Mosquito...it Lives!!!!

In case everyone figured I was just goofing off for the last few weeks here is the latest. My mom has been down here almost every weekend for the last 2 months and she has been a great help. It has also helped to start familiarizing herself with the boat. This weekend my dad came down and offered his assistance cutting out parts and gluing them in. It's amazing how much more you can do with 2 people.

We have finished up the cabin sole or sleeping shelf of whatever you want to call it. I prefer "great cabin" and this weekend we installed the main deck with it's hatch opening. The deck is made of a strip building product called duracore. It is 3/8" end grain balsa sandwiched between 1/16" strips of western red to give it some longitudinal stiffness while planking. We laid up a 25" wide cambered panel of it on a curved mold (bent plywood) all in one shot in a vacuum bag last weekend. The panel was 9lbs before fiberglass which is a little more than 4mm plywood (0.4lbs/sqft versus 0.6lb/sqft) but the advantages are that the inside of the "cabin" has a smooth roof for sleeping comfort while still giving the deck adequate stiffness for tromping around and raising/lowering the mast. The deck could have been a foam core layup but this stuff was laying around and about to become firewood.

The daggerboard tunk halves are laid up and ready to be joined and then installed in the amas. The daggers are ready for a final fairing and last coat of epoxy.

The Amas will get some 2lb expanding foam and then the decks will be going on as soon as the trunks are complete.

The next big milestone will be the first float and test paddle sometime in early december. I will be going out of the country over the christmas holiday so work will be on hold until I get back to finish all the rigging and get her sailing sometime in February with the race the first week of March. Yikes.


Current weight breakdown (I know your curious): drum rollllll....

Main hull: 105lbs plus bow deck, hardware, more epoxy (looking like it will end around 125)

Amas: 45lbs each plus some expanding foam, decks and trunks. (looking like around 65lbs a piece) Daggers: 12 lbs each

Rig: recently purchased a carbon stick that was on a Bimare Javeline 18HT catamaran. maybe 30lbs

Add sails and rudder, rigging, lines and some more epoxy and she is closing in on 350 at an alarming rate. I am doing my utmost to keep this in check. I'm still emotionally ok with the her weight. We will see. Whatever it comes out at you'll wish it was lighter but thats just the way it goes.

She has also earned her name. 'Mosquito'

Aside from the many mosquitoes that have met their end by flying into my wet epoxy and become part of the hull (and those that I have swatted), she will be a fast racing machine in all wood and so a nod is given to the de Havilland Mosquito which was a wonder in it's own time. Once the fastest plane in the world at 400mph and constructed of all wood. Pretty Amazing. I often feel like I am building a fuselage as much as a sailboat. Mosquito video link

UFC Tri Update

Time seems to be flying by and I have been working night after night. My mom has been driving out to help on weekends and this has been a great help. I'll bring you up to speed on what has been done and what is left to do.

All three hulls are now in existence. 2 amas at equal stage of constuction. The second ama went together more smoothly and is very fair and tight and I believe a bit lighter. All hulls have a coat of epoxy on them. The daggerboards have been built, machined and sanded and await epoxy coating. The main hull bulkheads are complete. The waterstay connection points are complete in the main hull. The transom has been installed and the "cabin" floor is going in in the next few days. The aft and bow decks are cut out and coated and will go in within the next couple of weeks pending the fiberglass aka tubes being installed. I have layed up a cockpit seat and the bow cockpit size and location was finalized and cut out this weekend.

Among the remaining tasks are the daggerboard trunks, Ama decks, aka-ama connection structure, aka-vaka connection structure (fiberglass tubes). installing deck support structure, installing decks, making hatch covers, making another seat, installing seats, making main hull aft cockpit. Make structural bow cockpit hatch. Sand everything and apply second coat of epoxy. make a rudder, tiller and cheeks. Those are the big ticket items at least.

Oh yeah, I also need to aquire a mast and sails, trampolines, trailer, rigging and hardware. No problem right? EEsh.