Much technical discussion today on the best way to set up the inwhales and gunwhales. Originally we had thought of not bothering with an outer gunwhale, but we need a rubbing strake that will – well – ‘rub’ – an easily repairable semi-sacrificial strip of wood on the outside round the top of the sheerstrake.
We roughtly cut the eight pieces of douglas fir for the inwhales (two pieces will be scarfed together for each side, then doubled up to get the thickness). The scarfs will be positioned on one of the long blocks for extra strength. This then left enough spare wood to cut the small 3″ spacer blocks.
We then glued the outermost split halves of the long blocks in place – but before we did this we discovered that the tops of the frames were generally slightly high by various amounts, so these were marked up and amounts between one and three mm taken off with the Japanese pull saw, angle grinder and chisel.
Once we had glued the split long blocks in position we had a look – no flat bits along the sheer at all, so the extra hassle has been worth it. Tomorrow the fairies will hopefully glue the inner halves of the long blocks in position.
