Fitting Out (Year 9):

Date	Discussion
April 2018	Ok - here we are! Yet another chapter in our ongoing mission to boldly go where no sane person should go - not if you want to stay sane anyway. Some people just want to split the atom - we split infinity itself. (Come on Star Trek freaks - get with the program)! Yes, "Year Nine" of the fit-out process and in just a very short few weeks it will be TEN YEARS since the first piece of keel was "laid" on its mould and Rhapsody's journey into existence began. Ten years! Can you believe that? I was sixty years of age and should have known better, now I'm - well, you work it out! I had no idea of the scope of the project I had undertaken, but I do now and on balance it's been pretty good. Building a boat is a great way of finding out about all the skills that you DON'T have and all the details of things you use in daily life that you never knew - or even knew that you needed to know for that matter. How high is a bench top, how thick is a standard inner spring mattress and how far should a toilet bowl be away from the wall etc., etc....? You want to know? Just ask me - I know all these things, at least, I do now! Right - on with the show...
25 May 2018	At the end of the last Chapter, I was describing the convoluted process of designing a couch that changed profiles from being a comfortable armchair to a more upright shape to serve as a dining chair. The change in reclining angle being managed by an linear electric motor. "Was I making it too complicated", I asked myself? I finally had to concede that the answer was "yes" and somewhat reluctantly, I have abandoned the idea. Anyone want a linear electric motor? Very little use... I still have to consult with my upholstering "hero" to see what I can do to make his job easier and still produce the right result, then build a frame for the ultimately non-reclining couch. Another "business arising" from the last entry was to do with carpets. I had bought a couple of metres of each of the selected carpets to test them out. I had selected two different polypropylene carpets, a heavier one for the floors in a dark blue, which is 4mm thick and the other for the wall linings in a 3mm light grey. They look really good together. I cut some small pieces to use as spacers whilst I dry fitted the access steps. These bits were used to ensure that the steps will still fold up properly once they are carpeted and I also cut some bits to test their flammability. I viewed this test with some trepidation since I was fairly certain that I wasn't going to like the outcome. Surprise, surprise - whilst the carpet certainly does burn, there was not the flare-up that I had dreaded. Yes, it is possible to set it alight, but it takes a while and it really isn't all that enthusiastic about it. So, it's nice to be wrong about something. (I know - I hear you say, you'd think I'd be used to it)! You will remember the pointless and time-wasting diversion into round stained-glass windows and what a difficult job making the frame turned out to be? Well, you will be relieved to know that I won't be mentioning it again, (well-not much anyway), because it's finished and so is the actual stained-glass window itself for that matter. Not only that but wait, there's more.... The hole in the wall between the sun-deck stairs and the passage outside the bathroom is cut too. It's a really scary thing to attack a perfectly good stained and clear finished timber wall with a router and cut a 255mm hole in it. One slip and..... Happily, it didn't happen, so all is well. Now, I just have to fair and paint the outside of the wall and the window can go in. I won't post a photo of the window until it's installed and looking its best. You'll just have to wait dear Reader! One of the things I did discover after cutting a great big hole in the passage wall was that it weakened it a fair bit - I know, why am I surprised? Anyway, it seemed prudent to bring forward the job of installing the mouldings around the frame of the door, which will be fitted at the bottom of the sun-deck stairs, which I shall now call the "back door". These are two mouldings of Meranti that will form the door jambs and will also return some of the strength lost to the fitting of the stained-glass window (portlight). Mouldings are not really difficult to make and produce a very professional looking "finish" to hide the various quality of carpentry which would otherwise be very visible and obvious. However, making mouldings is very time consuming. It involves cutting sawn timber boards to the approximate size required, then running them through the Thicknesser to produce a finished lathe. Then setting up the router table several times to make the profile required, rounding off all the edges and then sanding the resulting pieces. As I said, not all that difficult, but a couple of different profile mouldings can easily take most of a day. Having installed the door jamb mouldings around the back-door, I was a bit dismayed to find that the one adjacent to the stained-glass window hadn't provided as much extra stability as I would have liked. After another cup of tea and some head scratching, I decided that the moulding was too light and would need to be replaced with a heavier one. It is always distressing to have to remove a piece that you have just spent significant time making and replace it with another one that itself took much the same time again to make. Never mind having to remove the old glue and make good the surface ready (again) for the new moulding. Anyway, it is now all done and looks terrific! The door jambs are both now ready for a "jazzy" tri-fold back door - in due course.... And yes, you guessed it, more stained-glass in there too, because I can. At least, I think I can... I have mentioned the folding access staircase at great length elsewhere and I'm not going to revisit it except to say that aside from painting, it is now finished. Its major role in life once it is folded up, is to be the helmsman's seat. So, it seemed like a good time to purchase a suitable cushion and try it out. Having purchased some 100mm thick high-density foam at great expense, I was immediately faced with a problem. Because the access steps need to fill the 800mm gap between the side deck and the saloon floor, the seat is necessarily 800mm off the floor. This was all part of the plan since it would sit you high enough to have a reasonable view over the bow of the boat, but I hadn't actually considered the practicality of lifting one cheek high enough to actually get seated on the cushion - if you see what I mean. Moreover, my partner is shorter than me so her "cheeks" are somewhat lower than mine, (although not by much, as a subsequent investigation has shown and, no I'm not detailing that research project here). So, what to do? It was immediately obvious that the floor area just around the immediate area of the helm needed to be higher than the surrounding saloon floor, like a stage or dais. This would of course, also improve visibility during mooring for example, when you might choose to stand-up to see over the bow more clearly. (You might use the raised area for toasts, sermons on a Sunday morning and so on, but I digress). I decided that an area of floor raised 195mm would solve the problem and given that I hadn't actually built the floor in that area as yet, seemed a good solution. An extra length of floor joist was installed to hold the edge of the dais and the actual raised section made on the bench, which is almost ready for installation. The dais and all its components all have to be easily removable of course, in order to be able to access the black tank hatches under the floor. With the dais test-fitted, it is now possible to slide a cheek (both cheeks actually) quite easily onto the helmsman's cushion and perch there very comfortably, with what is really quite good view. Now the sitting position is resolved, we can start on the dimensions and layout for the dashboard and engine controls. What fun... Those of you who have battled through the earlier parts of this document may recall a discussion about a ladder outside the boat, to get from the top of the transom on to the sun-deck as another way of gaining access to the saloon. The ladder idea was abandoned because it obstructs the walkway across the back deck and it was suggested that a couple of separate cast ladder rungs could be simply attached to the back wall of the coach-house to serve the same purpose. Indeed, my engineer friend Phillip at CA&E, had a casting plug that could be used to make the necessary steps. So, the backwall of the coach-house was angled forward at precisely the angle required by these castings and the wall was made double thickness (25mm) in order to be strong enough to support them. However, despite "the best laid plans" and all that, it turned out that there was a problem. The casting plug I had selected was intended for aft leaning steps because the non- slip patterning was on the wrong side and not having any alternative, I forgot all about it - as you do. A couple of weeks ago I was wandering around the dark depths down at the back of the boatyard, where the dead boats go to await their fate and noticed an old G-Craft cruiser with three very sorry looking cast bronze steps bolted onto the transom. After a quick enquiry, they were kindly donated to the cause (thanks Moose) and after much huffing and puffing and bad language, they were removed for cleaning. On looking around the old G-Craft a bit more, I noticed a bronze fairlead-cum-anchor guide, which I quickly realised with a bit of "bending" with a large hammer, would fit the top of my stem post perfectly. Looking at the G-Craft's stem post, I noticed a long stainless steel "cut-water" strip on the front edge which I also removed, although I can't use it directly, it did have a shaped casting set low, near the water line, which caught my eye. I imagine that it was intended to hook to a winch to help pull the G-Craft on to a trailer. I can't see Rhapsody ever being on a trailer, but the fitting itself might be useful as a mooring or tow point. It was most reluctant to come off, but eventually it could be offered up to Rhapsody's stem post and it was indeed a very close fit. Fifteen minutes with a grinder and it could have been made for it. The last step in this process was to go and see a friendly local chrome plater. A-Class Metal Finishers have a really good reputation so that was the next stop. The parts came back today and they all look terrific. They now go and rest in the "jewellery" box awaiting the final part of the fitting out process, when all the painting is finished, and the "shiny" bits go on and a beautiful butterfly emerges into the sunlight...
16 Jun 2018	With the "helmsman's platform" finished, there has been some experimentation with the position of the controls. I bought a control set from Telex that has two levers, one for the throttle and the other for the gears. Many boats use a single control for both functions, but unfortunately that doesn't work if have multiple helm positions. There are some clunky adapter gadgets available to try and get around the problem, but they're expensive and just that - clunky! I had imagined the controls sticking out of an inclined dashboard, but the right-hand side would then cut across the window glass next to the entry door - not good. Also, I have to allow for curtains to be fitted on all the windows, so that has to be accommodated as well. The solution seems to be a small horizontal shelf about 150mm wide, set below the level of the coach-house wall. This has the effect of narrowing the width available for the dashboard, but it does allow for easy access to the controls and space for the curtain. The other very important control is the steering wheel. As mentioned elsewhere, this is a small ship's wheel 100mm across, with an electrical joystick in the centre. It was going to be in pride of place in the centre of the dashboard, but when you sit in the helmsman's seat and imagine the ergonomics of that arrangement - they're pretty awful! If you are going to steer the boat for hours at a time, you need to be comfortable and holding your arm up in mid-air without any support, would quickly become very tiring. So, it turns out that the horizontal shelf, installed to test the engine controls for layout, has just enough space available at its after end to fit the steering joy-stick. Not only is it a much more comfortable spot, being alongside your right knee, but it looks as though it was always planned to go there. No-one ever needs to know the truth... The only remaining concerns are that the dashboard is a bit smaller than I expected and I do have a number of gauges and switches to fit somewhere and the matter of a backrest of some sort is still unresolved. On the subject of things "unresolved", I need to mention the couch again. This was going to be easy. There is an "L" shaped area in the port aft corner of the saloon that was always intended to be fitted with a couch and a coffee table - easy. I was so sure that this arrangement would be straightforward that wiring for a decorative light fitting over that top of that coffee table was built permanently into the roof right above where I thought that the table would go. I have mentioned elsewhere the extensive research and design work that went into trying to make a couch comfortable for lounging as well as dining. In fact, I built a test chair that was able to change the seat angle to achieve that with the use of an electric motor. All that was fine until I realised that it was probably over-complicated, would be a challenge to upholster and that I should just stick to the KISS principle. ("Keep It Simple Stupid" as opposed to SNAFU). I had invited my upholsterer friend John, to come over for a coffee and all my good decision making about KISS and the like, was thrown into complete disarray when he looked at the mocked-up "electric chair" and said "Wow-that's terrific. Yes, we can upholster that, no-problem". You're absolutely no help at all John! So, the "electric chair" as we've begun to call it (is that "Gallows" humour do you suppose), or at least a couch made up of multiple individual electric chairs, was back on the agenda. The next step of course, was to start building the real thing. On a piece of MDF, I made a full-sized drawing using numerous examples of chair design from the Internet to find the best compromise dimensions for comfort and all was going well until I realised that a chair that lays back a bit is quite deep. In fact, if it's up against a wall, it needs about 750mm or more in front of that wall just for the chair, never mind an allowance for leg room. When I went into the boat and laid out the proposed design on the floor in its corner, the realisation arrived like a wrecking ball, that there was no way it was going to fit. Pity! The space in the corner is about 1350 by 1800. So, it would not accommodate an "L" shaped couch. By the time you have used at least 750 of the 1350 on the short side, there might be room for a single seat position remaining, and that doesn't allow for any legroom. Not good. So, if it's not going to work what to do? This is a "several tea-bag problem" and took serious "ponder" time sitting in a plastic garden chair in the saloon imagining all the other possibilities. The result is to return to the original design philosophy of making comfortable accommodation for just two people by abandoning the "L" shaped five-seater couch idea in favour of a two-seater side-by-side lounge with a coffee table in front. It's on the short side of the "L" although for a two-seater will actually be quite wide. I may even have room to include a little "drinks table" at each end. The electric chair concept is back and much easier to build for two-seater couch and an electrically operated height adjustable table is still being investigated. I will make the table a little larger than necessary so that visitors can pull up folding chairs to the other side as the occasion demands. And, also so that the hanging light in the roof doesn't look quite as much as though it is in the wrong place! The new seat frames were started yesterday. I haven't used the word "finished" lately - unfortunately! However, I have mentioned that there is to be a round stained-glass window in the passage and I can say that it at least, is finished. The hole is cut in the wall and its stained Australian Oak frame is also finished and ready to go. The only part of that still to do is to fair and paint the sun-deck stairs wall. It will be exposed to the weather, so it has been glassed and finished with Peel-Ply. However, it still has to be filled, sanded and painted - the worst part of building a boat!!! I've started looking at installing the bedroom roof now too. It has been left so long because it lets a lot of light into the interior of the boat, which makes working there much better. However, the time has come. It is not a particularly difficult job, but it's a big area and will take some time. Although as a prelude, the edges and "fiddly bits" have to be finished first and the roof over the passage is the more difficult. It is pitched at an angle because it covers the steps from the bedroom to the saloon and is complicated by the fact that it is flat, and the surrounding roof is curved. However, the panel has been made and is on the bench for painting. Another job that has finally wobbled to the surface is that of the hatches in the decks. There are three hatches in the foredeck; two for gas bottles and one for mooring lines and maybe the anchor as well. There are four hatches in the after-deck; two for mooring lines and two for removable fuel tanks. The plan is to take a cast of the deck areas concerned to establish their profiles and then cast suitable hatch lids and surrounds in fibreglass. I had always intended to hinge the hatches, but that has some challenges in a curved deck and for general accessibility. So, I'm considering completely removable hatches now for simplicity and yes, they will have tethers! Duh! The required hatches were marked out and plastic sheeting placed over the top to act as a mould release. The sheet was quite thick (0.2mm) and even with considerable effort, was difficult to make lay flat on to the boat. Also, it was practically opaque, which made transferring the design very tricky. So, try something else. A plastic drop sheet from the local paint shop was the next idea. It is much thinner so that it lays easily and accurately on the hull and it is reasonably transparent so that the design could be transferred easily. Terrific? Well, no... It turns out that the plastic drop sheet is made of polyethylene, which doesn't get on well with polyester resin or more particularly the catalyst, I suspect. As soon as the resin and the fibreglass were applied, the drop sheet plastic underneath softened to the extent that it slid away from its proper place and then proceeded to lift and bubble making large corrugations in the glass layer on top, making it useless. So, on to Plan C - when I think of one...
21 Jun 2018	Update: - Well, Plan "C" turned out to be just a variation on Plan "A", that is, to use the same, thicker, polyethylene sheet as I had started with, but in smaller pieces so that it could be stretched more tightly. This option was only really possible because I happened to find a sheet of material from another manufacturer that was fairly translucent, allowing the design to be successfully transferred through from the underlying timber onto the surface of the film. Another potentially "bright" idea I thought, was to glue the film down onto the timber to stop it moving and lifting. I had an aerosol can of spray glue around and it was actually quite successful. I was able to stretch the plastic sheet out tightly enough to get the wrinkles out and the glue then kept it there. At least, that was until I put the polyester resin onto it. Then, the same thing as before, despite the extra sheet thickness, there were wrinkles and blisters all over, and - well, so much for Plan "C"... Ok, this is serious. Over yet another cup of tea, I realised that if the next step in the process of making the hatch moulds was to involve using "vacuum bagging", which has its own plastic film component, why don't I use that film for Plan "D", because that must be chemically stable when used with polyester - mustn't it? I found a local outlet for vacuum bagging supplies and bought a couple of metres of the special film, which I now discover is made of nylon and not a "poly" anything. That has to be a good thing, right? On the upside, I'm getting really good at masking up the aft and fore decks with plastic film, unfortunately - which is not hard to imagine when you're doing it for the FOURTH time! Anyway, having cut more fibre glass mat and mixed another pot or two of polyester resin, it all went on very smoothly. After an hour or so, when the glue had almost set (it was a very cold day), there's not a wrinkle or blister in sight. So, if it stays that way overnight, it'll be a success! About bloody time...
27 Jul 2018	I see from the dates that I have been less than attentive to the story of Rhapsody in the last month. I have been building a deck on the back of my house and that has taken up some of the available time. Excuses, excuses - I know. However, there has been some progress. The "cliff-hanger" at the end of the last post was the possible chemical interaction difficulties with polyester resin and various plastic films. Success at last. The moulds are fine although getting together with Moose to learn the next part of the process has been a problem for the moment, but we'll get there! The couch for the main saloon is more or less finished. There are just some more fibreglass reinforcements needed internally to complete the frames. The linear actuator motors turned up and are terrific, although designing mountings for them has turned into a challenge. The seat "buckets" have a piano hinge along their front edge and given that no potential storage space on a boat should be wasted, it would be useful if the seat buckets could be pulled right forward away from the couch to access the usable space behind. This ambition implies that the linear lift motors need to disengage at least at one end, to allow that to happen. Firstly, that's nuisance and secondly it requires that the motors be re-engaged when the couch is put back into normal use. This action will require some degree of re-aligned as well and is an even bigger problem. The solution seemed to be to mount the upper end of the lift motor on a steel bracket and simply put a "ball" on the other end that will drop in to a slot and become self-aligning. To make that happen, the motor mounting area is fairly confined so that it has no choice but to point in pretty much the correct direction as the seat bucket is being lowered. As a further insurance, the lower mounting for the motor is shaped as an oversize box with a sloped bottom, to slide the end of the motor shaft into the right place automatically. The bottom end of the linear lift motor is just a 20mm shaft with a flat end and given that the alignment of the motor changes with its height, a pivot or hinge type bearing, or more specifically a ball shaped end cap is required to allow it to move without binding. I didn't think that machining a couple of half-ball shaped end caps from a length of Nylon rod would be all that difficult - well, not until I tried it anyway. Apparently, there's a special lathe attachment for machining spheres and it's really easy - if you have one. Then another solution came to mind. My son has a 3D printer and has assembled some significant expertise in that area. So, having found a 3D drawing of the part I wanted on the Internet, he was able to make one for me in about an hour. "How many would you like" says he, and "from what material"? So, a couple of days later I had four spherical end caps beautifully made of Nylon and a much better job than I could have done using a lathe - it's the method of the future I suppose. Thanks James! I invited my friend John - The Trimmer, to come and have a look at "the couch in progress" and he gave me some pointers about upholstery material. Having not long ago been shopping for carpets, it's hard to believe that I am now shopping for upholstery material. I thought you only did those sorts of things when a job was almost finished - does that mean... Well, not really, but it's getting closer. I suppose the curtains will be next. As I have said many times, one of my least favourite jobs is painting. To be more specific, it's not the actually putting on of the paint that I dislike, it's preparing the surface first. So, this why this particular job gets a mention here - the side walls of the sun-deck stairs. They represent a big area and the double frustration is that as sheets of new plywood when they were put in, they were perfectly flat and ready for painting. Now, since they've been glassed for strength and weather protection and despite using Peel-Ply, they need to be sanded all over to bring them back to the flat paintable surface they were to start with. Humph! Anyway, if I want to install my now finished framed stained glass window - it has to be done.
27 Aug 2018	The side walls of the sundeck stairs are still not painted because there's a hitch. The top edge of the wall can't be finished off until the roof panel that sits over the inside steps between the bedroom and the saloon is installed. Of course, the roof panel must be made first and then... you guessed it - painted! It is much easier to paint roof panels on the bench before installation as I discovered quite some time back. So, the new roof panel was cut and dry-fitted and then painted with wood preservative. Two coats of polyurethane Hi-Build undercoat and one of gloss finished the job. Nothing difficult, but like all these things it seems to take for ever. One point to note in passing however, is the trial of foam brushes. I have been using high density foam rollers for gloss finishes and given that this panel was quite small and that the roller covers are expensive, I had an attack of rampant parsimony. So, I wondered if a foam brush at about 50c was worth a try and was delighted to find that it was outstandingly easy to use, and the results were excellent. No brush marks and a really great discovery, I shall buy some more. With all that done, the roof panel was duly installed and edges rounded ready for glassing into place. Then perhaps, I can paint the wall of the sundeck stairs finally! Whilst tidying up around the door to the sundeck stairs I remembered that I still had to clear finish all the replacement Meranti door jambs. I described why they had to be replaced elsewhere and that's all done now too. I'll even have to start thinking about the tri-fold door fairly soon as well! There's another voyage into unknown waters... The sundeck stairs are open to the weather. Rain will simply fall down on the stairs and drain down eventually to the bottom step. The original plan was to provide a sump under a grating built into the bottom step and take the water out through a hull fitting. It turns out that doing it that way would have the skin fitting too near the water line and is not really workable. I don't want to use a bilge pump to remove the rain water because in case the batteries fail whilst the boat is unattended, when the water will simply drain into the bilges - not good! It looks now as though I will have to do away with the sump idea and simply drain the bottom step directly out the side of the hull. This will raise the skin fitting by 200mm or so and that should be enough. I have bought a cockpit drain fitting which has a one-way valve built into it and the only debate now is whether to put a "fall" on the bottom step to help things along even if that makes it feel a bit odd to walk on. The Red Gum combing for the main hatch has received some attention this month too. It has been heavily filleted into the roof and reinforced with fibreglass. The top edges have been rounded over and are ready for finishing. The sides of the main hatch itself have been cut to the shape of the roof and edged with a solid bead of epoxy to provide additional abrasion resistance. The electrically adjustable all singing and dancing saloon couch has been the subject of a lot of attention. So much so that even I'm bored with it. So, suffice to say that it's finished and has received its first coats of timber preservative. I will paint it with polyurethane interior next week and then it can go to John for trimming. The amount of work involved in the rotten thing has been completely disproportionate to its role on the boat, however - it will be fun when it's finished I suppose! One of the little jobs happening in the workshop at home is making a start on the electronic Rudder Position Indicator system. Since I've started planning the dashboard with its jazzy joystick steering control built into a baby ship's wheel, it's going to be needed soon. The rudder position at any time is shown by an array of nine LEDs. There are four red for Port and four green for Starboard with a white one showing mid-ships position. I have the sending end electronics partially built too and that will mount on a bracket over the top of the rudder post, which was made oh so long ago...
8 Sep 2018	Now that the combings round the main hatch are finished, it has been time to start the hatch itself. Actually, the roof part of the hatch was made ages ago using the same curved mould as was used for the roof beams, so it should fit the roof shape at least. I wonder if that's enough to stop it leaking in the rain - don't all hatches leak? The hatch's side rails have been made too, as mentioned above, but now all the parts are glued together and ready for dry fitting. The only question remaining is how the top edge of sliding cabin door will be accommodated and sealed. The door will slide on tricky little runners in a special plastic track, all of which I imported from America. So, I might have to make the door soon as well. Ah! The pressure... The door is really only a frame for a large fixed glass window and it is the last of the glass pieces that needs to be cut for the boat. A milestone of sorts maybe or should that be "kilometre stone" these days? The sloped roof section above the stairs between the bedroom and the saloon is made and installed, but I was rather disconcerted to realise that from inside the boat, I can see daylight through the joins, which is not good in a roof that is going to be open to the elements. Of course, the problem is that the new roof section is a piece of plywood that is flat, which is being made part of a roof that is curved. So, gaps at the sides are inevitable really, I suppose! Still, as someone once told me (only about 500 times), "Bog is your friend" and so a tapered filler piece was made and "bogged in". Voila - no more daylight, (or rain - hopefully). Whilst finishing off the "slopey" panel, I decided that it's perhaps time to start on the bedroom roof/sundeck proper. It's a big area and it tapers towards the aft, making it an awkward shape as well. The roof beams were deliberately placed relatively close together since it is to be a load bearing floor. They are about 295mm apart, which is really inconvenient when you have plywood sheets that are 1220mm wide. The width of the roof is around 2800mm and that's not very convenient either! Duh! Anyway, a plan has been drawn up and I've made a start. There are three odd shaped panels that surround the top of the sundeck stairs and form the bathroom roof which have been made first. They will be marked up and painted on the bench before installation as was done with all the other roofs - it really is much easier than painting overhead, once the roof is installed. Now I have the rotten electric couch off the bench ready to go for trimming, I've even got a bit of space back ready to paint roof panels - Oh joy... And, someone asked if my two-seater electric couch was really just a double "electric chair for the guilty"? Now there's a thought...
9 Oct 2018	With a bit of bench space available again, the first three roof panels were made, dry fitted and masked up on the bench ready for painting. These are most of the bathroom ceiling, the remainder of the passage and the top of what I'll call the "dressing table". That's the space on the forward wall of the bedroom on the starboard side. There's a shelf with what will be a chest of drawers underneath a mirror above, perhaps with more shelves. I do have some wiring to hide in that corner, which was the original reason for the mirror and that's probably what will happen. The three roof panels fill in all the odd shaped areas on the roof and leave just four simple, almost full sheets, remaining. The three panels are now painted and fitted and look terrific. Two of the remaining four, are also now cut-out and ready for painting. The main hatch is now made and fits quite well. It now has a 40mm combing all around which fits over a corresponding combing on the roof, which should allow it to seal well against wind and rain. The outside edge of the hatch has to fit over the main cabin access door, which I haven't made yet, so it will have to wait for a while. It will be a sort of "pelmet" arrangement eventually. I've resurrected the door's sliding track and door lock from the "glory box full of stuff bought so long ago" and have started planning the door itself. It will need to be 40mm thick to accommodate the lock and will be glazed eventually. That's the last window on the whole boat, which is yet to have its final dimensions determined. Painting the combination Helmsman's seat/Entry stairs has become a problem. It has several faces that will be visible, and each is to have a different finish. This creates a dilemma about the order in which they should be done. For some reason, I decided to stain and clear finish the front faces first - bad idea! When it came to timber preservative and undercoat on the white painted surfaces, despite liberal use of masking tape, I managed to wreck the clear finish. OK, do it again I hear! Yes, but to sand it down and do it again, when the face veneer is only 1mm thick creates the potential to expose the underlying timber, which is a different colour! Still having no choice, that has been done, but the result is fairly disappointing, which is a shame. The last faces are to be carpeted, so I have bought some more of the dark blue marine carpet to do just that. Putting a roof on sounds pretty straightforward. However, it does raise a number of little "gotchas" along the way, that have to be addressed first. Such as: do we have access holes for the wires to connect all the concealed lighting? Are there wires that need to be embedded and hidden in the roof beams before the roof goes on - things like the bathroom light switch, the ceiling fan and the stern navigation light? Are the top edges of the vertical walls that are to meet the roof, fitted accurately and finished properly? The answer to most of these questions of course, was "no". The wall of the passage is made of two butt joined sheets of plywood that are stained and clear finished, but of course, the edges, where they are visible, must be finished properly too. In the bedroom, along-side the dressing table, the edge of the plywood is visible from floor to ceiling and so must have a trim strip and that must be done before the roof goes on. Now, making an appropriate moulding is not a big issue, but it takes time to find a suitable piece of contrasting timber, set-up the thicknesser to trim it to size, then set-up the router table to mill the required shape. Then, you get to fit it and finish it - easy! That moulding took a whole day to make and install - I'll sand it down as well, when I get a minute! I mentioned the boat's concealed LED lighting above and it is becoming more and more useful as I install more of the roof, because it's getting progressively darker inside the boat! In fact, I have taken to having the lights on inside the boat all the time so that I can see what I'm doing. To automate things (because I can), I have connected the main shed lights through a transformer to the boat's lights and now they all come on together, which is nice. On September 17th, my partner's father passed away at the ripe young age of 98 - RIP Gordon...
24 Nov 2018	A few weeks seem to have sped by since my last "confession" and I have to remind myself repeatedly that designing and building Rhapsody is supposed to be a hobby. Although treating it more like a "job" is easier from a personal discipline point of view. One of my other hobbies as a licenced Captain, is driving paddle steamers on the River Murray. I have deliberately reduced my time on the river in the last couple of years to make more "Rhapsody Time" available. However, I was asked to fill-in recently for a good friend who is not too well, and just had to spend a week steaming down the river. It is a tough job, but someone has to do it... We finished the last "instalment" making a roof for the bedroom, which is also the sundeck floor of course. In common with the other roof areas it is made of three layers of 4mm plywood. The first layer is laid at 90 degrees across the hull and the remaining two layers at 45 degrees in each direction to that. It's called Double-Diagonal planking and given that the roof has convex parabolic shape as well, is comparatively light and very strong. The roof beams in this section are generally spaced at about 275mm, although they vary here and there to fit in with other requirements. The details of some of those "requirements" are now lost in time and I have no idea what some of them may have been - Ah, well. The first layer of roof panels are the visible ceiling of the bedroom and are painted on the bench, which is much easier than painting between the roof beams "in-situ". However, it is one of life's puzzles that if you put a panel on the roof and secure it with locating screws and draw around the areas to be painted, leaving those that are to remain unfinished ready for gluing, that when you finish the painting and come to put the panel back in the same spot, with the same locating screws - the paint is in the wrong place. Amazing! The error is usually so small that only I would notice it, but a puzzle nonetheless. The whole ceiling painting process uses many metres of masking tape of course, and I have discovered to my cost that not all masking tapes are created equal. The glue on many of the cheap tapes is very tenacious stuff, particularly if it is left on for more than few hours. The roof panel painting process involves a coat of epoxy sealer, two coats of undercoat and a final gloss coat. Each of which, except the last, has to harden sufficiently to be sanded, which takes a little time. The result is that the masking tape may be in place for a week or more and the glue on the cheap stuff dries out in that time to such an extent that it becomes a major problem to remove. So, the moral of the story is: "Don't be such a bloody cheapskate and buy decent masking tape. Yes, it's expensive, but oh, so much easier"... I mentioned earlier that all the hidden wiring had to be completed before putting the roof on. Not only is all that done - at least, I hope I haven't forgotten any cables, because it's too late now, but all the LED lighting strips are installed as well! The LEDs are all described as "warm-daylight", but the colours actually vary quite significantly between strips. They were all purchased at the same time from the same supplier, but some have quite a blue tinge and some are almost yellow. It's a pity because it looks a bit odd - but not odd enough to try and correct! One of the major items to be constructed on the roof (once it's finished) is the air-conditioning system and some detailed design work has been required in preparation for that. For those dear readers who are not local, a word of explanation about evaporative air-conditioners may be useful. (I use the term "readers" here in the plural in the faint hope that there are indeed more than one of you - or any for that matter)! The South-East corner of Australia where Rhapsody will spend her time, is very dry. Rainfall is low and most of the time, so is the humidity. As a result, and at its simplest, it is possible to provide a significant cooling effect by just blowing air through a wet rag. Many homes in South Australia are fitted with a commercial version of such a unit and Rhapsody will have hers. There are three vents in the saloon wall behind which are three 12inch fans. They will be provided with speed controls to adjust the airflow into the saloon from outside via a wet "pad". The pads are 100mm thick and have a honeycomb structure that is kept wet by flowing water across their top edge in a "gutter". A small pump is installed under the floor near the waterline and provides the water flow. It has a separate switch so that the air-conditioner can be used for ventilation only. The waste water is returned to the raw water reservoir to avoid a continuous "dribbling" noise, which may have unfortunate consequences, particularly at night... A further two 8inch fans are provided to create a flow of cooled air for the bedroom via a trunk on the roof. The trunk will be incorporated into the Portside edge of the roof and should not be particularly obvious. Car radiator fans are used because they are readily available and cheap. Also, they are particularly designed for continuous use and have sealed and waterproof motors. The whole air-conditioner unit will be hidden in a cupboard which is also the base for a permanent BBQ grill for the sundeck. With any luck, it should be largely "out of sight, out of mind". Just recently, whilst looking for something else, I came across a piece of plywood, painted on one side with an elaborately shaped hole in it, that had obviously been carefully made for some job or other. It was some minutes before I recognised it. Ah, yes! Just behind the toilet, I had made a cupboard for spare toilet rolls (as you do), and this was its door. For some reason, I had only painted it on one side and had put it aside until the next time I had a brushful of gloss paint available. I think that was about five or six years ago. So, whilst painting roof panels recently the said gloss paint was available, and the job completed. Once it was dry, I went to fit the door into the boat with some trepidation because I had no recollection of where the hinges, screws or door catch might be. I shouldn't have worried. One of the benefits of NOT tidying up too often is that all the necessary bits and pieces, albeit somewhat dusty, were right there, where I had left them. So, a few minutes with a screw driver and the cupboard door was re-fitted and looking gorgeous. Not only did all the screw holes still line up, but with a small "click", the door closed perfectly. Nice!
24 Dec 2018	The last boat building session for the year is complete. I might have a few days between Christmas and New Year, but Christmas in South Australia can be a bit hot and this year's forecast is no exception. After Boxing Day, the temperatures are set to be in the low forties and working in a steel shed is no place for mere humans to be on such days. So, I suspect that the boat will now have some time to itself until next year, to languish in peaceful contemplation of its sins! Like - how much time and money has it cost me, how things that should have been easy have not been and a myriad of other challenges it has set me. The broader picture of boat building as a hobby is that challenges are good! Acknowledging the old adage "If you don't use it, you lose it" I have certainly maintained a greater level of fitness and mental acuity than I would have done over the ten years of the "build", (yes - ten years) doing anything else! Indeed, I have had to learn many new skills to deal with some of the issues that have come to light. That is not to suggest that I have become an expert in any of them, but a passing acquaintance at an amateur level has been achieved here and there and has been great fun. "Jack of some trades and master of none" is entirely apposite here. I'm not going to reveal the construction cost of "Rhapsody" even to myself! Especially to myself!! I do have a spreadsheet somewhere, but when the total cost to date passed three times my original estimate - and that was some time back, I stopped looking! I don't want to know!! However, one figure I worked out the other day which is of passing interest, is the cost of the fuel to physically travel to the workshop and back in order to spend all that money on building a boat. Consider - the shed is 86kms from my house, which is a 172Km round-trip. I work 2-3 days per week on average, which amounts to around 25,000Kms per year. My vehicle uses about 10 litres/100 Km, which is 2,500 litres of fuel at an average of say, $1.50 per litre, which amounts to $3,750 per year. So, if I've been building for ten years, that's $37,500 just in fuel costs - and it's not finished yet! Now, do we want to think about shed rental as well? No, nor me, but you get the idea... The up-side this week is that the sundeck / bedroom ceiling is finished - more or less. The three layers of double-diagonal 4mm planking are complete, with only a layer of 200gsm glass to go on to finish it ready for painting and carpeting. I have been wondering whether the carpet may actually be artificial grass. After all, all dwellings should nave a small garden - yes, I know.... The sides of the coach house above the sundeck, need to have some reinforcing added to support the safety rail stanchions and the air-conditioner and its trunking, has to be completed, but those are all jobs for next year. Now for some turkey and Christmas pud.
24 Jan 2019	Happy New Year to all my stoic readers - those masochistic souls who are still persevering with this tome. Well, there's at least one anyway and if you can persevere, so can I. However, we're having a bit of a hot spell at present, which given that it's mid-summer in Australia, is hardly surprising, I suppose. The forecast for today is "sunny with light winds", which sounds lovely until you read that the expected temperature is 45C, which is not so lovely. Boats are built from the ground up, so whilst having the structure of the boat largely finished is great, it does mean that all current work is necessarily near the top, both of the boat and of the shed - where it is hottest. Under a tin roof in 45 degrees is no place for mere humans and for precious little else, I suspect. The sun-deck roof has been the target of such work as has been possible in the last few weeks, after the Christmas and New Year silliness died away. One day where the temperature was only in the high twenties and epoxy could be used without it setting so fast that there is no time to do the job properly, half the sundeck received its sealing layer of 200gsm fibreglass cloth. I'm still waiting for a day that is cool enough to do the other half! The edges will need filleting and taping as well to provide extra rigidity, once the whole roof/deck is covered and sealed. Because the sundeck is open to the elements, it has to cope with rain. Not that we've seen much of that lately! However, a provision is required "just in case". Some 25mm I.D. PVC pipe set at the edges of the deck as baby "Freeing Ports", should do the job. Naturally, run-off from the roof shouldn't run down the windows for preference - in case someone has left them open! So, four outflow pipes have been installed above the gaps between the windows. They may stain the coach house sides, but that's better than draining into the boat. All areas that have multiple uses have conflicting requirements and one of the design challenges is to not only identify them, but to find solutions as well. Necessarily, some of those solutions are compromises. The rainwater drains mentioned above being placed over the solid area between the windows also, as it happens, means that they also occupy the strongest parts of the roof, which is exactly where it was intended to place the handrail stanchion mounts. The stanchions have yet to be made, so their base plate sizes are unknown. Also, it has been strongly suggested to me that they should be bolted in place rather than screwed, which means that access to the underside of their mountings will be required as well, simply to tighten their nuts. (Another comment here is really tempting - but...). To further complicate matters, the Portside edge of the roof, amongst the stanchion mounts and the rain runoffs, must also provide the air conditioning duct for the bedroom below. That duct must also be able to be opened for cleaning or repair etc., so one or more access hatches into the ducting, are also required. As I said before, multiple use areas can have multiple conflicting issues, each of which needs some thought. Right, some solutions. 30mm holes for the rain run-off pipes, have been drilled at a slight down angle from the floor of the sun-deck. The pipes will be epoxied into place and cut off flush with the coach house sides, between the windows. If the run-off stains the paintwork - to bad, get used to cleaning it. The two pipes on the Port side will be 190mm long so that they can drain right through the A/C duct. A template for the inner vertical face of the ducting has been made from 3mm MDF, together with six disposable chipboard frames to ensure that the real panel ultimately gets installed correctly. "Why go to the bother of making a template", you might say, it's a simple enough panel isn't it? Well no - the ducting itself has some complications too. The stanchions that will be mounted on the top face panel of the ducting aren't upright, they have to follow the angle of the coach house wall and lean in toward the middle of the boat. Also, that same top panel is curved fore and aft, to provide the aesthetic line of the top of the boat. And just to complete the picture, you may recall that we're building this ducting on the sundeck, which is itself curved athwartships. Lovely stuff - there's only one right-angle in the whole thing and it looks weird. There is an aphorism on the shed wall in big letters, it says, "Nothing on a boat is flat, square or level - it's OK" and in this case, nothing could be more true!
14 Feb 2019	OK - a suitable cool'ish day turned up eventually and the starboard side of the roof was glassed. Then, yet another day of below 25 degrees allowed the centre and final, part of the roof to be finished off too. The Port side has been filleted and glass taped as well, although that will be inside the air conditioning trunking. The A/C Duct described above in some detail, has turned out to have even more complex requirements than first thought. Following the aesthetic line of the coach house is all very well, but there is the small matter of the Fly Bridge to consider. The Fly Bridge will sit on top of the saloon roof and have a flowing curved shape at the sides to taper down and meet the top edge of the existing coach house above the mid-point of the middle window. It will have a second set of engine and steering controls and maybe a windscreen and Bimini as well. It hasn't been given much detailed thought thus far, although I do have the basic plan drawn up, because I can't build it until Rhapsody finally leaves the shed, since there isn't enough headroom to fit it now. The sides of the Fly Bridge will be taller than the sides of the coach house at the forward end and allow the A/C unit to be a bit taller as well, and that changes the shape of the front half of the A/C duct - again! All of which is going to look decidedly "odd" until the Fly Bridge is finally installed, but it'll be OK - trust me! However, the upside is that it does allow both 200mm fans to be used to ventilate the bedroom as originally planned instead of one, which is nice. Two fans rotating more slowly providing the same airflow as one fan going quickly, should be quieter in operation during the night as well. The A/C duct pipes air across the bathroom ceiling to the bedroom. That suggested the idea that an additional vent could be easily be installed in the duct, which would service the bathroom as well. It is not to so much the blowing of cooled air into the bathroom that is attractive, as the notion of pressurising the bathroom a little to ensure that it ventilates properly though the window and through the 100mm solar vent that will also go in eventually. Nothing like fresh air in the bathroom, depending on who used it last... I had planned to use some simple rectangular wire mesh air vent grills in the bedroom ceiling for the cooled air, but quickly realised that the air flow would just be straight down. After extensive research, adjustable louvred grills seemed to be out because they are too big, so the solution seemed to be some round stainless-steel grills I found, that still have louvres, but they're fixed and not adjustable. Given that there will be four outlets in the ceiling, I can mount each of them to blow at a slightly different angle and so adequately distribute cool air around the room that way. The down side is that the A/C duct that started off at 150mm wide and then become 175mm when the enclosed volume and therefore airflow were calculated, now had to be changed again to 200mm to suit the size of the new vent grills. Every change of size means changing all the curves as well, of course - nothing trivial. Good thing I hadn't glued it in yet!! The coach house is made of 12mm plywood, so the top edges (other than where the A/C duct is built), need to be reinforced with some substantial carlins. I made a carlin for each side some years ago, whilst I was still thinking that the top edge of the coach house would be straight and horizontal. In its final version, it is neither of those things, so I had just cut them off and set them aside (actually, one broke off - ah, well)! The beams were made of three thicknesses of plywood, each 80mm wide and over four metres long, and glued together. I dug around under the boat and found the cut-off section for the Starboard side and discovered to my surprise that not only was it almost exactly the right length, but with the judicious application of some skilful "brute force and ignorance" and bad language, could be persuaded to adopt the new curved shape. How lucky is that - waste not want not? The A/C duct fulfils the role of carlin for most of the Port side, which is just as well, since for the life of me, I cannot find what I did with the original Port carlin - gone... Part carlins were then made for the remainder of each side of the boat, to fill in the top edges of the coach house right down to the very back of the boat. They were then sanded to the same curve and look terrific. The aft most edge of the sun deck, where it meets the top of back wall of the bedroom, was originally shaped to be a smooth curve across the boat, although the wall underneath is actually three straight panels each at a slight angle to the other, rather like the windscreen. Given that the centre portion of the roof also forms part of a set of steps down to the transom, it ended up with a slight lip which would make a fair trip hazard - for me principally! So, I have shaped the after edge of the sun deck to be the same as the back wall of the bedroom beneath. It has been epoxy filled to hide the carpentry sins and will then be rounded over to finish it off. A friend of my son has a NC Laser Cutter. During a recent visit they loaded a copy of the Rhapsody Logo I designed, (which is on the top of the Home Page) and used it to burn the design into some timber ovals. Actually, the machine cut the ovals out as well - scary! I now have a set of six very nicely monogrammed coasters to fully protect the surface of the lovely saloon table - that it will have, when I build it!
19 Mar 2019	Autumn in South Australia officially starts on the 1st of March, but it's a pity that no-one actually told the weather that it was now time to stop being so bloody hot. We have had the longest, hottest summer on record and temperatures over 40 degrees have been common for days at a time. One day, the temperature in my carport reached 49.5C and I don't know about the temperature inside the shed, because it was too hot to go inside and read the thermometer. Needless to say, not only can I not work in such temperatures, but epoxy doesn't work very well then either! Some progress has been made however, and the fibre glass sealing over the sun-deck/bedroom roof is now finished. The after edge of the sun-deck, across the boat, has been reshaped, rounded over, filled and glassed and looks terrific. The full length carlin on the top edge of the starboard side of the coach house and the part carlin on the port side, are also finished. They now have a thickness of 37mm and feel very solid when you use them as "handrails" whilst walking around the outside of the boat. Oddly, the sun-deck makes a very comfortable worksurface when you're standing on the transom too, because the height is just right and it also feels very satisfying to stand there doing various jobs whilst surveying the "creation" stretching out in front of you! The A/C duct, which has required such an inordinate amount of attention, is also complete, more or less! The wall of the duct has been filleted into place and glassed both sides and the PVC pipes for rain run-off have been glued in as well. Putting straight pieces of pipe across a curved section of roof is a bit of a battle, but the judicious use of some heat from a hair dryer finally persuaded the straight PVC pipes that being slightly curved was OK. The duct now has all four of its 115mm vent holes cut to pipe air into the bedroom. Each hole has been lined with epoxy because the air coming from the A/C will necessarily be quite moist. One advantage of moving to a bigger round vent is that it's large enough to get a hand through should any maintenance inside the duct be required - like attaching the handrail stanchion bolts. The duct also now has a slightly smaller (95mm), hole cut for a vent to cool the bathroom. Another 95mm hole has also been cut in the bathroom roof for a simple ventilator. I have a solar powered extractor fan that will be mounted somewhere at the front of the fly-bridge eventually, that will provide some level of continuous ventilation. (More so during the day, I suppose - given that it's solar powered...)! The A/C duct needs a "lid" to finally close it off of course and this has now been cut out. It is on the bench being painted with timber preservative before final installation. The inside of the duct has been painted with preservative as well, although much of it is already covered with epoxy and fibre glass, you can never have too much sealing to try and keep the pesky moisture away from the timber! Reinforcements to the "lid" of the duct that will become the mountings for the handrail stanchions, have also been made, painted with preservative and installed. The stanchions are stronger if they are bolted to the roof/duct, rather than screwed, so space has been left so that their nuts and spreader plates can be installed via the bedroom ceiling vents. The forward end of the duct carries two eight-inch car radiator fans on a suitable mounting board. The fans are set at 45 degrees to the duct allowing bigger fans to fit in a smaller space. It will also give them access to a bigger area of the water absorption pad, which in turn, will make them more effective. It's all a fairly tight fit and is a set of compromises of course, like everything else on a boat, but it's designed to get "the most out of the least"! The use of two fans instead of one, should provide the maximum airflow with the minimum noise - no bad thing for a bedroom. The box to contain the rest of the air conditioning system is coming into being as well. With the duct finished, the remainder of the aft facing "intake" panel of the unit could be made up and installed. The air intake panel is really just a frame to support a section that will be covered with fly wire and removable for cleaning. Airflow for the saloon is provided by three 12inch car radiator fans. These fans are ideal for this application because they have a slim profile, are intended for continuous use and have waterproof motors. I had three what I thought were suitable units in the shed, that had been salvaged from various previously owned vehicles. However, when I pulled them out, I realised that being second hand, they were all slightly different - particularly their mounting hole spacings, which was a nuisance. Whilst then idlily trying to remember where those fans had come from, I also realised that they were already quite old. One had come from a 1985 Subaru! So, bite the bullet and buy some new ones! One of the other advantages of using car radiator fans is that they are not only very common and easy to get, but also therefore, relatively cheap! As an aside - whilst looking for fans on eBay (as you do), I noticed that they are available with either straight or curved blades, which made me wonder why? It turns out that curved blades are apparently slightly less efficient, but are much quieter in operation, which is handy for an A/C system. It was also handy, because quite by chance, that was what I had already ordered - before I actually found out why - still, you have to win one once in a while, don't you? Occasionally, eBay suppliers keep their stocks in Australia and so it was in this case. As a result, three nice new fans turned up in less than a week, rather than the usual inexorable trip from China. I cut a plywood panel on which to mount them and that is now painted with preservative ready for installation inside the A/C box. A couple of other tasks can now be "ticked off" as completed, such as glassing the main hatch cover, which is now finished. Actually, it's only finished on three sides, because the outer or starboard, edge has to "mate up" with the sliding saloon door, which I haven't made yet. It will need a sort of pelmet arrangement to keep the rain out whilst allowing the door to side fully open (and closed I suppose)! That line of thought forced me to realise that I really can't put off making the sliding door any longer. Not only because of finishing the hatch, but if I am to get the boat painted and moved out of the shed so that the Fly Bridge can be made and fitted, then a saloon door is probably a fairly useful thing to have! The sliding door will also contain the last piece of window glass for the boat for which I don't yet have a pattern. The sliding door requires a track along its bottom edge. It can't hang from the top because of the opening hatch. The track should also secure the door so that it cannot just be lifted out - or fall out for that matter, which makes it fairly specialised. I sourced a suitable track quite some time back from a company in Florida. It has a couple of little trolleys with four wheels each - they call them "gun carriages", which is a fair description. Each wheel has a stainless-steel bearing and once installed in the track, is captive so that neither it, nor therefore, the door itself, can be removed without taking out the whole installation, which can't be done from outside the boat. It's all made of high-density plastic and is UV stable. Buying the right thing for the job is sometimes just easier! Of course, we'll absolutely ignore the cost here, just for sanity's sake... Entry to the saloon is over the side deck of course and whilst mounting the sliding door track on the side deck would be very straightforward, there's an issue. (Isn't there always)? The track would stick up 40mm into the doorway and make an unacceptable trip hazard - for me principally! So, with a predicable degree of self-interest, I decided that the track should be let into a trench in the deck to make it lie flush and therefore, remove the trip hazard. Sounds easy if you say it quickly. The deck at that point is both straight and horizontal fore and aft, which is unusually helpful of it! The deck does slope slightly away from the coach house for rain run-off, but that is minor. The side deck is made of 12mm plywood supported underneath on the inside and outside edges by 40x50mm timbers. It provides significant strength to the whole structure and is really very solid! Half of the required trench is very close to the coach house wall precluding the use of a router to mill the slot or just about any other power tool for that matter. The other half is across the doorway which made it somewhat simpler. However, cutting a 45mm deep trench in solid timber and epoxy, where access is limited, is no trivial task, as I discovered. I managed to cut the sides of the trench with an oscillating saw eventually, although the fully cured epoxy underneath completely destroyed a whole packet of blades in the process. Then, I just had to remove the timber from the trench the old-fashioned way - with a chisel and mallet and a fair bit of time! (And, some damage to the knuckles of course)! The trench is now cut and just needs to be lined with epoxy and/or glass to bed in the sliding door track. Since it will be exposed to the weather, I'm wondering if the track needs some arrangement for drainage. I'm rather afraid it might - better put the kettle on and think about that. The apparently Sisyphean task goes on...