Making and shaping a new Irwin 54 rudder on New Years Day 2011

We started gluing two days back,the epoxy cure time controls progress.

The days are ticking,the ARC Round the World Rally departs from HBYC club waters on January 8th,thats just seven days from tomorrow!

Ensuring a perfect fit has been important.

The depth of the two halves meant they had to be fully milled to shape by Nigel of Digicut,I then freed the small groove off with a selection of hand tools,some quite new,some very old but perfect for the job.

This was the laminated blank before I started the hand plane works.

After belt sanding,we are at the stage when we can apply biaxial glass cloth and epoxy.

Officially old

Things to dwell on from the http://www.hebburn.org/ webb pages! best regards for 2011,Roy

Officially Old


Posted by Steven Kippax on 30/12/2010, 8:19 am

Came across this and thought you guys would find it as interesting as me.

Bring back any memories?

Someone asked the other day, 'What was your favourite 'fast food' when you were growing up?'

'We didn't have fast food when I was growing up,' I informed him.

'All the food was slow.'

'C'mon, seriously.. Where did you eat?'

'It was a place called 'home,'' I explained. !

'Mum cooked every day and when Dad got home from work, we sat down together at the dining room table, and if I didn't like what she put on my plate, I was allowed to sit there until I did like it.'

By this time, the lad was laughing so hard I was afraid he was going to suffer serious internal damage, so I didn't tell him the part about how I had to have permission to leave the table.

But here are some other things I would have told him about my childhood if I'd figured his system could have handled it:

Some parents NEVER owned their own house, wore jeans, set foot on a golf course, travelled out of the country or had a credit card.

My parents never drove me to school. I had a bicycle that weighed probably 50 pounds, and only had one speed, (slow).

We didn't have a television in our house until I was 10.

It was, of course, black and white, and the station went off the air at 10 pm, after playing the national anthem and epilogue; it came back on the air at about 6 a.m. and there was usually a locally produced news and farm show on, featuring local people...

I never had a telephone in my room. The only phone was on a party line. Before you could dial, you had to listen and make sure some people you didn't know weren't already using the line.

Pizzas were not delivered to our home... But milk was.

All newspapers were delivered by boys and all boys delivered newspapers --My brother delivered a newspaper, seven days a week. He had to get up at 6AM every morning.

Film stars kissed with their mouths shut. At least, they did in the films. There were no movie ratings because all movies were responsibly produced for everyone to enjoy viewing, without profanity or violence or almost anything offensive.

If you grew up in a generation before there was fast food, you may want to share some of these memories with your children or grandchildren. Just don't blame me if they bust a gut laughing.

Growing up isn't what it used to be, is it?

MEMORIES from a friend:

My Dad is cleaning out my grandmother's house (she died in December) and hebrought me an old Woodroofe’s Lemonadebottle. In the bottle top was a stopper with a bunch of holes in it... I knew immediately what it was, but my daughter had no idea. She thought they had tried to make it a salt shaker or something. I knew it as the bottle that sat on the end of the ironing board to 'sprinkle' clothes with because we didn't have steam irons. Man, I am old.

How many do you remember?

Headlight dip-switches on the floor of the car.

Ignition switches on the dashboard.

Trouser leg clips for bicycles without chain guards.

Soldering irons you heated on a gas burner.

Using hand signals for cars without turn indicators.

>

Older Than Dirt Quiz:

Count all the ones that you remember, not the ones you were told about.

Ratings at the bottom.

1. Sweet cigarettes

2. Coffee shops with juke boxes

3. Home milk delivery in glass bottles

4. Party lineson the telephone

5. Newsreels before the movie

6. TV test patterns that came on at night after the last show and were there until TV shows started again in the morning.. (There were only 2 channels [if you were fortunate])

7. Peashooters

8. 33 rpm records

9. 45 RPM records

10. Hi-fi's

11. Metal ice trays with levers

12. Blue flashbulb

13. Cork popguns

14. Wash tub wringers

If you remembered 0-3 = You’re still young

If you remembered 3-6 = You are getting older

If you remembered 7-10 = Don't tell your age

If you remembered 11-14 = You're positively ancient!
I must be 'positively ancient' but those memories are some of the best parts of my life.
Don't forget to pass this along!!

Especially to all your really OLD friends....I just did!!!!!!!!!

Irwin 54 rudder stuffing box

Twenty years of marine service,this was the ' Before' picture.

The ' After' picture looks a whole lot better!

Sort of a before and after,we had the chance to remove the bronze stuffing box on the Irwin 54 we are making a new rudder for,plus upgrade the clamping system,our bead blaster came in handy as you can see,this is a service we offer for all sorts of cleaning works,car engine piston and valves come to mind?

Karen and Greg splash their new Argie 15 build

Greg started with one of our Dix Designed Didi mini transat kits,then had an idea,why not build a smaller design to get the hang of things,he chose the Argie 15 kit,they launched it the other day,the Didi Mini Transat is now built and turned over,so the plan worked well.

Hi Dudley,Roy,

Attached is picture of our launch day.

It has been a long time coming,but appropiately we launched on Boxing day.My wife karen and younger son Kent went on Maria's maiden voyage.

Maria was the name given to the boat (by the family) as she was the other women in my life for the year whilst building!

What a wonderful experience it has been from beginning to end.

She sails beautifully.

Thanks for all the help and support along the way.

Kind regards

Greg

Greg and Karen

One hundred thousand and counting!

When this blog thing started I had little idea how it would grow,we are into year three now,if not we should be soon? Google clocks the page impressions,checking the other day I see the all time score is over 103,000 and last months viewers were 15,000,thats amazing!

The blog is supposed to be a  generation of orders idea,I am not at all sure this is fully the case,I wander off course now and again but todays blogs get us 100% back on course with some remarkable pictures from a friend and fellow boat builder Dudely Dix.

The scene outside the Dix home in Virginia USA.........

We had a blizzard move all the way up the East Coast last weekend. We had 14.2" (360mm), which is the third highest single snowfall since records started in mid 1700s. Everything is still white and we have about 40-50mm of solid ice on the road in front of our home. Makes driving somewhat interesting. The major roads have been cleared but we have to drive about 1.5km to reach a major road. See attached photos from Sunday. That is home-made boerewors, chicken and pork ribs on the braai. I roasted a beef round the following day, also on the braai.


Regards,

Dudley Dix

Dudley Dix Yacht Design

1340-1272 N Great Neck Rd #343

Virginia Beach, VA 23454, USA

Tel (757)962-9273 Fax (757)965-3573

You know what they say, 'n Boer maak 'n plan. (A farmer makes a plan). I am 25% Afrikaner, so some of it must apply.

Regards,

DD

And I came home from the boat yesterday,it was again blowing 35knots of South Easterly I thought to myself, yet another evening without a nice braai,then Dudley sends me these pictures,am I a wimp or what!?
Roy

Tonight we braai!

Tek-Dek boat decking,in Cape Town

As South Africa's sole agents we brought a lot of Tek-Dek into the country,as the Rand currency weakened the price went up,plus we found it less UV restistant then once thought.With the Rand now at a much stronger level and the factory promising they have sorted out the UV problem,there may be a renewed interest in this decking,its very much a do it yourself type product if you have the idea to try it and some basic tools?

We still have stock to clear,not more than about four square meters but enough for the average cockpit floor or two? contact me for profiles .  Roy

You assemble the required panel in segments,then glue them down when your ready,you can do assembly at home on your work bench,then roll it up and take it to the boat later.

Laying is similar to laying a vinyl floor as its a plastic sheet with different profiles to work from.

Washable,even with a power cleaner.

Laid by a professional,who owns the boat,if more stocks are needed it will have to be imported for your job.

Irwin 54 new rudder manufacture using Vesconite

We are on the next stage of seeing a new and upgraded version of the original rudder on an Irwin 54,Charles Marine,Hout Bay, is handling the project and is doing a great job of bringing all the (many) required skills together,this is over the annual holiday period,so no mean feat at all.

The new heel fitting,the stainless is marine grade in 316,the bearing is in Vesconite,which is self lubricating and should never wear out,inside is a bronze disc with an upper dome shape for the rudder shaft to turn on.

Check Vesconite out at  http://www.vesconite.com/?gclid=CMapjavUjqYCFUoKfAodzCpP3A

It was decided to dump what was left of the original rudder,this included a total rip out of the internal structure inside the boat that supported the top bearing,we made up a marine ply kit for that and a specialist laminator fitted that bonded it in with epoxy and biaxial glass cloth.

A yacht specialist Charles doing a test fit of the new lower heel bearing shoe.

The new rudder has a longer shaft which allows a lock ring to hold the shaft captive inside the boat,we also had the machine shop mill out slots to accept the 12mm x 75mm flat bars which were then welded in place.The plys are the center core of the final rudder,our CNC shop is shaping the two outer faces,which will next be laminated to the core prior to a final power and hand plane finish and a coating of biaxial glass cloth and epoxy.

This is Tyk,Charles Marines head security officer,Tyk does a great job too!

The new rudder shaft and support webs.

With the 12mm marine ply center core fitted,Charles checks the new rudder for ease of movement,it is so free that the wind was able to swing it with some ease!

More seasonal greetings

This one is from my good friend Dudley Dix,who is also our main designer due to his ever popular Radius Chine design development,its easy to build with,proffesional or amature,the Dix 45 in this christmas card is a steel construction,built for the Stockwells in Hout Bay by Brian Alcock and originally named Tantalus,it had a name change twice and is now named Vlakvark. All the timber for the boat was supplied by myself (Commercial Lumber cc) ,Cherry inside and Teak in the cockpit.

The winters longest day

In England the date has  just past on December 21st, near Markfield Town, they have an Oak post cut with a deep slot in it,when the sun is square on and in line at its lowest limb,the light shines through and reaches its furthest distance behind.Thanks to Notty for his pictures.

You may also want to read about Abu Simbel in Egypt,the same idea but on a mega scale by comparison!

http://witcombe.sbc.edu/sacredplaces/abusimbel.html

The most remarkable feature of the site is that the temple is precisely oriented so that twice every year, on 22 February and 22 October, the first rays of the morning sun shine down the entire length of the temple-cave to illuminate the back wall of the innermost shrine and the statues of the four gods seated there.


Try also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Simbel_temples  ,its an amazing feat of engineering!


Roy