grendel

in the background you can see those ribs for the front section, all carefully sectioned off and ready to be fitted once I get to that point. we are really getting towards the bow now.

right onwards and upwards, the front sections ribs are all shaped, so that temporary structure can come off now, a couple of ribs fixed in place and now some more ribs being steamed.

I agree, I had the brake system on the car apart at the weekend, as there was what felt like a rogue activation of the ABS, as part of the process I removed the abs sensors and cleaned them, also wire brushing the rings that the sensor reads. after I had done all this, monday comes and I have an abs light on and no speedo. new sensor ordered, which I fitted at lunch time today - still no joy.a full check of the system showed where I had unplugged the connector on the ABS unit, and it hadnt reconnected properly, two pins that hold the connector in place were stopping it being fitted properly, pull the 2 pins out, refit the connector and push the locking pins back in and everything is back up and running, cost £14 and half an hour, much cheaper than even taking it to the garage for them to look at it.

this morning I woke up at 5am, with an idea in my mind. I had some old telescope drive motors and gearboxes lying around, what if I could convert one to a mudweight winch for the model. so when I got up I grabbed one to inspect at work, yes I think it really might work. This evening after steaming some ribs up, bending them on the former, etc I dug out some old gears, would they mesh with the gearbox - yes, grand. now all I need to do is add a winch drum to the gear, make up a mounting bracket, add a motor controller, and a winch should be born. it should be just small enough to mount on the forward bulkhead.

It is a good laugh when the youngsters come round, but can be a bit disconcerting with the gangs of older late teens come round, as they tend to ignore the no thanks signs, or no decorations- no participation, and I can imagine that they could seem a bit threatening to elderly residents. Unfortunately we no longer participate as by the time I am home from work, all of the younger kids have finished their trick or treating, and its the older ones (strangely enough the same ones who at christmas come round carol singing, but dont know any of the words to the songs, and who think that simply wearing a mask is costume enough - or is that it just hides their identity).

I cant recall any halloween parties at school, I can however remember as a young adult attending some halloween themed fancy dress parties at this time of year, maybe early 80's. I do remembering being congratulated on my stiches on my forehead one year (only a few weeks after having a stone break the windscreen on my van, cutting my head open).

some more front ribs steamed up tonight.

get a big enough boat, half sink it, drive it under the bridge, then pump out the ballast, once sufficient clearance is obtained, proceed forward along with said bridge, problem solved.

Why not mount them on the bridge.

a busy day, from doing the boot fair this morning, fixing the mother in laws back door step, half an hour diagnosing a problem with the car (abs / speedo sensor failed) then a trip out to my old viking friends training session (to drop off some arrows I had found - had a quick practice with bow and arrow, and back home, then I spent a little time, clamped up some more ribs for the front section.

Sunday lunchtime shoot for me, a couple of quivers of arrows at my old viking mates training event today, I still achieved a reasonable hit rate even after a 20 year break, passed two bows on that I had picked up at a boot fair a couple of weeks back for their have a go archery stall. Sadly no pictures of this

before I get ribbed too far I have to make up the formers for those front ribs, better to do it now than when I get to a point I need to backtrack, so formers have been added in the form of faux planking, then marked out so I can steam the ribs and bend them round the former and clamp to dry, I need 2 for each location, some will end up passing under the hog, others will be notched in to the side of the hog. once dry these will be numbered corresponding to the location, thus we will form the shape of the hull at the front end, to give that distinctive shape of Broad Ambition. at the moment she looks a bit like a clamp hedgehog, I cant steam up any more ribs as I have run out of clamps, some holding the ribs I fitted earlier, others holding the formers in place.

I think they have been at my cider, they are just a bit tipsy and falling over

With all those extra ribs bent up I had a bit more I could get on with this morning, more ribs steamed (I have now moved to the former 2 jig as we are changing shape quite fast now, by making 2 ribs at once in the steamer I get one slightly bigger (to fit the stern side of the bulkhead) and one to fit nearer the bow, so if I steam 3 pairs, I can fit 3 bigger ribs, then fit the 3 smaller, I can then go to the next former down and repeat the process, after that its that awkward section where the curve changes from convex to concave between the bulkheads.

And you wonder why your phone is listed on a dodgy phone number website......

well the wood from the blinds was steamed and came out ok, it was roughed up with some sandpaper to give the glue a chance and fitted, now to see how the glue holds, another pair into the bending jig. it does seem to take the shape nicely.

I just had a small (very small) glass of some that was left over from bottling up and phew, it certainly has a kick, probably could have done with a little sweetening. but I think drinking one bottle of it will have an effect.

Ordered and paid

I would have 3 but I would be hard pressed to find the space on my desk. That said, a friend who worked for a games development company once managed to run 17 monitors off a single gaming workstation (as there were 17 optional views available in the game , he said they had to try it as someone out there in game world would surely set up a machine that way).

useless for CAD as you cant draw accurately enough on a touch screen, I think I will just stick with my 2 24" monitors at work (with a spare slot to add a third if I need one)

This afternoon, as I was relaxing I started looking at my cider, it had stopped bubbling a while back, so I siphoned off the liquid (one demijohn still had a lot of frothy pulp floating on top - the other had none. As I siphoned off into jugs, I put the result through coffee filters into a spare demijohn, this takes quite a time to filter through. The second demijohn being clearer 2 jugs had very little sediment, so these have been bottled with some sugar to put a bit of sparkle and fizz into the mix. further bottles were filled with the filtered cider, the rest is either filtering or waiting to be filtered, now to see if the bottles can take the pressure (my ginger beer was known for exploding bottles)

Well these bits seem to steam ok, I tried one of each and fitted them in the jig together, we will see when they come out tomorrow.

day off work today as I had a dentists appointment, besides we use the grid reference finder all the time at work.

from the grid references, the southern most bend of the river just before the locks inn is 327m further north than the southern most bend of the river at Beccles, on the other hand The Locks Inn is197m south of the Yacht Station at Beccles, so you takes your pick.

besides, he's not a matelot any more - he has been promoted to Salty sea dog (it must be official - it was on the telly).