develop his carpentry skills while coping with videoing & editing & marvelled at Steve’s forethought & inventiveness at dealing with setbacks like the glue not setting ( those clever light boxes ) Just to name one ( I love Steve’s laugh when it goes pear shaped ) On top of all that you contributed with typical American generosity from the boating community to the Costa Rica project , such a worthwhile project. I wish you all the very best of good fortune in your endeavours & I hope that you can carry on sharing your maritime adventures with us vicarious armchair adventurers. If you ever make to to little ‘ol Uk east coast like Yarmouth, I’ll buy you guys dinner !
What a beautiful yacht.....the progress is stunning....watching a CLASSIC yacht being built....warms my plywood and fiberglass "tiny" boats
Regarding the fore hatch location: it looks pretty tight up against the main mast.
* Ideally you'll want to have room all around the mast to stand and work a halyard. At the very least enough so you can easily cross between hatch and mast from ps to sb.
* The hatch hinges forward, for it to function as a passageway and not just ventilation I think you'll want more room to stand on deck.
* If the hatch is open, the cover obstructs the way around forward. Don't leave yourself without a save, comfortable way to cross the deck when the hatch is open.
While working the mast The hatch hinges forward, so between hatch and mast is where you end up when you go out that hatch.
👍 very good points. Building a sailboat and sailing one is a big difference. Haven't heard a word concerning a bowsprit either. They where used on serious open water (blue water) boats.
The reason the info on the plans and spec sheets is only shown once is that if you make a change you don't have to chase that change around the drawings and you aren't likely to have conflicting info from page to page
I'm sure you have already tried this but hitting a local marina (I'm sure they are not close) and walking around seeing other boats in the flesh and talking to the owners and stepping onto their decks getting a feel for how much room there is to work would be helpful. Very impressed with the progress and accomplishments you.ve made so far. Still a long way to go.
The form of a wooden boat is really a thing of beauty. Seeing Acorn to Arabella rise from the shed, step by step is both hypnotic and inspiring in equal measure. Loving what you're doing guys, thank you from the UK.
The craftsmanship is awe inspiring.
'Oar' inspiring?
Love that autumnal light, beautiful workmanship as ever.
Great job and thanks for showing the difficulties in building a boat from scratch
Arabella is going to be a museum piece! What beautiful craftsmanship. I'm thinking that you should make the cockpit as large as is practically possible. I have a 26' boat with a smallish cockpit and I always wish it were 2" wider...
I enjoyed watching the brainstorming. Thanks for showing that.
Man this project has come so far, I remember watching you guys work on the keel so long back. Now it has deckbeams. Wild.
The tender/life raft idea is super interesting! I have so many ideas now.
It's looking more and more like a boat every time you post. Progress is amazing.
So nice to see father and son happily working together on a great project.
Thad Danielson is not related to Steve. You might be thinking of Grandpa?
@@AcornToArabella Ah my bad. Still seems like a great working relationship.
Looks great with the beams. I cannot wait to see the cabin tops in place.
Hey Steve - FABULOUS JOB YOU ARE DOING - On both the boat and your video channel. As a Bluewater Sailor with over 40k Ocean Miles and an Offshore Instructor...I would love to see you Rig Arabella as a Cutter...so much easier to "de.power" inboard and bring the center of effort closer to the center of lateral resistance. It's all about balance and a sea kindly feel; especially when laying down thousands of miles in a variety of sea conditions! Keep up the good work and I hope to visit before your launch date. I promise to come bearing gifts!! ;-)
Steve,
Watching the difference between you and Satchel sitting in the cockpit was profound to me. You were present in the conversation. He was in his phone. I hope to be more like you. I am landlocked in Kansas but have loved watching this journey from “we don’t do beaches” central.
Cheers.
In Satchel's defense...I think he pulled out his phone to look up the dingy/life boat Steve was describing. I think that...because it's exactly what I did at that moment. I could be wrong though.
I have been building boats for a lot of my 68 years on this planet. I wish I could jump on a plane and come help. A nice tender is great but I would also put on a life raft along with the tender. You never know when disaster strikes. An unsinkable tender still tide down to the deck will sink like the amount of lead ballast you have in your boat. Whale strikes, freighter ramming's and reef ramming's will sink a boat in seconds, not minutes. Have a secondary life raft. Have epoxy and boards to slap on in case of a puncture from an underwater object. I always carry a sea anchor in case of a tiller malfunction in a storm or hurricane. Looking wonderful, a dream project until you know the boat is too small and you build a bigger boat, LOL!!! Blessings and health to you your crews and families from northern Israel.
And a Rescue Sling!
It's starting to look really small with those deck beams in place.
@@Majoofi I thought so too, but it may just be the (relatively) wide-angle lens of the camera.
solid advice, dingy AND life raft. dingy is better light, cannot explain how many disadvantages for everyday use a heavy dingy has, that build sounds like weight is ramping up pretty quick, design your dingy, then talk to full time cruisers about it, soon find out if it is a good dink plan or has serious flaws.
I thought they said they planned on building a dingy with Victoria’s wood.
Watching you guys building Arabella is so rewarding. Can't wait to see you progress even more!
There is something very satisfying about winding a screw home with a brace and bit also far more control than an impact driver. She is shaping up nicely Steve and I love the chats about the placement of the deck structure, it's just what I have done in the past and a few mock up's save regrets about placements in the future.
When my electric (corded) drill broke I broke out my eggbeater and brace. Haven't looked back!
Thanks for posting and sharing. Interesting to 👀 &👂the decision making process.
What an absolutely fun and deeply rewarding exercise to experience with your buddy! The imagination would be further stimulated, I feel, with the addition of at least one session of some unctuous weed of suitable excellence!
Some of the still shots from your guys videos are amazing, you should put together a big coffee table book to help fund the project, I'd buy one in a heartbeat 👍🏻
Haven’t watched in almost a year. Great stuff. Looks great gents !
I'm loving the real human aspect to the planning
I liked the human planing bit.
Thad mvp.
I love his demeanor. So kind
Not being a person who is blessed with Patience (WHAT??) I am very happy to see the deck beams put in-even if you will be taking them out and back in later. In my eye I can see the shape of the boat better.
Yes! This is a funny comment. I'm never going to build a boat. I probably won't even sail. I watch Steve (and Alix) because of his example of patience and delayed gratification!
Stepping up the game with a bit of B-roll and pulling some focus, nice!! Project is looking good!
It is legit starting to look like a boat, to someone like me who has never been on a sailboat. Its amazing.
I love the discussion about the drawings (10:12).
cant wait to see alix's face when he gets back :D
amazing episodes as always, discovered you just last week have been religiously watching.
When is Alix do back?
@@frmoregon When the leaves turn red, i.e. yesterday! Given the backlog (based on Instagram photos, this video was shot in the beginning of September), it'll be a couple of weeks before we see him on camera, though hopefully he can return to narrating sooner than that.
👍👌👏 Very well done again!
Thanks a lot for making teaching recording editing uploading and sharing.
Best regards luck and health to all of you (including Akiva of course).
Hey Steve,
I was intrigued by your idea sketches of a tender / life raft - maybe its quite feasible to strip build a hull off the boat - much like the blow moulded part of said plastic boat - and then foam the inside - to then finish the boat and put glass all around
or basically start the strip building on top a app. shaped peace of foam
thanks for letting us be part of your journey
Every sailor I've ever met has always wanted a lighter tender- easier to move on deck, easier to row, to haul on and off the beach, etc. Keep that in mind.
And it has to tow well, fit on the house and look good, which is something I cannot say about this Portland pudgee. It looks hideous and will distract from the beauty of Arabella. You can make beautiful tenders unsinkable too...
@@BabetteS beauty is a personal thing. A dinghy is a working boat- hauling groceries, water and diesel jerrycans, kedging muddy anchors, etc. A "wooden boat show" dinghy will not look that way for long. To me (very personal opinion) a "work-boat finish" has its own form of beauty on a dinghy.
@@paulheitkemper1559 I wasn't for a minute suggesting that a tender should be a "wooden boat show" dinghy. I do agree that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but I do believe the tender fit the yacht. From my point of view this PP does not fit that description by any stretch of the imagination. Besides, there is a lot more Arabella to be built before it's tender-time... Maybe the Arabella boys should write out a "design our tender" competition. I might even enter! ;-)
@@BabetteS Now that's an interesting idea.
Easy to move on deck, easy rower, easy sailor and easy to fix while ugly/beat-up enough to still be there when You return to shore from the hike or beer-haul. That's not an easy task. That pudgy thingy excels any other tender I could come up with by far in the ugly-department though.
Badass? More like THADASS! :D That guy is awesome.
Man, this is looking superb.
I owned a Tahiti Ketch. The Mizzen was stepped on a beam below the cockpit. The engine was below that. If you step the mizzen on the cockpit sole, it will only be supported by the standing rigging and be much weaker than the other way.
That plane is quite impressive. Just looking, I am guessing there is a significant learning curve.
I see what you did there. 😄
On the Mizzen, while I have not studied the plans with any great detail it looks to me as if Atkin (sp?) was using the two levels of beams as a cantilever so that the mizzen would be pushing at the top and pulling at the base when under load. This would take a lot of torsion off of the deck beams.
@@MyChannel-wg8ml he was talking about forward and backward loading on the beam not the side to side loading
@@MyChannel-wg8ml Not really thinking of vertical load. A mast on a sailing ship is loaded horizontally when under sail, with wind pressure behind the sail and force coupled through the mast to the structure in order to provide movement.
When a mast is mounted flush to the deck in a collar, the thrust from wind pressure causes the mast and mounting collar to rotate downward at the front of the collar while pulling upward at the rear. This causes a localized twisting force at the base of the mast which is transferred to the deck and/or supporting deck beams (hence, "torsion").
Back stays and braces are intended to relieve this pressure but all cables stretch under load, so not completely effective. Modern aluminum mast mountings accommodate the "twisting" under sail pressure by mounting the relatively lightweight aluminum masts onto a hinged plate that actually opens forward as wind pressure is applied. Wooden masts from older designs were "double-stepped" for this reason.
By mounting the mast at two separate points with some distance between them the center of rotation moves to approximately halfway between the two mounting points Thus, the "twisting" force is split into a forward thrust at the upper mount point and a rear thrust at the lower mount point.
It is true that "cantilever" is generally used for horizontal applications, but I could not think of an equivalent term when discussing vertical structures.
Hirakawa Dojo as a professional engineer, I immediately understood your comment. While the reply was valid, it was a prime example of spouting off information without know what the topic was. Good job at putting them in their place.
@@alexnelson8 It was not really a matter of "putting them in their place" so much as wanting to be clear. I have an engineering degree as well, but I have not used it much in the last 40-50 years. It turned out engineering was not my passion. As a young man I was very much into sailing and spent a number of years at sea, so things like this are buried in my head from long ago.
The main mast on the plans is also "double-stepped"; with the lower end being anchored at the keel and the upper braced at the deck with that pair of nice heavy double deck beams Steve was sitting on. You cannot really anchor the mizzen to the keel though; that pesky engine is in the way ;)
@@MyChannel-wg8ml you have a point - as the mast is between two beams rather than on top of one, there will be torsional force taken by the two deck beams as a unit, but that will effectively be a downward force on one and an upward force on the other. I think the original point about the different deck levels still stands though, as it would add another bit of offset structure that can support that bending force from the mast.
I'm sat in a tent in a field in dorset uk & the wind is blowing 30mph 40mph gusts. Kayaking is out at the mo but acorn to arabella is in so all's good 👍.
Why on earth would you want to be in a tent in Dorset instead of a nice B&B with a fire and pint in your hand. ?
@@billhamilton2366 I asked myself that same question bill.👍
@@bish1121 because pubs kick out at 10pm and tents don't.
Excellent work
The Portland Pudgy looks a good compromise between a ship's tender and a lifeboat. The sailing option would give you contingency in the event of a disaster meaning you have some ability of locomotion rather than drifting endlessly until a rescue eventuates! Good idea! Arabella proceeds apace.....!
Love the idea of an unsinkable closed-cell foam-core life boat/tender. Definitely with sail rig and oars. Maybe even a small electric motor with solor charging for the batteries if you want powered propulsion? A tent style shelter would be a wonderful addition for shade out on the open sea in a life boat situation. Maybe even some sort of desalination system if one exists in a small enough pakage to carry on a like boat? Would a "life straw" filter salt water to a drinkable state? Loving the progress on Arabella as well. The double beam adjustments look like some smart well thought out moves.
A life-straw cannot filter dissolved minerals like salt.
@@johnmiller8884 but some other water filters can.
One cheapish filter can turn a can of root beer soda into pure water. Gotta replace the filter after that can, though. I forget the specific brand, was really common 20+ years ago.
Another great video. Thank you
Now Arabella is looking like a boat! What you are describing as a 'lifeboat' is a Boston Whaler. Two skins filled with foam, unsinkable even if cut in half, or filled with water and twice the stated passenger capacity. I have a Super Sport 15.
SV Seeker recently did a video showing all types of foam, it might help with questions about foam or email him. Great boat and you guys are doing a awesome job!
Just today I took the time to read "the beating will continue until morale improves" kkkk this is really the way at sea!
Looks like Captain Bligh will be the skipper, so you'll need that life raft.
@@keithbrowning3899 a good sturdy plank.
@@keithbrowning3899 Captain Bligh would be preferable to Wolf Larsen.
We bought a t-shirt with that printed on it for the new XO. We (the Ship's Office) also gave him a framed quote from Henry Ford about having the right people for the job and getting out of their way.
You can open up the foredeck a lot by getting rid of the sampson post and going to a couple of large cleats. Not as traditional, but more functional. You have plenty of structure to bolt them to.
As far as a lifeboat/tender goes why not cold mold one. A cold molded hull will be as strong as a strip built hull and it will be much lighter.
Also there is no reason not to step the mizzen or both masts on deck. Deck stepped spars need either a compression post or some sort of support below the deck. If you want a more open space below a ring frame or two can replace a compression post. My ketch has deck stepped masts and it has been sailing for 47 years that way with no issues. One consideration for the locations of the aft face of the house and the mizzen is the location of the companionway. You want to leave 18" or so between the aft end of the house and the mizzen if you have a centerline companionway or you need to be contortionist to use the companionway. That issue goes away if the companionway is off the centerline enough.
what a transformation by just removing the bracing and putting on a few deck beams.
I have the old Stanley compass plane, and a record 120, and I've found they work better if the sole is removed and reshaped similarly to a Japanese wood body plane, to focus the pressure on the wood at the mouth edge in front of the blade. The Record was way out, hadn't been used much. the Stanley was not so bad, but needed some love. Instead of scraping like a wood bodied plane, I used a crosspeen hammer and anvil as you might to straighten a saw blade, only give the two spring steel pieces a little hollow stem to stern, but straight side to side. then stone the frog to follow. But I wish I had had the motorized Makita compass plane at times. Very handy tool for bringing out the beauty of wood and a pleasure to use when tuned.
For the past few months, work has been done, steadily. That, close, camera work, shows off all the varnishing, rivet, extreme angle sawing and the wood grain. We daydream, to see Her, sailing to meet other full keel boats, as Pretty as She is, inside and out.
Avid fan by the way - big love - inspirational
Awesome as always.
It might seem to early to be thinking about cabin lights, but if you want to conceal the cables to the fittings, have a thought as where you want lights and where the wires might run.
#vanlife
A light weight dingy will be appreciated every day. An over built, heavy dingy will cause endless misery. Everything is a compromise. On our 40' wood boat, we ended up using an inflatable when cruising because it was so easy to handle, deflated it stored below decks and it didn't chip paint bashing into the hull when boarding in a heavy sea. The nice thing is that you can change dingys any time you want, you don't have to make a final decision.
Agree with previous post Be careful moving the forward hatch aft you will spend more time working on the mast than the windless and quit often you need to stand in front of the mast especially in rough weather. Plus the further forward the hatch the better the ventilation
Regarding the brace and bit; to me its biggest advantage in a case like yours is that you can feel how snug the screw is.
Looking good 👍👍hi from Australia 🇦🇺
@ Steve Acorn To Arabella
Perhaps as you were talking about making the boat unsinkable you could put a few layers of 2.5mm or less Corflute between the hull & inner hull with 2mm gap between each sheet of Corflute. Within the 3 layers of Corflute you could could put Part A & Part B liquid closed cell foam in the gap between sheets which if say a ship or whale breaches the outer hull along with 2 layers of Corflute then both Part A & Part B of the closed cell foam liquid come together to seal up the breach. At the moment of a breach you could use two of those CO2 cartridges from a life vest to force air into the section of the breach at the top which would force both Part A & Part B to go to the breach & seal up the breach immediately. You would only need to make rectangle sections of Corflute below & just above the waterline that were 2mm gap filled with the Part A & Part B closed cell foam so that expansion would happen at the breach rather than within the wall. Having closed off sections of these vertical Corflute sheets sandwiched together with a fine layer of 2 part closed cell foam liquid would act as a safety barrier around the whole ship from under the waterline to above the waterline.
Hey Steve, You need to put that power planer on your Christmas list.
They are very useful. And most people don't really consider it, but it fulfills the role of a regular plane just fine. THE only caveat being that you need a good surface to calibrate it on and have stepped shims to raise however much you want to take off (because of how the design is made, some have monoblocks, like the one above, some are floating blocks, where the step raises and adjusts completely separate from the handle).
I have 2 regulars sized ones, one normal from Hitachi, and a convex/concave one from Makita. And i really don't go for the normal one. At first i did, then this old guy that made doors for our restoration projects hinted me that if i keep a flat plate to adjust plane and shim plates for the step, i'll never need another plane. And i just use the Makita, because it works really well and i have 3 tools in one.
Did you hear about Arabella's maiden voyage? She hit a rock off the coast of Nova Scotia. The Coast Guard had to dispatch a survey team to correct the charts to show where the rock now sits.
and change the chart to show the bottom composition as "gravel".
... and were the lead sits in too shollow of water
21:07 The comments reminded me of something I read that was said of Knox-Johnston's Suhaili. Approximately: "Should she strike land on her return I would fear for England". (A web search has not turned it up, so I might not have it exact, nor the attribution)
Did you know Suhaili is an Atkin Eric and the little sister to the Ingrid (our Arabella)?
I love the idea of the pudgy. One if you do need it your just not at float waiting for help you actually have a chance to get to land. My question is how sturdy is it.
"You don't need a floor". Hahahahaha. Thanks. I needed that.
I am just a landlubber but the tender/lifeboat idea is interesting and seems to make sense, I assume would save a lot of space onboard Arabella.
I just found my grandfather's bit and brace the other day. I need to get some bits for it, but I look forward to not working with it nearly as hard as you are. :)
*I always found a Bit Brace to be faster, with more finesse and more power to get things just right, too. It just is that way. Besides, it feels so much better. It gives all craftsman a feel, a sensory/tactile connection to the wood. You can feel what the wood's grain is tell you through the bolts or screw. And it just sounds so much better with its click click in the ratchet latching mechanism. Old, well used ones are smoother feeling and sounding, because of the wear. | Music to my ears, that is for sure.*
Really enjoyed the discussion at the end. Seeing how the build progresses from week to week is awesome. But hearing how the decisions are made, the back and forth discussions. Well,... that's more awesomer.
put the power cord over your shoulder instead of tripping over it and rubbing it on the work piece keeps it out of the way and you know where it is if it snags and 3:30 you don't need 2nd hand to hold it and great video as usual
Yea, the topic of a design rendering and specification is always an interesting one. So often the specification diverges from the design simply because the designer/builder has a client with particular demands. It’s like a fork in software development. And then there’s the final product that has even more changes. So I guess the lesson is, the design rendering is really the dream of the designer and the specification is where the dream meets reality.
18:34 Steve, all those special-angle offcuts are documentable part of Arabella. As such they really ought to be up for sale. I'd give body parts to have a small piece of your boat sitting on my mantle. Or maybe I'd give a chunk of money - I need to keep all the body parts I have left.
Just a thought. Gives me something to dream about, gives you some much-needed funds.
Experience has shown me that the cockpit well needs to be as deep as possible (with great BIG scuppers) while the engine compartment needs as much headroom as possible, easy to say, tough to do. Ventilation in the engine compartment is VITAL to a happy engine and a happy crew.
I’d love to know more about that foam you mentioned building the lifeboat from, thanks
Probably just basic styrofoam. Not that crappy bead board stuff, the blue or pink extruded foam you can buy in a home improvement store.
Thanks music much better this week!
My sail dingy is foam and cedar. You use cedar stringers with foam between them. Ie foam cedar ,foam cedar repeatedly round the hull and glass each side, strong light etc.
When you talk about the 'samson post' is that the same thing we west-coasters mean when we say the 'king post?' Stout and supported enough that a windlass or cleat there can be used to tow the boat, good for mounting a winch, preferred attachment point for a traction kite if you lose your masts, etc?
It's Sampson, like the biblical figure. And yes.
I remember reading something about keel stepping gives you a free spreader, i.e. it stiffens your mast overall, imagine holding a 20' pole just at the end vs holding a pole at the end and 2' from the end.
If i were in the US, man id help you full time!
The boat is looking awesome. My question is ,Do you know how to sail?
He has never been on a moving sailboat before but I believe he is gonna learn quickly
Bonjour Stephen
I follow your amazing project for a xhile, and more and more I have a question, seeing walking in the boat with the deck beams (I am just a simple model boat builder and do not visualize the scale of your plan with your hull) : what will be the headroom? Will you be able to stand up in the cabin ?
Amicalement, Raphaël
The deck house will stand a good 30cm above the beams, and personally I would make it more like 45cm taller for more headroom.
Not unsinkable. Remember we shipwriights learned not to say that after Lord Pirrie of Harland and Wolf the belfast shipyard. Love that all the effort is paying off .
Only today I noticed that despite being clean-shaven, your dad has lots of hair too - in a tail! Great dude!
Thad Danielson is a great guy, but not Steve’s dad.
Does everyone in that part of the world have weird hair?
Acorn To Arabella Oooooh. My mishear! And it explains why he did not quite look as I had remembered him! 🤦🏼♂️
MikeAG333 What’s weird about a beard or a ponytail?
yeah can't blame you for mishearing "Thad" as "Dad"
Read about Shackleton’s journey from Antarctica to South Georgia Island in a cobbled together boat.
Never lost a man on the journey and was able to go back and rescue the rest of the crew.
Didn’t lose a man.
Luck.
@@mysterymete Quite a bit of it was IMO. I still admire Shackleton and his spirit.
I was thinking and I know it’s in the past but I’ll share it anyway… I think if I was trying to figure out where to put the hatch and deckhouse I would use an open space and dump some lumps of wood in the ground, saw them up and knock them together into rough sized hatch and deckhouse shapes and position them all as if in the deck. Then place the windlass and another lump to repres t the Sampson post and try and position yourself doing some tasks?
I know the floating dry dock your friend was talking about. I used to work on that very same dry dock in 2005 it's the biggest in north america named the TITAN came from BAE Systems ship builders in VA. aka was Norfolk ship builders.
Just noticed the engine called for in the plans is a Red Wing Marine one, good taste on the part of Atkin, if a bit of a demonstration as to the age of the plans.
At 10:00, you ask, "Why not just stick the mast on the deck?". to me, that implied that the mast will be attached to only one level of structure. I don't see how that would provide substantial resistance to the mast being rotated around it's base (unless it is kept upright by rigging). If it is held upright by rigging, I would still think that you need two levels of restraint to hold the mast when the ship is being rigged, so that a stiff breeze during the rigging work does not lay the mast across the gunwales.
LOVING THE WORKMANSHIP...
I know it's a bit late but did think about building the interior of the boat before the deck beams are secured? Modern boat have as much as possible built in the workshop and placed in the boat before the desk is installed. The only reason not to build before the deck beams are secured is you haven't got the final hull shape. The units can be made with an extra 3 inches that can be scribed into the hull, later.
That works better for molded production fiberglass boats than for one-off builds. Large modern boats have the interiors added after the hull is complete. Check out Trinity Yachts.
Good, so long as you have two deck beams, between the mast and the hatches/house opening, you should be good. Hopefully someone with more knowledge will chime in and backstop me.
A friend many years ago built this boat in wood strip epoxy. Unfortunately he went with solid wood masts. After the first real blow, he went with aluminum. Go figure.
Best wishes, stay safe
hi boat is looking very good i like it
Looking good! But pls explain again why you shaved down the thicknesses of some frames at the bow and stern locations? Would it have been better to just made notches in the shelves there?
Okay. I fell asleep watching last night. Sorry. But who is Thad?? He looks like the kind of man you could sit down and talk with for a couple years. What’s his story? Where is he from? Planning out the deck is such exciting content! Man this just keeps getting better and better with every episode. LOVING IT! Man Alix is missing out big time IMO.
Thad is one of those souls that will leave us too soon, or live forever. But we won't know until it happens.