now begins the actual work. Darren is standing on the ladder 3 feet off the ground so we could get a sense of how tall the boat would look when on-site. It is Darren's metal shop I am using to do all of my fabrication work . it is around 20,000 square feet of heavy things. it seems like everything he owns weighs 5,000 pounds or more, not least of which is a tugboat, though it's not in the shop He is also a very adept and creative problem solver, something which has been invaluable to me as all the engineering for this has happened as we worked or as problems came up (often).
in order for the boat to withstand winds of, say 40 mph we needed to beef it up. We decided to attach steel rails. In order for the steel to mimic the shape of the hull required two different bends: sheer, the vertical dip from bow to stern and sweep, the sideways curve from bow to stern. We did this using a steel bending machine.
