The plans have arrived!

I have just returned from Scotland where I spent several days on the Isle of Skye. I highly recommend this beautiful corner of the world. Some shameless advertising: The Dun Flodigarry Hostel on Skye is awesome. Coincidently, Iain Oughtred lives on Skye, but I did not go looking for him. Maybe next time. My gasoline powered rental car got 45 mpg on the bad days, 55 mpg on the good days, and my friend's Citroen Belingo has more space and more utility than I could ever ask for, and got an easy 50mpg. Why we can't get this in the states is beyond me. "The American public doesn't want it" and "we don't have the technology" is nothing but lies, lies, lies.

I digress.

Upon arrival stateside, I found that my GIS plans were waiting for me. They are quite comprehensive. The pages are not numbered, but I would say about 95. I think I read that somewhere too. There are definitely some words I don't know, some I do, and some I need to double check on. Storer provides a list of all the tools I need, in addition to the lumber and supplies.

Everything construction related is measured in metric, with tight tolerances, right down to 1mm and so forth. The size of the needed lumber is also provided in English/Imperial sizes as well for ease of purchase. The panels of the boat are drawn out on 8' x 4' marine ply, in some cases there is very little room for error without wasting a piece of plywood or two. Something that concerns me is that for the for the pieces that take two panels joined together (such as the side panels), Storer assumes the 8x4 pieces are true. This is America, not Switzerland or any other myriad of precision minded countries, and I'm very doubtful I'm going to get two pieces of ply that are exactly true to size and true to each other. This is a two fold problem: I have to draw the pieces onto the plywood and cut them out. The drawing is determined by measurements gridded out on the actual plywood. (This is called lofting, I'm almost positive!) So if my plywood isn't uniform on all sides with true 90 deg. angles at each corner, the measurements will be off in reference to each other, and I'll have a crooked boat. Second, the side panels are so tightly squeezed, I'm afraid I might not be able to get them out true to size if the plywood itself is off. Maybe it will be easier once I get going.

So the big question on which further research is needed is how to make sure the 8x4 plywood panels are sized and true to each other.

More reading is in order, but overall I'm pleased with the quality and comprehensiveness of the plans.

Sweet boat!

I.AM.PSYCHED!

UPDATE: The plans are 76 pages long, not including the drawings. My good friend Matt has advised me to bring a ruler and a square with me to purchase the plywood and ensure I get the best pieces most accurate pieces. Nice!