Experimenting

I've pretty much gotten my working area ready to go with the build. There are a few items still to iron out, like where my epoxy station will be. I did try a few practice items. First, I made an 8:1 scarf using some scrap pieces of wood. I got it made using saws and belt sander but I think I'm going to invest in a hand held power plane. I think there are going to be enough scarfs to make that tool earn a location on my bench. Next, I made some notches like will be needed to the deck stringers. Couple cuts on the table saw and a little chisel work and they looked good, but my old chisels are pretty tired so I'm going to get a couple new ones and treat these right. I was pretty happy since I've never did either of these things before. Starting to feel like I know an tiny bit about wood working.

Workspace

The work shop area preparation took a little more work than I initially expected. The wall that needed opening up was not just a partition, it was load bearing. Now this was unexpected since the AI Domes  plans for our house don't show this wall being load bearing. A trip to the local lumber store for some 2”x10”x10ft lumber for a header, installed temporary bracing, install the header and I was ready to move on to building work benches. 

I really debated about work benches. In general the more the better given space, but specifically in this case is a bench long enough to work on full length parts like the hull sides, keel, mast and longer stuff like cross beams. Due to the shape of the dome basement I have an area that is 32ft long but only 12ft wide at the garage door side and 7ft on the opposite wall. So a 30ft bench 32”-36” deep will preclude building two hulls at the same time. My psychology is such that I'm loath to build one hull to the stage of moving it outside before beginning the 2nd hull.  So I've decided to build three 3ftx8ft benches that can be lined up and leveled for long work and when that is done moved back from the scared hull area.    Also I built a short bench for the table saw that will place it's table at the height of the benches, 36inch.

Spoke with Condon Lumber and my plywood should be here next week!
Also I just found out a sheet of Okoume 6mm weights about 18lbs while a sheet of Meranti 6mm weights about 24lbs, so for the full load of plywood the Okoume is closer to 350lbs lighter than the Meranti. Not only is the Okomue lighter it's a joy to work with, I've never seen nicer plywood, never any voids and beautiful when finished, very glad I went with Okoume.

Plywood

Today was the first buy of materials that will eventually become Tiki 30 #164. A few thousand dollars from my hands to Condon Lumber of White Plains NY hands and I own a stack of 29 6mm & 18 9mm 4'x8' B.S. 1088 Okoume plywood, to be delivered within two weeks. This generic Okoume is about half the cost of the Joubert I used building the CLC dinghy. I think this is a good choice as it saves over $1000 and the wood is to the same BS 1088 standard which includes no interior voids, passed the twice boil test, clear faces and the 9mm has 7 plys and the 6mm has 5 plys same as the Joubert. The other reasonable,IMO, choice would have been Meranti plywood. The Meranti also meets BS1088 standard and is cheaper but its denser so the total stacks of plywood weighs about 280lbs more. That represents nearly 10% of the unladen wait of #164 and I'd rather use that weight for an extra 30gallons or so of water.

Time for Action

Today it's time for action on the Tiki 30 #164 build. I haven't decided yet if I'll try to time this build it goes against my natural grain but it would be a nice data point. All of today's work was just applies to my particular situation. Removed drywall, move three receptacles, moved two overhead light switches, removed door and frame. Need to wait on pulling the stud wall until I get to town for some 2”x8” lumber for a header across the new opening.

At one point while measuring how the hulls would fit in the allocated space it dawned on me my garage door is only 80” tall. After looking at the plans for about a half hour I could not nail down the max height of the hulls. I know the max is at the aft end of the cabins but I couldn't get an exact number. So I call a nice guy, Marc, in central Florida who had shown Donna and I his Tiki 30 build this past winter. He was just getting to the shop to work on the boat and measured his boat. Came out to 79.5” with his boat elevated about 1.5” in it's rolling cradles. Whew, that make like easier. Still don't know how I'll flip the hulls to glass the sides and bottoms.

And finally Donna put the plans on large pieces of cardboard in the hope to keep them from getting destroyed during the build.

Site Selection:

I blew right past the May 1^st start, but then we didn't even arrive in Maine until May 9^th. Then there was and still is a long list of must get done items on our Dome house. But things have gotten a little less hectic and thoughts of the Tiki 30 come back. This picture gives and idea of the to be the site for the build of Tiki 30#164. Our dome house has a ruff diameter of 34 ft but the sides with entryways cut down that measurement. So the dimension from the face of the garage door to the opposite wall, which is through behind that stud wall through the door, is 31 ft 10 inches. From garage door to stud wall is only about 21ft, so some house remodeling will be the first order of business. The plan is to open up that wall about 7ft to the right of the door. The glass door will be reused in the main floor mud room.

 Next comes finding a place to keep my CLC Passagemaker dinghy.