I finished bracing up the Dodge today. Its all temp bracing until I put the new frames in the boat.  She looks like a pile of sticks.  scary.

My white Oak finally came in and i can start cutting frames.  It took almost 3 weeks to get this lumber. My only guess is that someone is making a lot of whiskey barrels  i guess it could be that its 5/4 qtr sawn minimum 6" widths.
Waiting on the gold leaf guy for the Chris Craft. Its nice to see guys are busy but man i want to get that boat finished.
leave some comments, i am interested in your thoughts.

BOATS:
I spent several hours working on reclaiming some clear cedar siding this weekend, its the going to be decking for the SUP i framed a week ago. I had to run it through the table saw 3 times and through the planer 2 times. i  have quite a bit of the material 400 hundred lineal feet. I cut it all hoping for future projects. the finished product is 3/8"x4 1/2" that should keep me set for a while. i did all the work in my garage without my dust control system running ... what a mess, even with the door open dust every where... my hockey gear looks like it was in a war torn 3rd world country.

HOT RODS:
There is a 1957 Chevy Bel Air 2 door sedan for sale on the side of the road not too far from where i live. i have driven past it for three weeks and kept thinking that it looks so cool i should stop.. i finally did today. its got no glass, no hood, no trunk lid, missing floor pans, front clip is gone and the drivers side rocker is gone the passenger side is  rusted through both inside and out, no motor or steering column, no price or phone number. how can you sell something like that? Its still very cool and here in Michigan you just dont see too many for sale. that car sells for $45000 finished, makes me wish i had the money to invest in building one. Once again i am forced to evaluate my projects and what i REALLY have time to do right now. Reality sucks.

So I took a few days off from blogging. My most loyal friend, Rex the dog, had to be put down due to illness and that was very hard emotionally,  also its varnish, varnish, and more varnish everyday seems about the same and the pictures from one cote to the next look the same.  I can only say so much about it. I can tell you that I start the process with interlux interstain and then interlux sealer and then petit high build varnish, then epifanes high gloss but isnt that what everyone uses?  I roll and tip my varnish cotes sanding between cotes with a soft 220 block or scotch brite pad and then higher grit the closer I get to the final cote. The painter will come to do the gold leaf lettering so i can have a minimum of 3 cotes of varnish over it.  It takes a long time because varnish doesn't dry very fast, and it has to be done in manageable sections keeping a wet edge.

Building boats will drive you to drinking and what better drink for a boat builder then a screwdriver.( to start anyway)

A while ago i saw an article in one of the woodworking magazines about wood surf boards.  I liked the way they had done the frames with plywood and holes cut out to reduce weight.here is a similar project.http://wavetribecompany.com/make-a-wood-grain-surfboard/ i liked the project so much that i have continued to think about it, i have some clear western red cedar and was thinking that it would make nice looking decks on a stand up paddle board built in the same way as the surf board. i am thinking that a solid nose and tail piece. but the rails or as a boat builder calls them chines for lack of surfboard lingo. solid or decked with the same material as the rest?

Long day yesterday.  I drove 730 miles to pick up an engine for the Chris Craft i am restoring. Its a modern engine PCM. Low hours, pretty much brand new. The snow made that drive take longer than it should have taken, we had about 6 in on the roads when we started out at 3:30 AM the snow got lighter as we went south but the drivers got worse. seems that they dont get that much snow in southern Ohio so they are unaccustomed to 2 inches they had on the road. All in all we made it and the motor looks great. I need to thank Jeremy at the Antique Boat Center for helping me get it loaded and for showing us around.

I want to put this in here for fun.  this is the first boat i ever built.  It was a fun project when i was building it but its hard to look at now. I have learned so much in the last 10 years, I am sure that my current clients are thankful.
http://i1020.photobucket.com/albums/af328/mcleodcarpentry/Boats/IMG00078-20100327-1513.jpg
this boat is a cedar strip canoe, i think of it more as a kayak without decks. Its great for cruising skinny water. easy to pick up and over logs or any thing that blocks the waterway.  one thing that i dont like is that without chines she is too tipsy for my taste.

Off to the Antique Boat Center in the morning to get an engine. gonna be a long day in the snow on the road.  Rummer has it that there isnt any snow in cinnci, we can only hope. I am not convinced that its cheaper to drive 12 hours to get this motor than it would be to have it shipped but... developing personal relationships in this business is valuable. I will be meeting the seller in person and you never can pass up making stronger ties.