The album of Ariel #422

[CapnK]

Ebb -

I found these potential foam tillers, they come apparently in both a straight and a curved model.

[Tim D.]

Ebb -

I found these potential foam tillers, they come apparently in both a straight and a curved model.

This forum is much to dignified for me to comment on this

[ebb]

Tim,
B & S Extrusions makes that foam tiller material.
They're a division of Marshmallow Composites LOL.

But there already are foam and carbon tillers in the market.
They just haven't got around to ones you can sit on. Yet.

[CapnK]

To pull this thread back from the Brink of "Inyerendo"... ;D

(Sorry in advance for the bad pun, but - Ebb made me do it!)

The end is near!

The end of an extended stay at dockside for me and Katie... ;D

Went to the welders today, he will have my interior bulkhead-replacing custom aluminum tubing mast support finished next week. WOOT! It's the one piece I have been needing in order to get moving on the interior, and in order to put the spar back up and sail again...

It's being made of 1 & 7/8" tubing, with a wall thickness of ~5/32". It is replacing the original wooden beams of white oak, and so will be much stronger and stiffer, and will also allow the interior to be much more open. I'll post pics when I get it, with more details.

Ever notice that nobody posts full info on their external chainplates? Well, I'm fixing that...

The new exterior chainplate material goes off to the shop tomorrow. I have decided to have someone who is set up for it do the cutting and drilling. The material is the same stock as what originally came on the Ariels (1.25" x 0.187"), but all the chainplates are longer, and they will be mounted externally on the hull.

Additionally, I am going to a split-backstay arrangement, vs the stock single backstay. Below are a couple pics of the chainplate stock, marked for cutting and drilling. The uppers are 18" long, the lowers and backstay plates 12". There is one of the original chainplates in the pic for scale/comparison; IIRC, they were 8-9" long.

Measurements for the holes:

The top end, I traced from the original plates. I then flipped the original plate over, and drew on the bottom hole (in order to have a proper amount of material around the hole. Then for the shorter plates, I measured up 3.5" for each additional bolt hole.

For the long upper plate holes, I repeated the above for the top and bottom holes. Then I took the original chainplate, lined it up on the bottom hole mark, and made the next hole mark by skipping one of the original holes. I don't recall the exact distance, can post it if needed.

The plates will be bent for a fair lead on the shroud 2" below the uppermost point. The first hole down on the lowers is 2.5" below the top lip of the drip rail/gunnel, 3.5" on the uppers. This gives plenty of room to get a wrench on the nuts inside, when attaching them to the hull.

The proportions look right to me. Input anyone?

[CapnK]

This is what the welder is making for me, approximately. The tubing is 1 7/8" outer diameter, thick wall (5/32") tube. The overall dimensions are included in the graphic.

The bend in the top piece is as follows: the center 12" is flat, beyond that there will be 1.5" of 'droop' at the end of each side. This shape conforms to the shape of the cabin roof, which like many Ariels, has been flattened from a smooth curve by 40 years or so of mast weight/pressure. The top tube will also have a flat plate about 2.5" wide welded along the top edge for its whole length, as seen in the graphic to the right side. This will spread the load once the mast is back up, make for a larger bearing area, and to make mating the support to the cabin roof easier.

The height of the support allows it to extend a bit more than 2' below the top edge of the cutaway bulkhead, which was trimmed just above the level of the port-side cabinet top. 6 3-4" square plates will be welded to the verticals, with holes that bolts will go through to attach the whole thing to the bulkhead. I may also opt for a 3rd hole which goes through the tubing (a triangle pattern for the bolts). There will also be some gussets at the top where the tubes meet, to help transfer the horizontal loads to the vertical.

The internal width of the two vertical tubes is the same dimension as the original Ariel doorway. The faint blue line on the drawing approximates the cabin trunk, deck, and bulkhead.

This structure is costing, "ballpark", between $200-300, and is being made of a bright finish tubing. The compression strength of the tubing is over 1,000#, I was told. This is the material used to make 'tuna towers' and hardtop frames on large sportfishing boats (35-70'+). All I will have to do to finish it for mounting is to drill the holes for the bulkhead bolts.

I told the welder that other folks might be interested in getting one of these, since so many Ariels have had compression effects, he said he could always make more.

[bill@ariel231]

Kurt,

interesting.. will there be a foot to the columns to transfer the mast step load to the cabin sole?

cheers,
bill@ariel231