Little Egret: an Egret-style day sailer

[RFNK]

Yes, space age in the way that The Jetsons were space age. Little Egrets are go!

Rick

[RFNK]

Space age in the way that The Jetsons were space age. Little Egrets are go!!



If it doesn't work, you could always install an adjustable rudder like this:



Rick

[johnno]

Is this the result of some ancient rating rule????

[m2c1Iw]

I'm trying to work out what the hull is made of sorta looks like a tyre off one of those mining tippers turned inside out.

[johnno]

Send in the torture boarders! You might well be right. Rick will tell us when he looks in next. You can see the same engrained pattern in the sand so it must be 3D.

[RFNK]

If you go to the Vietnamese Boats thread in People and Places you'll see lots of similar boats. They're made of woven strips of bamboo sealed with tar or lacquer. These ones are this extreme banana shape to handle being rowed or motored through quite rough surf on this part of the coast (just north of the Hai Van Pass, a little north of Da Nang, Central Vietnam). Note the rudder post - the rudder can be lifted high up so it doesn't hit the sand as the boat comes in. A rudder plate can also be slotted in to the stub of the rudder. It's a common arrangement from Central to South Vietnam where surf has to be negotiated by the fishermen.

Rick

[RFNK]

Here's one of the round boats being made. It shows the material pretty well:



And this is a wooden version, south of Nha Trang:



Rick

[johnno]

The flipping back upright will take place this Wednesday at high noon..make ye ready!

[Larks]

I'll be there John.

[johnno]

I'll be there John.

Many thanks Greg, there should be four of us.

I mixed my cowboy and nautical slang there a bit...apologies to any gunslingers or admirals who took offence!

[johnno]

I probably have spent about six hours mulling over the tiller shape and connection to the rudder post, another couple of hours hunting for the timber, and maybe an hour to make it. It's a simple boat and deserves a simple tiller. With the boat upside down, I couldn't really test a prototype very easily, but a lot of the old sharpies had dead straight tillers and I like the look.

Hit me if you must, but I'm also not really a fan of multi-coloured laminated tillers. I got lucky and found a nice piece of light coloured tight grained kiln dried Tassie Oak, and it was even just a short length, sitting there in Bunnings after I'd unsuccessfully hunted around the specialist timber merchants. Seems it's fairly hard to find kiln dried hardwood over 45mm thickness. I was after something 50mm square but found this 45mm square piece and it will be plenty robust I think.

Not a very interesting pic. This will probably be the only piece of wood in the boat which gets varnished.

[Larks]

Looks ideal John, I can see that a Ronstan "battle stick" would be a good fit for it..............

[johnno]

Looks ideal John, I can see that a Ronstan "battle stick" would be a good fit for it..............

I might try making one out of different diameter bamboos

[leaotis]

You can always fall back on "it's really just a work boat" or my favorite, "this part is only a temporary prototype".

[johnno]

Come to think of it, I might even paint most of it, and just leave varnish where I grip it

[RFNK]

Your attitude is all wrong. For the tiller you should laminate it in three parts, using only resorcinol to glue the laminations. The tiller must be 27 7/8 in length. The for'd third must sweep upwards in a 1.6 degree radius, while the aft section should sweep downwards in a 1.3 radius. The grip should be woven from Bolivian flax (easily obtained from any chandlers in Maine). The tiller should be laminated with two strips of Eastern Stippled Birch and one strip of Garotted Oak for strength. Call Joe at Muir's on Elm for this.

Nearly forgot. To make sure that everyone can see that you know how to laminate and that you shun epoxy, you should finish the tiller with 10 coats of Old Grump, also available at Muir's.

Rick

[johnno]

now now...

[Larks]

Your attitude is all wrong. For the tiller you should laminate it in three parts, using only resorcinol to glue the laminations. The tiller must be 27 7/8 in length. The for'd third must sweep upwards in a 1.6 degree radius, while the aft section should sweep downwards in a 1.3 radius. The grip should be woven from Bolivian flax (easily obtained from any chandlers in Maine). The tiller should be laminated with two strips of Eastern Stippled Birch and one strip of Garotted Oak for strength. Call Joe at Muir's on Elm for this.

Nearly forgot. To make sure that everyone can see that you know how to laminate and that you shun epoxy, you should finish the tiller with 10 coats of Old Grump, also available at Muir's.

Rick

Old Grump eh?? Does that come in either a gloss or matt finish? And do I need to apply it with a fine foam pad or can I brush it on with a north American beaver (Castor Canadensis) eyelash bristle brush? Do I need to thin it and what temperature range can I use it in?




(.........sorry, ..........struggling to get some momentum on a submission.........this is more fun.........)

[johnno]

So here's my pedigree...





Reality is, if coming off the post horizontally puts the tiller where you want it, any bend you put in it has to come up only to come back down. More will follow when I get the tiller/rudder post fitting back from the fabricator, hopefully tomorrow.

Meanwhile, Gary and Greg can continue to ponder what might have been..

[RFNK]

The easily obtained beaver fur brush will be fine but make sure the fur was harvested in November. Have you no experience with Old Grump? I thought everyone around here was already familiar with it. Anyway, you'll find that Old Grump usually comes with a thin skin - this needs to be removed carefully before gentle stirring. No need for further thinning as Old Grump has no tolerance for any other substances.

Rick

[davebrown]

Beaver fur? Easily obtained, yes. But expensive. So expensive.

[Larks]

Meanwhile, Gary and Greg can continue to ponder what might have been

at the moment I'm too busy pondering what might be.......

[johnno]

I hope those of you up in those northern climes have been enjoying your view of Little Egret top down so to speak, whilst we antipodeans down-under have been forced to look at her bottom-up for the last month or so. I'm afraid your time has come, and we need to re-establish for ourselves a more normal view of her, and I need to get back to work on her interior and decks.

So, at high noon, the team assembled for a pre-flip bonding session. Unfortunately Greg had some urgent business at the last minute and couldn't make it up. To gee up the troops I'd laid out a small feast, with the promise that a trouble-(read scratch/ding to the boat) free flip would be rewarded with a pizza supreme. Again, for our northern hemisphere friends I had especially arranged a Kookaburrra pizza supreme. No, not road kill kooka! but a speciality nonetheless.

With Greg, the strongest, sidelined for the day, I'd quickly also laid out some chips, previously laced with all the performance enhancing drugs I could find around the house...and fed them to the team. Were they up to it??????????

I quickly moved the chips towards the leanest of the trio, hoping he'd dip and flip...

and meanwhile the team pondered the correct strategy for the pas de quatre, and in particular, which position would require the least muscle power.






At this point, yours truly was also required to take up a team position, and with my wife in absentia, unfortunately the actual flip had to go unrecorded.....

Suffice it to say, the combined intelligence more than made up for the lack of grunt, and the deed was perfectly enacted. I know the dictum, if there's no pix, it didn't happen, but within moments of the flip, I managed to quickly grab the camera and record the placement of the final padding under the bows as she resumed her rightful bottom down position...




It was time for rewards, the PIZZA!!!!

However, upon returning to the deck, it seemed that whilst we had been distracted with our herculean task, someone with a taste for a good spot of kookaburra pizza had been unable to resist the spread, and had eaten the bulk of it!!!!!









I wonder what mysterious presence had been here un-noticed by us all????? Perhaps a clue lies in the bottle the mystery man left behind????? hmmmmmmmmmmmmm.........


and was that why the boat seemed so much lighter than before, even with all that extra paint and fibreglass..???

I suspect a benevolent spirit at work here, one with a strong arm and powerful mandibles.........

[johnno]

I'm sure you'll forgive me posting a couple of pix of her the right way up and with her new shiny bottom......

[RFNK]

Looks terrific John! But well done to all!

Rick

[jsjpd1]

Very well done indeed! What a nice boat.

Jim

[Larks]

Sorry to abandon you today John, but needs must and it looks like I'll be having a late night tonight to get this submission in ........my mind feels like it is wading through molasses after all of this inactivity over the last few months and it's been a slow (and often distracted) slog this arvo.

As well as it being a good excuse to get out of the house, I was looking forward to meeting your H28 mate, but I'm glad to see that it's all gone without a hitch other than the mysteriously lemonhanded pizzia (though I'd expect to see empty beer bottles scattered around it rather than an empty soft drink bottle).......She looks a treat right way up, what are the chances of rolling your awnings up for a profile shot while the suns out???

[PeterSibley]

Old Grump eh?? Does that come in either a gloss or matt finish? And do I need to apply it with a fine foam pad or can I brush it on with a north American beaver (Castor Canadensis) eyelash bristle brush? Do I need to thin it and what temperature range can I use it in?




(.........sorry, ..........struggling to get some momentum on a submission.........this is more fun.........)

Thank you Greg !!

[johnno]

Very well done indeed! What a nice boat.

Jim

Why thank you sir...as are yours, and your new littley.

[Duncan Gibbs]

Splendid John! Simply splendid!

Were there any snow-shoe tracks around the pizza? The kind worn by the people who inhabit tundra type environments? The mind races!

[Duncan Gibbs]

BTW, I very much like the "Attilla To Hold."

[P-man]

sweet looking boat! nice work.

[timo4352]

...
Do you know Larry the Cableguy down there?
He'd say now "git 'er dun!"

[Rik van der Vaart]

Looking very nice Johnno.

[johnno]

Last night I picked up the rudder assembly, with the metal components of the tiller/rudder connection I'd designed all fabricated up for me. The rudder is designed to have two vertical positions, so that I can drop the rudder 4" deeper if I need/want to, and it's also designed to have a lift up tiller, and it needs to be able to be adjustable on the water, without the whole caboodle dropping through and down to the bottom of the ocean.

This was about the most simple and functional way I could work out to do these tasks, and still be elegant and fit the aesthetics of the boat. Ignore the temp screws/bolts in this picture, I just put them there last night to hold the bits together.

The tiller pivots on the main axis/hole as close as possible to the axis of the rudder post. The second curved slot in the flange allows the tiller to come to rest without dropping down onto the cockpit coming.

The hole through the top of the rudder post is to take a rod and 'R' clip to stop the rudder dropping right through. This rod also lets me pull the rudder up and down.

There are two synthetic collars that fit into the composite carbon fibre/epoxy rudder tube top and bottom, and another synthetic washer that sits between the tiller fitting and the top collar.



Here's two views of the rudder in 'up' and 'down' position, and then the other views are self-explanatory.

I'm glad to have this done..one of the more expensive bits of the boat, but I'm pleased with the result.

[Rik van der Vaart]

Nice metalwork. So the vertical rod is solid ss? Lot of momentum on the welds but they look well done.

[andrewmct]

Beautiful and functional. Just wondering where you sourced the top and bottom grommets on the rudder shaft. Do they come from the marine fabricator? Love this thread.

[PeterSibley]

Ah! Now I see what you were doing yesterday afternoon!

[johnno]

Beautiful and functional. Just wondering where you sourced the top and bottom grommets on the rudder shaft. Do they come from the marine fabricator? Love this thread.

Yep, the fabricator turned up the grommets for me to fit the tube he supplied. I was going to get a grommet made for inside the tubular tiller fitting as well, but in the end, just went for a washer between the fitting and the grommet. They're acetal by the way.

[johnno]

Got a bit sick of painting, so I'll try to keep doing some fabrication for a while, and then turn to painting the decks, final interior coats, and the rudder and cb.

This morning, the small but not insignificant drilling of two holes in the hull for the centreboard pivot pin. There's not many reference points available for this, and obviously the location of the board within the case is pretty critical. In the end I used a plumb bob to set things up and it seemed to work okay.

Of course, unless I got adventurous and slung the whole boat three to four feet higher using the roof structure, there's no way to really tell how the full depth extended swing of the board will work. It'll just have to wait until the launch I guess.

I guess next I'll make some collars for the mast holes in the deck, and for the rudder tube. Then I might start to think about the coamings, though being the weekend, timber purchases might have to wait until Monday. Maybe some mock-ups might be the go. I haven't decided on final dimensions for these parts yet.

[hokiefan]

Hey John,

Love your Little Egret. Egret has long tugged at my heart-strings as a boat I have to build. Right now it is just barely second string, only because my thoughts run to a bit smaller sailboats. About the size of Little Egret as it happens!!! Keep up the good work.

Cheers,

Bobby

[leaotis]

Here's two views of the rudder in 'up' and 'down' position, and then the other views are self-explanatory.

Pretty work, especially the way the tiller attaches to the gooseneck.

Is there anything to keep the rudder shaft from coming up? I'm thinking of the boat pitching.

[PeterSibley]

John, will there be a lanyard of some description attached to the centreboard ?

[WX]

Looking Good there Johnno.

[johnno]

Mack, good point. When the rudder is in it's normal (up) position, which is where it's bottom face equates to the lowest point of the hull, it can't really go up or down, because there's virtually nowhere for it to go. If it rises up, it would only be about 1/2" before it meets the lower collar. It can't go down. When it's in the down position (4" lower), it can't go down any more, but it could rise up. I guess I'm hoping the weight of the solid SS rudder bar will keep it down. If that is not the case, then I will have to make a little restrainer of some sort, but I think I'll wait and see.

Peter, yes there is still a centreboard cover to go in place, which has a short slot for the cb handle to move along, and acts as the restraint to its lowest point of drop. I want to talk to Ross to see if we put a bar through the handle as an alternative end stop. Then there will also be a pulley system to use for intermediate cb positions and full up. That will be pretty conventional.

[PeterSibley]

Perhaps a strong wooden dowel and a couple of rubber stops ? A section of broom stick?

[johnno]

Peter, it'll most likely be an adaptation of this set up. I'll have a pin (bronze) through the 45 degree handle brace for travel with stoppers (but not black) for 'full down' but I'll also have some tackle and a cleat for intermediate positions.

[PeterSibley]

I look forward to your solution as my JIM will need a few little ideas too, (JIM being the Selway Fisher canoe yawl I showed you the plans for ).

[Larks]

Peter, it'll most likely be an adaptation of this set up. I'll have a pin (bronze) through the 45 degree handle brace for travel with stoppers (but not black) for 'full down' but I'll also have some tackle and a cleat for intermediate positions.

John, I don't know if the Hartley set up would work for you, the weight of the CB keeps it down nicely and it's not tied down into a position so that it can kick up if you touch bottom, but I have a simple block arrangement from the CB "handle" to the mast step and back to a cleat just forward of the helm. So quite easy to raise and lower the CB from the helm position and simply tie off to the cleat at whatever height suits the sailing at the time.

[johnno]

Yep Greg, that's exactly what I meant but didn't explain very well by saying I'll have tackle and a cleat. I'm sitting basically at the aft end of the centreboard case though, so no need for a long set-up. I have weighted the centreboard (remember the lead saga) so it'll have neutral or negative buoyancy. The rubber fitting on the handle is about protecting the last bit of the movement into the full down position so that the timber handle is not hitting against timber centreboard top, and the pin is to take the pressure of the tackle off when needed, for example, storage or travel.