Didi 950 Progress Lifting Keel Option

Mike Vermeersch in Ravenna Ohio turned over his Didi 950 hull a couple of weeks ago and sent me a video of the process.  He turned the hull with the help of a few friends, using the spit roast method and a pair of engine hoists.

With the hull settled in her new cradle, Mike has settled into doing the epoxy fillets and coatings, ahead of starting on the interior joinery.

Epoxy coatings progressing on Mikes Didi 950

While builders have been making material progress with their builds, I have been doing the drawings that detail the lifting keel version for Fred Grimminck. Fred is building his Didi 950 in Queensland, Australia. He has also turned his hull in the past fortnight.

The lifting keel version uses a keel support box of identical footprint to that of the fixed keel version. The difference is that the keel has to slide through where the motor sits in the fixed keel boat, so the motor has relocated to below the front of the cockpit and has a saildrive. The keel support box for this version has the casing built into it, with a flange at the top edge for bolting the keel securely in the down position. In the raised position, the keel is at approximately the same level as the bottom of the rudders. Draft is 2.35m (79") with the keel down and 1.15m (39") with the keel up.

The keel is lifted by means of a tackle, with the tail led to a dedicated winch that is recessed into the galley counter. This is a simple system, without the waterproofing and complication issues of leading it to a cabin roof winch.

Accommodation of the lifting keel version of the Didi 950

This lifting keel offers Didi 950 owners the possibility of having a racer or a performance cruiser, with deep draft, that can live on much shallower moorings or can access shallow anchorages.

To see our full range of designs to a wide range of concepts and materials, please go to http://dixdesign.com/.

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A little progress

Spring is here for sure and I do have a little progress to report. Ive not made as much headway as I would have like to in the last few weeks, but like the song says, a  little bit is better than nada.

I think Ive taken the salon as far as I can in regards to building cabinets and furniture. The latest project completed was fabricating the end caps for the dinette benches, and a small table that will sit between the two comfy chairs we will have. I think the small table will house  the am/fm stereo for the salon, and has a drawer for stashing the remote control for the TV. The end caps for the bench, while  not a job, required a bit of time. Because of the 16" width, the end caps needed to be glued up. I had to decide  how I wanted to have the bench seat riser connect to the end cap and chose a dado which had to be plowed in to the end cap. I did not want to see end grain wood on the end caps, so I fabricated a cap that had a dado plowed in to it so it could slip over the top of the end cap. While I was building the end caps for the salon dinette, I also did the same thing for the wheel house bench seating.

I took a look at doing some work in the wheel house, but felt that it is going to be better waiting until the super structure is landed on the hull in a few months. The wheel house floor has a decent camber to it, and also falls off grade forward to aft. I dont think the super structure is going to rack when we lift it, but Im not 100% sure it wont, and theres no point fastening any finish ply to the front of the wheel house if theres a chance it could move. I did figure out the camber of the wheel  house floor, and fabricated the face frame for the bench seat drawer unit. I gave myself plenty of room to scribe the face frame to the floor and still have an inch of face frame left on the bottom once it was fit. Because I not had the face frame built, I had the drawer size in front of me, so I decided to build the three drawers that will go in the assembly.  The far port side opening in the face frame is for the air conditioner vent that supplies the wheel house.

Because I could possibly be drilling holes in the wheel house face frame and the four end caps for the bench seats, I did not put any finish on these parts. All these little odds and ends parts I"m making will make assembly at the launch site go much more quickly .

For the last four or five years, Ive been threatening myself to go and buy a real planer to build this boat. The current planer I  have is a  15 year old Delta 12" thickness planer that is really undersized for how much lumber Im running through it. I really need a 15", 240 volt machine with a three knife cutter  head. The Delta machine has seen better days, but seems to still get the job done. Having sharp knives in the machine is the only way the it has a fighting chance of keeping up with what I ask it to do. When I first bought the machine, I had a local sharpening guy do the knife sharpening work for me. The problem I had with the professional sharpening is that the blades seemed to dull quickly. The edge they produced, while sharp, did not have enough meat on the back side, so the cutting edge would fail, then dull, and begin to leave ridges on the work. As long as the knives do not have a severe nick in them, I prefer to sharpen them myself. To sharpen my jointer and planer knives, I use a jig cut in to a piece of hardwood to  hold the knife at the correct angle. The sharpening media I use is 300 grit, 2" wide adhesive sand paper wrapped around a hard wood block. Before I put the knife in the holding jig, I flatten the back of he knife using the 300 grit block. With the blades held firmly at the correct angle and the jig clamped in the vise, not much time is needed to revive the edge.  Once the edge looks good and all the shiny spots have been taken off of the edge, Ill hone it with the same block using 600 grit self adhesive paper. Sharp tools are one of my pet peeves, and having them makes the work much more enjoyable and consistent.

I still have a long list of things I want to get finished before I move her out of the barn namely: Aft deck ceiling including ceiling lights, rear steamer light, rear work lights. Paint aft deck ceiling. Pull ceiling light wiring in salon and wheel house and locate switchs. Water line from salon sink to salon 1/2 bath. Salon and wheel house doors.  Hydraulic lines from engine room to anchor winch. Hydraulic lines from engine room to bow thruster. Hydraulic reservoir install. Weld vent in salon roof for gray water holding tank that I forgot. One more coat of urethane and caulk undersides of bulwark cap. Weld "D" rings to  hull to chain hull down to dolly. This is pretty  much my punch list, and Im going to try to stick to it before she leaves the barn. Hopefully, the list wont grow to much larger and Ill have her ready to move by early Summer or late Spring. The boat yard Im bringing her to is packed full right now but after the first of May, it will begin to clear out.

Cheers

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Progress

A quick update on Belle Starr. Since the last post on these pages, a substantial amount of repair has been done in quick succession. Belle is fortunate to have many admirers and I am fortunate to have as many dedicated friends.

Paul showed up for two days to drive a work crew on the installation of two panels, enclosing the starboard side and reforming the chine. Prior to his arrival I had repaired three major bulkheads - the interior furniture that defined the chine. In this boat, plywood bulkheads take the place of frames and there is one every two feet, some of which are cabinets or seats that double as structural members.

The panels were made from two sheets of mahogany plywood scarphed together and ripped lengthwise. The panels were then screwed in place and spiled to the existing hull. Installing an almost sixteen foot "plank" is very satisfying. Two of them fitted together filled most of the huge gap in Belles hull. Of course there is a lot left to do - smaller holes to be fitted, lots of patching and fairing, but I feel much has been accomplished with the help of neighbors and friends. Belle Starr is no longer a muddy wreck on the beach.

Many thanks to Paul Miller, Heather Hicks, Martin Schnieder and Lynn Watson for their invaluable help.
  
Belle will float again.

Paul has documented the process on lumberjocks. Photos courtesy of Paul.

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Progress Report Stone Horse Belle Starr

Wouldnt you know? The last work session on the Stone Horse, Belle Starr was during a snow storm. Now, you should understand, it doesnt snow very often in the lower elevations of the Pacific Northwest anymore. Yet, here it is a month later and guess what? Yes its snowing.

This makes for a challenging outdoor work situation when most of the repairs involve epoxy and the rest of the work is sanding and painting.

One huge benefit from the cool weather is, the epoxy cures very slow. This means that glue applied yesterday is still pliable today and is easy to shape, form and finish.
There are tricks to successful use of epoxy in cold weather so be warned, dont do this at home unless you are willing to accept the occasional failure of your material.

The last few days have seen some progress in the repair and rehab of Belle Starr. This is not a restoration project as we so often see in the Doryman boatyard. Belle Starr is in great shape for a 30 year old boat.

You may think differently from the photos but often, long before an owner decides to sell their boat, maintenance falls to a minimum. It is not unusual to see a fine wood boat, only a couple decades old, with serious problems. In this case a few yearly haul-outs were neglected and it is a tribute to the builder that the boat held up so well.













As noted earlier, the bowsprit and boomkin needed to be replaced. In the process of researching the development of the Stone Horse, I discovered that the original plans called for a plank bowsprit.

This is good news! Im not too fond of hanging out there, over the deep blue, on a stick.

To supplement the safety factor, Belle Starr will soon have a bow pulpit, which for some inexplicable reason, she didnt have before. A wide flush deck with no life-lines or handholds seems precarious for the single-hander, though I find the sparse, clean lines aesthetically appealing.
















This boat has a bridge deck in the cockpit. Its about the same level as the galley, down below. When rot developed in the main bulkhead from the cockpit deck, as it so often does, it traveled across into the cabinet on the other side.







This is an excellent opportunity to install a new sink where Belle Starr had a simple plastic pan. (May I mention that it is wonderful to have a project that can use some of the stuff that has accumulated in the material storage shed? Its a regular chandlery out there!)






This was a tricky repair; a puzzle. All of the pieces were glued-up at the same time and each had to be installed in the correct order. There is a piece of the deck missing from under the teak overlay that you cant see here. Talk about a challenge!

Once again, the cool weather slows the epoxy cure to a crawl, giving plenty of time to get it right.

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