32-Foot Cabin Cruiser "Sunfish". Part II.
Set all the shores to a chalk line snapped down on the hoard floor if you are building her in a shed; if out in the weather, first where each shore is to come shovel away the loose top soil and sink a "deadman" just as a railroad tie is begged in the ground, tamp it down solid and then set your shores up on these. It is a great handicap to have to build out of doors. In a shed or shop you can run the braces to hold the head of the stem plumb up out of the way to the rafters overhead, which you can't do on the ground. It prevents a lot of stumbling and dodging around the shores. Give the keel a coat of lead coloured paint to preserve it where it is securely braced up plumb and true.
Then get out your molds and as these are only temporary a cheap grade of pine about an inch, or better yet, an inch, and a quarter thick can be used. To shape all these by hand with a drawknife and saw is a tedious operation; if there is any place where you can get access to a band saw for an hour or so you could easily saw out the various pieces and put them together at home. Where you have to join two pieces together butt one against the other and then nail or screw with iron screws a cleat across the two to hold them. Keep all cleats and braces on the same side. Let the top end of each mold extend up four to six inches above the true sheer line so that you can run a batten up above this line and can leave it there until after you have the topstrake on to keep her deck edge fair and true. It is not necessary to bevel the molds; you do that by setting each of the molds forward of the centre, 4, 3, 2 and 1, so the smooth side of the mold faces aft and is just flush with the mold marks on the keel, and the after ones 6, 7 and 8, the reverse way; by this the smooth edge represents the true shape required and when you put the battens on chisel away and bevel the mold's edge until it fits flat against the mold.
Molds of 32-Foot Cabin Cruiser "Sunfish"
Be very careful to set each mold exactly to its mark and to set it and brace it perfectly plumb. If the underside of the cross-spall — the wooden brace across the top of the mold — be planed up true before it is fastened to the mold it will he found of great assistance in setting the mold level. You can hold a spirit level up under this edge and tap the mold to one side or another until the bubble sights true in the centre of the level, and the plumb bob, hanging from the centre marks on the cross-spall, is plumb over the centre scratch line along the top of the keel.
Keep all the braces you can up overhead so that they will not interfere with your working around the boat, and cross them X shaped, as they go up to the rafters; by this arrangement you can get a more rigid brace than if they simply go straight up from the head of the mold. The whole business could swing like a parallel ruler that way, but the X brace is firm.
Before you can run the ribbands around you need the transom, the shape of the face of which is given along with the mold shapes. Do not cut it out to this shape however, as, due to the bevels, it needs to be an inch and a quarter wider on the bottom edge but no larger across the top where it bevels under from the line, and around the edge it may even take more. With sufficient wood left outside the line you can, after bending the curvature in the face of the transom, clamp-screw it to the small knee and by bending battens around the molds cut and fit it accurately. All these bevels could, be laid out on the floor in the full-sized drawing, but it goes into a lot of projection and drawing, too difficult to attempt to explain here. The amateur over a number of difficulties, as there are special articles in these books on laying, down a set of lines, how to project a transom, an explanation of the meaning of a Table of Offsets, an article on how to cut the rabbet line, etc.
The transom is shown drawn to the outside of the planking. If you are going: to let the plank fit flat against the edge of it you will have to take off the thickness of the plank from the shape shown, but as that does not look very neat on a job of this kind, due to the curve in the face of the transom, it would be better to bevel the front edge of the transom so that the plank ends make a seam right around the corner and are. fastened to oak backing pieces screwed fast to the inside of the transom around the edges.
This particular job is one of the hardest in the whole construction of Sunfish. Anyone who can figure out this transom and make a neat job need have no fear of any other part of the work. Apply the bevels as you take them, is the keynote.
The curve to the transom should be bent in it first. Steam the boards well in a steam box and then clamp them over a mold built for that purpose with about an inch more curve than you want; it will always straighten back a little, so put more curve in than you need.
Another way to build this transom is to bend about a 3/4 or 7/8-inch transom and level the edges so that the plank ends go right past, flat-footed on its edges, then trim off these projecting plank ends to receive a 1/2-inch oak or mahogany facing-piece and bend and fit in this transom, fastening it with screws, plugged, to the inner rough transom. Be careful to set the transom up perfectly level when you bolt or rivet it to the knee that holds it to the deadwood.
When this is shored securely, and it is usually, held by two stout timbers spread out like a pair of legs to the floor to hold it up and forward at the same time, you are ready to bend around the ribbands.
First run the sheer ribband — about a 2-inch square strip of clear spruce — in one length if you can get it; if not, join two pieces together by nailing a piece outside and lapping over the two ends where they, butt. Don't attempt to scarps and rivet the two pieces of a batten together Sometimes another batten is bent outside of the first at the deck edge, as that is a very important part of the boat to keep absolutely fair and true. At intervals of about 6 inches run other ribbands fore and aft from bow to stern. They will, of course, be close together at the ends and once in a while the ends can be left out by using a shorter batten amidships.
Where there is a short curve in the frames, put the battens closely together, and where they are flatter spread the battens. Use square-headed coach or lag screws, turning them in with a monkey wrench after first drilling a hole so they will not split the wood and put a flat-iron washer under the head of each one so that you can pull 'the ribbands up wood to wood without having the bolt-head bury itself in the ribband.
She will begin to look very much like a boat when you get her this far along, and by standing off a way you can see just what her shape is going to look like. If, in putting on the ribbands, the molds do not seem to be fair, don't go and cut one mold to let the ribband in so it will touch the next, until you have carefully looked along the batten and tried your measurements. It may be all that is needed is to plane down the ribband a little, reduce it in size, or taper one end, and it may then bend in and still show a fair, easy curve.
No designer would think of trying to bend all the curves that make up a set of lines for a boat with one kind of a batten. They have many differently proportioned battens, some like your ribbands, all one size throughout their length; some larger in the middle than they are at each end; some large at one end and gradually diminishing all the way to the other end. So graduate your battens, if they are too stubborn, and don't blame the designer. In the next number we shall start in and frame up the hull and proceed to plank her.
Table of Offsets of 32-Foot Cabin Cruiser "Sunfish"
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