Boom jaws & table

[Wendy Reymond]

Has anyone built boom jaws and table for a 36' or thereabouts? We are basically following Wm.Garden's description/plans in WB No. 59.
In terms of the table, he suggests constructing it in three sections, with three bolsters, 4 screws through to the mast. Any comments about the best way to join the three sections to each other?
Thank you - Wendy

[Art Read]

Just bumping this back to the top. A good boom/gaff jaw "how to" would make interesting reading!

[Wendy Reymond]

Well, Garden's plans and description are very good (as you would expect), and have enabled my husband to make the gaff jaws, tumbler, etc.
Just interested to know if there is any hands-on experience out there.
Wendy

[Wooden Boat Fittings]

Wendy, we were moving a mast from a 40' ketch yesterday. If I'd seen this thread before we moved it I'd have taken some photos for you. But as I recall it, the table encircled about two-thirds of the circumference and was supported by a total of three or four quarter-circle buttresses. As I recall, the table and supports were all of 1" timber.

If each segment of the table were properly supported from underneath, there'd probably be no reason to join them all together, provided you left, say, ½" gaps between each piece for drainage. This would allow for easy removal when necessary. Alternatively, I suppose you could glue each segment to the next. and / or sink a small dog (maybe a Pekinese?) into the outside face of each segment to hold them together.

Mike

[Gaff]

I am in the process right now making a new table, though it is for an 8-meter boat. I have the mast out and used a milling machine to mill out a doughnut from a solid piece of oak. Set up the milling machine, it does the work and you get a perfectly round table requiring very little finishing. I plan to slip this over the bottom end of the mast, and use say 6 blocks, glued and screwed to the mast to support it. The previous owner of the boat made the table from Kauri and it did not last as the wood was too soft. Over a few years the boom jaws gouged out the table. This one should last much longer though a need to address the issue why the jaws gouged out the table in the first place. Regards Jim

[Ed Nye]

I'll bet money your turned oak table will split along the grain in a short time. If you want the table one piece, you need to use two or three thin ones and glue them together with stagered grain.
Ed

[Wendy Reymond]

Thanks for all the info, which we are now digesting. Will eventually post the method we use - probably 3 or 4 pieces. Table will be constructed from tallow wood.
Wendy

[Dave Fleming]

Set up the milling machine, it does the work and you get a perfectly round table requiring very little finishing. I plan Somebody let you use a metal working miller to work wood?? Must'a been fun cleaning out all the chips from the ways, screws,etc...

[Ken Hutchins]

Dave, I use my metal lathe and milling machine frequently on wood. Shop vac for cleaning and frequent lubrication keeps every thing fine. Careful and daily disposal of oil soaked wood chips is absolutly necessary to prevent spontainous combustion of accumulated chips. Of course this applies to woodworking machinery as well.
Being a toolmaker I find there are many times when I want the accuracy or the quickest way to do the job is with metal machines.

[NormMessinger]

"...spontainous combustion of accumulated chips."

Holy smokes, Ken. What kind of oil are you using that would cause spontainous combustion?

[Ken Hutchins]

Any accumulated wood chips can do it, the oil makes the probability worse. Chips from green wood is real bad. Sometimes small sparks from cutting tools static electricity or electric switch sparks can stay hot undetected only to ignite much later. Shop vacs and dust collectors should also be cleaned out every day.
Best to take a few precautions than risk burning the shop and/or the house down.

[Dave Fleming]

Shop vac for cleaning and frequent lubrication keeps every thing fine. Careful and daily disposal of oil soaked wood chips is absolutly Ken, that's the problem the way the wood chips work their way into seemingly every nook and cranny on any tool and with the lubrication necessary for metal working machinery and the resultant mess of oil soaked wood chips one would have to be a fanatic about keeping the machines clean and relubricated.
Before I knew any differently, I enquired about using metal working machinery for wood working and was flat out told, (not in my shop bub!).
Some time later I met a lady woodworker whose father had been a machinist and he had set her up a South Bend lathe for her very delicate wood turnings BUT the machine was lubed and cleaned a bit differently than if it was being used to turn a piece of say 4140.
PAX