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Sep. 27th, 2022 11:00 amOne ongoing problem is deck hardware will be thru-bolted, and I can't be on both sides at the same time. I've taped wrenches in place with mixed success, and used vice grips similarly too. As a potential solution, I was thinking of T-nuts, which both anchor in to wood to keep them from spinning, which is what I want, but also go up in to the wood, which is not what I want. Searching, I found brad nuts, which instead of protruding through the wood, protrude away from it, and have small holes for brad nails to anchor them to the wood (tho they could be epoxied too probably). That was after finding weld nuts, which are nuts meant to be welded to the other side of sheet metal, to create a more secure anchor, which is kind of a similar idea but for a different material. A lot of these nuts are on the other side of backing plates, so weld nuts actually welded to the backing plate would make sense there, or else just doing little spot welds to attach existing nuts to the backing plates.
Went to the hardware store in Rio Vista today for screws and bolts for another project today and picked up a few brad nuts to play with. They might come in handy if I'm able to take the nut off of a piece of deck hardware and replace it with the brad nut without the screw spinning (odds are reasonable, since there's probably a lot of paint holding the other side), tack it in place, go to the other side of the deck, and remove the bolt.
Current project is re-enforcing some of the mahogany cockpit coaming in the rear where the mainsheet car bolts on (the mainsheet car rides in a mainsheet traveler that lets you move where the end of the boom is pulled or "sheeted" in to, from side to side). The mahogany has checked (split) in multiple places (this now badly neglected craft was once, adjusted for inflation, a nearly one million dollar luxury item). This is important structure. The mainsheet takes an enormous amount of stress when pulling the boom and sail in when going to windward. Some previous owner added four metal braces to hold the checked splinters of the mahogany together, but the side pieces are now checking too, and the back piece is screwed to those for support, and the sides are pulling away.
All of this is definitely now wobbly and I've been pondering what to do about it. Initially I added a bow eye (like what you pull a boat on to a trailer with) just aft of the coaming in case the coaming broke free, so I could re-attach the mainsheet block, sans traveler and car, to that.
A while ago, I got some "L" shaped brackets with the idea of notching them in to the wood under the mainsheet car and thru-bolting the mainsheet car through the wood and them, and then thru-bolting them through the bottom of the coaming which also goes through fiberglass and marine ply cockpit, a full 2 inches of stuff. That's dry fitted now (Leo/Sampson Boat Company always announces his dry fitting successes).
The traveler is useful for pulling the boom far to wind while letting go the vant to ease the main without it flapping nearly so much, so I want to keep that if I can.
Waiting on spar varnish to seal the wood I cleaned up where these new fifth and sixth special braces will go but other hardware is in place. Probably some pics later. As part of taking the car off, which is one of those fun "wow, this has never been removed in 60 years" things, I found perfect original finish on the mahogany. The rear coaming looks janky but that means that I can just clean up it and the rest of the coaming and have the wood for show instead of structure, checks and all.
Still need to do discussion responses (if anyone else has actually posted) and the "learning journal" assignment which has more reading attached to it.
As one special "I went in to town today" treat, I get broccoli on my tortillaritos.
Trying to do lots of things at once continues to not be a good strategy for making headway in any of them.
Edit: Brad nuts: https://www.mcmaster.com/weld-nuts/nut-type~screw-mount/
Went to the hardware store in Rio Vista today for screws and bolts for another project today and picked up a few brad nuts to play with. They might come in handy if I'm able to take the nut off of a piece of deck hardware and replace it with the brad nut without the screw spinning (odds are reasonable, since there's probably a lot of paint holding the other side), tack it in place, go to the other side of the deck, and remove the bolt.
Current project is re-enforcing some of the mahogany cockpit coaming in the rear where the mainsheet car bolts on (the mainsheet car rides in a mainsheet traveler that lets you move where the end of the boom is pulled or "sheeted" in to, from side to side). The mahogany has checked (split) in multiple places (this now badly neglected craft was once, adjusted for inflation, a nearly one million dollar luxury item). This is important structure. The mainsheet takes an enormous amount of stress when pulling the boom and sail in when going to windward. Some previous owner added four metal braces to hold the checked splinters of the mahogany together, but the side pieces are now checking too, and the back piece is screwed to those for support, and the sides are pulling away.
All of this is definitely now wobbly and I've been pondering what to do about it. Initially I added a bow eye (like what you pull a boat on to a trailer with) just aft of the coaming in case the coaming broke free, so I could re-attach the mainsheet block, sans traveler and car, to that.
A while ago, I got some "L" shaped brackets with the idea of notching them in to the wood under the mainsheet car and thru-bolting the mainsheet car through the wood and them, and then thru-bolting them through the bottom of the coaming which also goes through fiberglass and marine ply cockpit, a full 2 inches of stuff. That's dry fitted now (Leo/Sampson Boat Company always announces his dry fitting successes).
The traveler is useful for pulling the boom far to wind while letting go the vant to ease the main without it flapping nearly so much, so I want to keep that if I can.
Waiting on spar varnish to seal the wood I cleaned up where these new fifth and sixth special braces will go but other hardware is in place. Probably some pics later. As part of taking the car off, which is one of those fun "wow, this has never been removed in 60 years" things, I found perfect original finish on the mahogany. The rear coaming looks janky but that means that I can just clean up it and the rest of the coaming and have the wood for show instead of structure, checks and all.
Still need to do discussion responses (if anyone else has actually posted) and the "learning journal" assignment which has more reading attached to it.
As one special "I went in to town today" treat, I get broccoli on my tortillaritos.
Trying to do lots of things at once continues to not be a good strategy for making headway in any of them.
Edit: Brad nuts: https://www.mcmaster.com/weld-nuts/nut-type~screw-mount/
