And . . . .. . . . . . Solace's lofting begins

[mark ward]

8 months after the plans were purchased, and plenty of planning and thinking and stuff, lofting has begun on Solace, an 1928 Alden Triangle. The bacbone is scheduled for lamination this winter. But my question to all the old timers around:

Is there an old superstition that draftsmen completely botch the lucky 13th station body plan offsets? After the points were lofted and checked and checked again, it's still as crooked as dubya bush. Everything else lays with out with ridiculous precision-much thanks to old John Alden and his draftsmens' attention to detail.

As soon as figure out how to post pics, I'll show you the progress.

Best,

mw

[mark ward]

and here's the pic hopefully...

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid35/p624de9f48aa1f787b3aca41c45dd69d0/fd2f804c.jpg

[ 10-09-2002, 03:59 PM: Message edited by: mark ward ]

[videoguy]

The fact that you think dubyas crooked may be your problem .

[WWheeler]

Video guy, I think that's out of bounds. See the recent message from our sponsor.

[Garrett Lowell]

Congrats on getting started Mark. I've never lofted before, so I can say it looks great! Seriously, keep us posted, and as Dingo would say: Crikey, mate! Post more than one pic! Keep at it.

[True Love]

Very much look forward to seeing your progress. These are beautiful boats.

[Ross Faneuf]

Traditionally, you loft the entire boat - profile, waterlines, buttocks, and body plan, using the information provided in the lines plan and table of offsets. Then, once everything is fair, you loft the frames or sections.

Are you just lofting the body sections? I ask because a traditional table of offsets would have offsets for stations 0-11, and maybe stations 1/2 and 1 1/2. I'm not quite sure what 'sections' are - the individual frames? since there wouldn't usually be a station 13 (except possibly for a very large boat). If you are just lofting a section (or frame) plan, there's every possibility that one of them is out. That would have been picked up by somebody from a construction lofting or something similar.

My apologies for not knowing the history of the plans and data for this boat; it's just that if you are starting with the traditional data (table of offsets and lines plan) there's not likely to be a 'section 13'.

BTW great boat name.

[ 10-11-2002, 01:35 PM: Message edited by: Ross Faneuf ]

[mark ward]

There is in fact a 13th and 14th station on the lofting plans and offset tables. They're located every 24 inches along the 28'-6" hull. What you're looking at in the picture is the scrive board because I was planning to pick up my lines and cut my moulds at a different shop from where my long lines are laid out. In fact I was however, until recently, planning to only loft the station lines and the keel profile and rabbet lines, therefore I started with the stations. But I've decided to fully loft all diagonals, buttocks, and waterlines to double check everything. However, I'm pretty comfortable with the drawing so far because of the following:

Being an architect, and continually working in AutoCAD, 6 months ago I fully lofted the triangle on the computer. I traced the lines from the hi-res scanned plans as purchased from Alden's office. I also layed out the lines per the table of offsets on the computer. They all lined up within 1/8" in all locations. (By the way, I already fixed the funny 13 station situation - user error). Then I tried plotting on our company plotter. That's when the wall fell down. It's lack of accuracy amazed me. Lines were off scale by up to 1 inch in 3 feet, which translates to a big chunk in 28'6". Thus my lofting the old fashioned way, as shown in the picture.

Also, thanks for the nod on her name, she's becoming quite my passion, although not at all times relaxing, as her name might imply.

Best wishes....