Sunday, November 30, 2008
Stanley get's skunked!
Here's a shot of Stanley in a less explosive time, by that I mean he got sprayed by a skunk this morning. The ever vigilant guard dog knew something was up and managed to shake him out but not before getting hit. The brave canine soul that he is, none the less I forced him to retreat as I took over the task of ridding our backyard of the pest. Making loud noises to no avail, I chucked a couple of rocks and chunks of wood at him but it didn't faze him.....had to bring out the big gun, a powerful air pellet pistol and filled him fulla lead, well sort of, I don't think it actually penetrated his thick fur even. I gave up after that and wife Carol called animal control, they came over but the skunk had dissapeared into a recess full of wood out of reach of Mike the animal control guy.....so, I have a strong feeling we'll have to deal with critter again, gives me the shudders thinking about it....i'm not too good with creatures like that, it's reassuring that Stanley is as brave and smart as he is.
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Rematch
In the battle of the titan glues, Gorilla glue won out over Sumo glue in the re-match. I wanted to do a rematch because I felt it may not have been fair to critisize the Gorilla glue for being hard to squeeze out of the bottle (hurting my hands) when the Gorilla glue in question was sitting in the cabinet for 2 years.
So in the rematch the testing team bought a brand new bottle and guess what? It flowed just as good as the Sumo glue and what made it the winner is it cured more rigid. Both glues foam but if you push on the Sumo glue (after it cures) it is spongey, while the Gorilla glue is firmer......and tougher and because of this, the winner.
So in the rematch the testing team bought a brand new bottle and guess what? It flowed just as good as the Sumo glue and what made it the winner is it cured more rigid. Both glues foam but if you push on the Sumo glue (after it cures) it is spongey, while the Gorilla glue is firmer......and tougher and because of this, the winner.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Going organic
Instead of using plastic mini fibers to thicken the epoxy, thought, hey, why not use sawdust and mini wood chips instead! So I did, looks like someone "diarrhea'd" on it but seems, so far, like it's workin pretty good......knock on wood.
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Continuing not knowing what the hell i'm doing...
the mini glue lam continues, pictured is a "stick-o-wood" being bedded into the rotted out cavity. Used the construction glue for this, although this has been a combo-products mix of various glues and epoxy resin....a tossed salad of glues if you will.
..........note how dark and gloomy it looks now, is this a harbinger for what's going to happen in the future?...er not?
..........note how dark and gloomy it looks now, is this a harbinger for what's going to happen in the future?...er not?Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Monday, November 24, 2008
Making hay while the sun shines
well, not exactly, but did manage to suck out bilge water while Stanley supervized. And, completed the first (of three) layers of the "mini glue lam."
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Overcoming inertia
Decided to make a mini "glue lam" to re-build up the rotted out section using 3/8"x3/8" douglas fur that was lying around. 
Friday, November 21, 2008
Here's the inspiration
This motorcycle has the look I'm trying to achieve with my boat, if you can overlay "boat" onto "motorcycle" and spin around three times while singing the Orlons song "don't hang up" while slinging spit at the same time you're sure to understand where I'm coming from. If you don't, frankly, you're better off!
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Tackling the rot
Don't know how to approach rebuilding this rotted out section, a lot of head scratching, i've been procrastinating and diverting myself and telling myself there are more important things in my life.....but I can't be in denial any longer, I must stand tall and deal with it without whining and lose the poor little me victim role.
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
What's it all about?, let's ask Alan Watts!
(the OOOhhhh-MMMM sound is playing)
Listen; listen downward, down into that sound. What is it? A current of air? Vibrating vocal cords? your own eardrums? something running in your head? It’s all of these, but go still deeper, this sound is you vibrating. And who are you? Don’t give me your name address and occupation; you know that’s just a mask, a front, a big act. Who puts it on? Who puts it on?..your body? …..What an act that is, and who puts that on?, your father and mother?, did they put you on? Come off it, you know very well who you are but you won’t admit it. Deep in there in the middle middle of your heart you know it. You’ve always been around and always will be. And the you in you is the same as the you in me. You are not some sort of tourist just visiting in this world for a short time. You belong here. Like the apple on the tree is the energy of the tree, you, yes you are the energy of the world. You don’t know who you are do you. You can’t really get at yourself just as the fingertip can’t touch itself and the teeth can’t bite themselves. And that’s because you, the far in you, is what we call Brahman, the self of the universe. The which for which there is no whicher. The heart and foundation of all that’s going on. You think you’re going to die some day, yes, that’s because every now and then you have to go off so that you can know you are on. You can’t have an up without a down or a back without a front, or a light day without a dark night. The whole thing is pulse.
So what are you doing Brahman? You’re playing on and off with yourself, hide and seek with yourself. You’re just passing eternal time with adventure. You forget who you are really. Every now and then you make like you are a John Doe or a Mary Smith or a butterfly or a worm or a star. And that you’re lost in the middle of a big, big outside world that isn’t you that you don’t understand and that don’t control. Of course, there has to be something else, something other to bring out the feeling that you are you. And so you can feel really you, that outside world has to feel really strange…different. You old trickster, deep down in you know the whole bit. Therefore what you want is a surprise. So you have to let things get out of control, you have to feel lost and lonely to know you as you. You play the thing out by inventing lusts and loves, fears and terrors, gnawing anxieties and screaming memes all so you can imagine it’s not really me, its IT that runs the show. But our secret is, as we say, tatframasse, YOU are it. YOU are running the show. By not letting your right hand know what your left is doing. By making like there is a whopping great split between what you do and what happens to you. And this is what we call Maya; the great illusion, and Lela; the play, the big act. And you don’t just play your game with such simple elements as on and off, black and white or life and death. To seem as real as real can be, this world that you are playing has to be so complicated that you can’t figger it out. So, between black and white there is a whole range of colors. Between thunder and silence a whole scale of tones. And between something and nothing; between a smashing fist on the face and trying to touch air there are all the textures of feeling; burning, throbbing, pushing, hugging, fondling, tickling, kissing, brushing and light wind on the skin. Your world is all these elements, of light and sound, of taste, smell and touch, woven together in many dimensions in the fabulous loom of your brain. Your brain, the most complicated thing in the world, which you yourself grew without even thinking about it. You have always been around, for you; I; the self, is simply what there is and all there is. All of us are raised from one center, tits on one sow, sounds on one flute, for ever and ever. But it doesn’t get monotonous, boring because we keep forgetting it. We keep the ons on by putting offs between them.
How big is it? How long is on and how long off? Don’t take these figures literally for their purpose is to just to give an idea of vastness. We say that man, human life, is a dance that lasts for four million three hundred and twenty thousand years. And of course there are all sorts of other dances going on at the same time with their own rhythms; star dances, rock dances, fish dances, insect dances, plant dances and strange animal scenes like crocodile dances, elephant dances. The human dance runs for four million three hundred twenty thousand years. A span of time we call a Calpa. Before it begins and after it ends there is always another calpa, or off period of rest. During which the self is simply the self and doesn’t pretend to be this me or that you. We call this rest period the Prolia; peace, uninvolvement….pure bliss. When four million three hundred twenty thousand years draw to a close the Lela dance begins again, though it always feels like the first time; every day is today. And then through many centuries, through many pulses of waking and sleeping, life and death, you stretch your world out through a span of time that varies in mood like the rainbow, running from purple to red, from royal delight to destruction and fire, for as there is no purple without red there is no pleasure without pain. There are thus four great divisions of the Calpa; we call each one a “yuga” and name them after the four throws of the Hindu game of dice; kreta; the perfect throw of four, treata; the slightly imperfect throw of three, dropara; the throw of two and cali; the worst throw of one. And so the first period, the kreta-yuga runs for one million seven hundred and twenty-eight thousand years during which the whole world is as perfect as a fresh flower and as unblemished as that of a young girl. The second period, the treat-yuga is a little shorter, it runs for one million two hundred and ninety six thousand years during which a small element of evil and decay comes into life. And the tips of the petals are very slightly brown. The third period is the drapara-yuga, running for eight hundred and sixty-four thousand years, the sylyble “dra” in drapara means two. Double or dual. So that in this age the powers of good and evil are equally balanced. The fourth period is kali-yuga running for only four hundred and thirty two thousand years in which the power of evil and destruction takes over. At the end your eternal self takes the form of Shiva, the lord of renewal through death. Blue bodied and ten armed with a necklass of skulls, but with one hand in the gesture of “fear not” as a reminder that all this is in illusion and play. And then Shiva dances the tandara dance, the dance of fire in which the material world is destroyed and the self returns to the state of prolia…of peace, uninvolvement and pure bliss. All this goes on for ever, through calpa after calpa after calpa and not only in this visible world that we call the universe, for this universe we know is just a speck of dust in another universe, and all the specks of dust in this universe that we know contain minute universes without measure. Boundless inward in the atom, boundless outward in the whole. However vast, how ever incomprehensible, however terrifying this entire display may seem to be, all of it is at root your own innermost self. The self you cannot touch or see or pin down or control because it’s too close, too near, right in the middle of everything……because it’s you.
Listen; listen downward, down into that sound. What is it? A current of air? Vibrating vocal cords? your own eardrums? something running in your head? It’s all of these, but go still deeper, this sound is you vibrating. And who are you? Don’t give me your name address and occupation; you know that’s just a mask, a front, a big act. Who puts it on? Who puts it on?..your body? …..What an act that is, and who puts that on?, your father and mother?, did they put you on? Come off it, you know very well who you are but you won’t admit it. Deep in there in the middle middle of your heart you know it. You’ve always been around and always will be. And the you in you is the same as the you in me. You are not some sort of tourist just visiting in this world for a short time. You belong here. Like the apple on the tree is the energy of the tree, you, yes you are the energy of the world. You don’t know who you are do you. You can’t really get at yourself just as the fingertip can’t touch itself and the teeth can’t bite themselves. And that’s because you, the far in you, is what we call Brahman, the self of the universe. The which for which there is no whicher. The heart and foundation of all that’s going on. You think you’re going to die some day, yes, that’s because every now and then you have to go off so that you can know you are on. You can’t have an up without a down or a back without a front, or a light day without a dark night. The whole thing is pulse.
So what are you doing Brahman? You’re playing on and off with yourself, hide and seek with yourself. You’re just passing eternal time with adventure. You forget who you are really. Every now and then you make like you are a John Doe or a Mary Smith or a butterfly or a worm or a star. And that you’re lost in the middle of a big, big outside world that isn’t you that you don’t understand and that don’t control. Of course, there has to be something else, something other to bring out the feeling that you are you. And so you can feel really you, that outside world has to feel really strange…different. You old trickster, deep down in you know the whole bit. Therefore what you want is a surprise. So you have to let things get out of control, you have to feel lost and lonely to know you as you. You play the thing out by inventing lusts and loves, fears and terrors, gnawing anxieties and screaming memes all so you can imagine it’s not really me, its IT that runs the show. But our secret is, as we say, tatframasse, YOU are it. YOU are running the show. By not letting your right hand know what your left is doing. By making like there is a whopping great split between what you do and what happens to you. And this is what we call Maya; the great illusion, and Lela; the play, the big act. And you don’t just play your game with such simple elements as on and off, black and white or life and death. To seem as real as real can be, this world that you are playing has to be so complicated that you can’t figger it out. So, between black and white there is a whole range of colors. Between thunder and silence a whole scale of tones. And between something and nothing; between a smashing fist on the face and trying to touch air there are all the textures of feeling; burning, throbbing, pushing, hugging, fondling, tickling, kissing, brushing and light wind on the skin. Your world is all these elements, of light and sound, of taste, smell and touch, woven together in many dimensions in the fabulous loom of your brain. Your brain, the most complicated thing in the world, which you yourself grew without even thinking about it. You have always been around, for you; I; the self, is simply what there is and all there is. All of us are raised from one center, tits on one sow, sounds on one flute, for ever and ever. But it doesn’t get monotonous, boring because we keep forgetting it. We keep the ons on by putting offs between them.
How big is it? How long is on and how long off? Don’t take these figures literally for their purpose is to just to give an idea of vastness. We say that man, human life, is a dance that lasts for four million three hundred and twenty thousand years. And of course there are all sorts of other dances going on at the same time with their own rhythms; star dances, rock dances, fish dances, insect dances, plant dances and strange animal scenes like crocodile dances, elephant dances. The human dance runs for four million three hundred twenty thousand years. A span of time we call a Calpa. Before it begins and after it ends there is always another calpa, or off period of rest. During which the self is simply the self and doesn’t pretend to be this me or that you. We call this rest period the Prolia; peace, uninvolvement….pure bliss. When four million three hundred twenty thousand years draw to a close the Lela dance begins again, though it always feels like the first time; every day is today. And then through many centuries, through many pulses of waking and sleeping, life and death, you stretch your world out through a span of time that varies in mood like the rainbow, running from purple to red, from royal delight to destruction and fire, for as there is no purple without red there is no pleasure without pain. There are thus four great divisions of the Calpa; we call each one a “yuga” and name them after the four throws of the Hindu game of dice; kreta; the perfect throw of four, treata; the slightly imperfect throw of three, dropara; the throw of two and cali; the worst throw of one. And so the first period, the kreta-yuga runs for one million seven hundred and twenty-eight thousand years during which the whole world is as perfect as a fresh flower and as unblemished as that of a young girl. The second period, the treat-yuga is a little shorter, it runs for one million two hundred and ninety six thousand years during which a small element of evil and decay comes into life. And the tips of the petals are very slightly brown. The third period is the drapara-yuga, running for eight hundred and sixty-four thousand years, the sylyble “dra” in drapara means two. Double or dual. So that in this age the powers of good and evil are equally balanced. The fourth period is kali-yuga running for only four hundred and thirty two thousand years in which the power of evil and destruction takes over. At the end your eternal self takes the form of Shiva, the lord of renewal through death. Blue bodied and ten armed with a necklass of skulls, but with one hand in the gesture of “fear not” as a reminder that all this is in illusion and play. And then Shiva dances the tandara dance, the dance of fire in which the material world is destroyed and the self returns to the state of prolia…of peace, uninvolvement and pure bliss. All this goes on for ever, through calpa after calpa after calpa and not only in this visible world that we call the universe, for this universe we know is just a speck of dust in another universe, and all the specks of dust in this universe that we know contain minute universes without measure. Boundless inward in the atom, boundless outward in the whole. However vast, how ever incomprehensible, however terrifying this entire display may seem to be, all of it is at root your own innermost self. The self you cannot touch or see or pin down or control because it’s too close, too near, right in the middle of everything……because it’s you.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Let me take you down, cuz we're going to...
...take a stick of wood, (see pictures), run it through the band saw, plane it through the planer, do some "notching " detail work with a utility blade and then clamp those suckers down with Sumo Glue (3 times stronger than leading competitor!, ..you know that already tho) and when that glue dries will cut off the excess and get back into sand, sand, sand then varnish, varnish, varnish leading to being ever more closer to finishing this project even though it may never be finished!
Monday, November 17, 2008
'twas such a nice day
Yesterday was a "summer" day. It got up to 85 degrees and light wind. What better weather could you hope for to take out the boat for a spin. Went to lake San Antonio again because it's the closest lake (55 miles away) and I can do a day run. Was really good, hitting that zen like haiku moment when the third beer kicked in and maintained it through a tank plus an additional 5 gallons. (3 1/2 hours on the water)= 6.5 gals per hour....seems pretty good mileage considering it's got a V-8 under the hatch.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Varnished Truth
...those inside side boards, ...don't know the official name for them, finally got sanded to 120 grit to get it ready for the first coat of varnish.
What I've found out is you cannot know how the varnish will effect the color...each piece of mahogany has it's own color characteristics, there can be differences within the same piece! ...it can really mess with your head., but it's all part and parcel with having pain in the butt boats!
...this last picture shows the first coat of varnish: thinned 50% with mineral spirits, the second coat will be thinned 25%, third=10%, keep decreasing untill 9 coats and yer done (supposedly).
What I've found out is you cannot know how the varnish will effect the color...each piece of mahogany has it's own color characteristics, there can be differences within the same piece! ...it can really mess with your head., but it's all part and parcel with having pain in the butt boats!
...this last picture shows the first coat of varnish: thinned 50% with mineral spirits, the second coat will be thinned 25%, third=10%, keep decreasing untill 9 coats and yer done (supposedly).Friday, November 14, 2008
the worlds forgotten boy
anybody that knows me (to any degree) knows I can go fletchin' nuts sometimes (most of the time) ....got to be because of being born with the umbilical cord wrapped around my neck! ...hey, let's not throw out the baby with the afterbirth, ...OK? ...anyway, Iggy and the stooges have always helped me maintain my unstability, now, by listening to this u-tube video, you may find yourself de-ranged for a spell....relax into it! and if you don't like that one, why don't you wait for the Messiah to come with Roy Buchanon (who tradgically hanged himself in a texas jail....)...and if that's not somethin' that turns you over, under, sideways , down then ....tell me, where have all the good times gone?
Got into a scrape!
..it was inevitable. In the rough and tumble world of wooden boat restoration you know it's going to happen.....just when?
TIP FOR THE DAY: be careful not to gouge into the wood with the scraper although I don't worry about shit like that myself.
TIP FOR THE DAY: be careful not to gouge into the wood with the scraper although I don't worry about shit like that myself.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Doing it my way
...todays project: replace old worn out sandpaper with new, fresh, vibrant sandpaper on the Hutchins sander.
The pictures tell the tale, first; peel off the old. 2) rule out the sheet and cut it to size. 3) Apply rubber cement to both the sandpaper back and the sander pad 4) place the sander pad squarely on the precut sandpaper. 5) Voila!, ...you're ready to sand, sand, sand!
The pictures tell the tale, first; peel off the old. 2) rule out the sheet and cut it to size. 3) Apply rubber cement to both the sandpaper back and the sander pad 4) place the sander pad squarely on the precut sandpaper. 5) Voila!, ...you're ready to sand, sand, sand!
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
They don't know Bo!
Been wearing my Bo Diddley shirt "around town" and people (mostly young) have said "who's that?".....Can't believe it
, They don't know Bo! We gotta go on a Bo Crusade, people, So that America...and the world...doesn't go down the tubes!
, They don't know Bo! We gotta go on a Bo Crusade, people, So that America...and the world...doesn't go down the tubes!Monday, November 10, 2008
gettin' right down to the real nitty gritty....
...60 grit to be exact, because that's what I put on my other vibrating power tool to get off on taking off the patina of the "old surface" that has enveloped every plank, nook and cranny of this old, gray boat
. I chose (using my free will) to listen to The Best of Joe Walsh while I sanded the night away. The only bummer was I couldn't hear the album over the din of the random orbital sander!...sometimes you just can't win for losing!
. I chose (using my free will) to listen to The Best of Joe Walsh while I sanded the night away. The only bummer was I couldn't hear the album over the din of the random orbital sander!...sometimes you just can't win for losing!
Sunday, November 9, 2008
post steambending details
Check out the pictures. If I didn't do the steam bending the trim would not bend enough to make the curve.....it had to be done.....and there's Stanley again exploring the deep recesses of the boat hull, any rodents better beware!
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Steambending update
After steaming the wood for about an hour i put the clamps on it. It bent easily and fast. there is a thing called "springback" so you need to overbend it on the jig. this morning I unclamped it and placed in on the deck, close to where it will end up.That's Stanley checking it out, hope he OK's it.
Steambending wood is back in style again
...yeah, it's making a comeback allright! Especially since Barrack is our next president, bringing a new bounce in our step and a twinkle in our eyes....No more walking around aimlessly with our dauber down and tombstones in our eyes!
It's time to bring in the new and sing and dance and.....steambend wood! If you look at the pictures you can see the "jig" where magic happens and also you can see where the steam is generated, in those paint cans filled with water on a hot plate.
As usual, when I work on the pain-in-the-butts-boats (or PITBB for short) i'll whip out a big twelve inch record of my favororite bands, this time it's the Sir Douglas Quintet "Mendocino" album.....".....where life's such a groove you'll blow your mind in the morning..." like it is sometimes while working on the PITBB!
It's time to bring in the new and sing and dance and.....steambend wood! If you look at the pictures you can see the "jig" where magic happens and also you can see where the steam is generated, in those paint cans filled with water on a hot plate.
As usual, when I work on the pain-in-the-butts-boats (or PITBB for short) i'll whip out a big twelve inch record of my favororite bands, this time it's the Sir Douglas Quintet "Mendocino" album.....".....where life's such a groove you'll blow your mind in the morning..." like it is sometimes while working on the PITBB!
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Consumerism in a boatish way
- People say a person can be defined by the products he uses....if so, I may be ready for the rubber room! In case you can't make it out here's the list of pictured items:
- Becks beer (in a koozie)
- Epifanes brush thinner
- Epifanes Woodfinish Gloss Varnish
- Miniwax Cherry coloured stain
- Loctite brand Sumo glue (3x the strength of the competitor)
- Jasco premium paint (and epoxy) remover
Monday, November 3, 2008
BORING!!!!
Actually vacuumed out the "aft" end of the boat today, that's as much as I could do before going into a coma. I can get really excited sanding or -my specialty-scraping....but when it comes to cleaning, well, ...let's just say in my natural state, left alone, with no direction home, like a complete unknown....I would be found under a pile of garbage so high you might mistake it for a superfund site...excuse me while I kiss my shop vac!.
Sunday, November 2, 2008
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