It definitely was a theory of strings when we weighed various concepts on how to tie down the load of new stringer wood we bought today. We found the mill thanks to local professional boat builders, who have amongst other old wooden boats built a world unique
The only Peipsi sailing barge in the world, courtesy of http://lodi.ee/
Peipsi sailing barge (which we have sailed with). After a shop tour they told us that mechanically dried wood is prone to snapping when bending stringers. One needs naturally dried wood, somewhat moist. So that is what we did, called the mill, went there and bought ourselves a bunch of rather raw wood. In the mill the wood felt very different from what we had handled before, it was springy and easily bendable. We also got to choose any planks we wanted. A very nice place with nice people called Corex. It was adventurous fitting 5 m long planks on a 3m car. Earlier that day I epoxied another bulkhead into place. Here are some pictures:
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- The mill we bought our wood from. The guy operating the saw was always in a good mood, which was nice. Later that day we got some crumpled face treatment at a local tool supermarket. A customer service contrast.
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- We sorted out a pile of stringers.
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- Here is Joosep dragging the timber to the small car. The weather was awful, raining, windy, cold and wet. Talk about winter, last year this time we had a meter of snow and -20 C.
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- Fitting the wood into the car.
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- Don’t ram this!
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- String theory in action. Joosep is tying down the trunk with some string.
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- The stringer wood assortment landed safely at our garage.
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- The bulkead epoxied, bolted, clamped, filleted and glass taped.
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- Fresh stringers with fresh epoxy.
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- A little closer detail of the fillet-glass.
We also bought the necessary sewage piping and hosing, plus some more clamps, to start our steambox construction. But this will wait until the first week of February, since the studying is stepping on our heels. Next update then!
