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On 24th May Wendy & I made another visit to
the boatyard. By this time the cabin floor was in place, along with the
insulation and the deck-head lining. Much of the electrical wiring was already
positioned ready for the cabin lining to be fitted. The main job of the day was
to make the final decisions about precisely where the internal bulkheads were
to be placed - in my drawings these were shown by lines, but Richard builds
good solid bulkheads with appreciable thickness. Needless to say while we were
dealing with this all sorts of other matters came up for discussion and were
decided.
Front view - with cat-flap
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Inside views
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The
"demi-semi-trad" stern with the hatch in various positions.
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At the time of this visit Phil, the carpenter, was still
working on another boat and would start the fitting-out of ours very soon. The
cabin lining will be in very pale ash with nice chunky panelling round the
edges. By the time of our next visit in about three weeks, we expect to see all
the internal bulkheads in place. As Richard said "Next time you'll see
rooms".
Looking forward
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Looking aft
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Our next visit was on 16th June. Phil, the
carpenter, had made good progress. The deck-head lining had all had its first
coat of varnish (in the front half of the boat) or paint (in the after half).
Quite a lot of the cabin-side lining was in place, and some of the framing for
the internal bulkheads (of impressive solidity).
The bulk of the day was taken up with three conferences.
The first was with Richard and Phil about the next stage of detail
concerning the carpentry in the back half of the cabin. They'd started there
because there were rather more crucial dimensions there than further forward. I
had a long conference with Dave Moore, who will do the signwriting and
decorative painting. We decided to do the signwriting in a proper Thomas
Clayton style. Dave was happy with the idea of "four seasons" castles on the
side-hatch doors, but not so happy with "day and night" castles on the back
doors, so we went to plan B for these which is for an abstract BCN style.
After an excellent lunch at the tea-room of the local
garden centre, we had a conference with Guy Taylor, who will fit the 230v AC
electrical installation. He was happy with the brief I'd written and came up
with a few good refinements. He went off muttering about talking to the
manufacturers about how to get the various pieces of kit to work together
happily.
Our next visit was on 6 July, when we arrived at Ashwood
with our present boat to use as a forward base. Phil had made good progress on
the structures in the back half of the boat.
We came up for a few days on 19-21 July. The demi-semi-trad
area had been lined out (including the two cabinets that would hold a lot of
the electrical gear). The sewage and flushing-water tanks were in place, as
were their skin fittings, and Phil was in process of building the starboard
part of the cross-bed around them, and then the folding section. The main fresh
water tank was fitted while we there. We went with Richard to B&Q to choose
flooring, wall tiles, bathroom fitings etc and decided we weren't enamoured
with any of their kitchen units and would rather have Phil build ours to match
the rest of the woodwork of the boat. I also had a long talk with Guy about
what of the electrics would go where.
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We were off cruising for much of August & early
September, and our few quick visits to the boatyard didn't produce any
pictures. On 13 September we arrived back at Ashwood with Felis Catus II
and for a few hours our old and new boats were moored side-by-side. Inside the
boat, the bathroom and study were almost complete, and Phil had moved on to
building the main structures in the front half. The main units in the galley
(except the high-level ones) were in place, as was the dinette in the saloon,
and on the day we were there Phil was building the oilskin locker inside the
front cabin doors. The engine was all set up and running. Meanwhile Guy had all
the electrics in place, had just taken delivery of the batteries (110 amp-hour
Elecsols - 6 of them in the domestic bank, one for engine starting and two for
the bow-thruster) and was testing the various parts of the system.
Phil needed me to talk through the design for the cabinet
on the starboard side inside the front doors, and with Phil and Richard we
re-thought what flooring to use in the galley - it will now be the same as in
the bathroom. We talked to a firm that also work in the boatyard and
commissioned them to make the cushions.
Our next visit was on 26 & 27 September. Phil had
finished the oilskin locker, apart from the door, and built the hearth that
will hold the Morso Squirrel stove. The firm next door had completed all
the cushions, which look very good. Guy had finished commissioning all the
electrical control gear and talked us through its use - it looks pretty
complicated on paper but sounds as though it will prove fairly easy to use.
He's built in a multipurpose meter that will help diagnose any battery
problems.
Phil was currently working on some of the trim and
finishing in the back part of the boat - the linings for the back dog-box and
the back side-hatch hole. We had a long talk with him and Richard about
possible completion dates. Richard said that we're nearing the end of the five
months he reckons for a normal fit-out, but ours will take rather longer
because our design uses considerably more than usual fitted furniture that has
to be constructed. So it now looks as though we're looking at a November
completion date, which means we'll have to play "dodge the stoppages" if the
boat's going to go to Ian's covered dock in Oldbury for the final
paint-job.
We also measured up for the curtains. The upholstery
company are going to get us a quote from a firm they know.
On 11 October, Wendy went to the boatyard by herself, as I
was laid low with a bug. The main purpose of her visit was to meet somebody
called Christine about the curtains. When Wendy had chosen the fabric,
Christine quoted what seemed a reasonable price, so Wendy made a firm order.
While she was there, Dave Moore was fitting the fist pair of decorated
doors.
We both visited again on 25 October. Dave had now fitted
all four pairs of decorated doors - two pairs for the side-hatches decorated
with roses & castles and the inner and outer back doors decorated in an
abstract BCN style. Inside the boat, Phil's work was well advanced. The two
high-level cupboards in the kitchen were complete (apart fron their doors), and
the lower-level kitchen cabinets had their doors and drawers. The bathroom
cabinet and study booksheves were also complete, as was the first run of
shelving below the port gunnel. Phil had also made good progres on a lot of the
finishing detail like the port-hole and ventilator liners and the trim round
the windows. The ceiling lights were all in place, although their switches
weren't yet fitted - waiting until the cabin sides have been varnished. We
talked through a few more details with Phil, and Richard showed us some
possible models of reading lamps for us to choose from.
On 2 November we made another visit. The cabinet inside the
front doors was almost complete and Phil was working on the shelves above it.
The light switches had been fitted.
The next visit was by Wendy on her own as I was once again
feeling under the weather. On that occasion Phil was busy making doors.
On 22 November we both came up again. We actually travelled
the day before, stopped in Birmingham to buy bedding for the boat and stayed on
our old boat overnight. Nearly all the internal & cupboard doors were in
place, but as yet without their doorknobs & latches. Richard was able to
report that Christine had now made all the curtains except the one for the
front door. He also showed us the special tailor-made triangular cat-litter
tray he'd made to fit in the space we'd allocated for it. With Phil, we decided
to reduce the width of the shelves under the gunnel in the saloon to give a
lightly wider corridor past the cabin table. He said that by our next visit
they hoped to have finished the internal carpentry and to be fitting the
flooring, upholstery & curtains.
Our next visit was on 3 December. This was the first time
we'd been up on a Saturday, so we actually met Anthony for the first time since
he started work fitting and commissioning the boat engine. But it was far from
the first time we'd met him, as fifteen years before he'd fitted out our
previous boat. Phil was finishing off the arched doors to the cupboard over the
bed-hole (see the third picture below), having also built some more sets of
shelves. The crochet port-hole covers we'd ordered had been delivers, and we
were delighted with them, especially when we found they fitted the port-hole
liners so snugly that the edge-rings they were provided with held them in place
with no need for any further fixings. We bright with us a whole load of
fixtures & fittings and spent some time briefing Phil on where we wanted
them installed.
The end of the inside work was now well in sight, and we
were able to write in our diaries a provisional date for moving aboard - 15
December. There will still be some outside jobs to be finished off at that
stage, and we'll have to wait until after Christmas to move the boat to Oldbury
where the final paint-job and signwriting will be done.
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