Current 'state' of affairs

So have been very busy lately, had a little restoration project with Jacqui. She's breathing new life into a old chair so there quite a bit of play in the old joints (somewhat like myself) so I'll be putting that back together hopefully tomorrow. You can see it on the bench there.
So this is the workshop that the currach will be built in. At the moment it's probably one of the messiest workshops in Ireland if not the world, quite different to the pristine workshops you normally see on the net!
Lots of tidying up to be done this weekend and next week before I start laying out the frame for bending and figure out some way of creating steam. Left my wallpaper steamer in Vancouver so the next one will probably consist of a large pot and a gas flame to generate more significant quantities of steam.
As you can see the loft is very well lit now, just finished that the other night cos it only ever had one bulb that worked off a 2 way switch. Lights were kindly donated by my buddy Rob. The mission today is to get some sockets going cos at the moment I pull power by dropping a lead down through a hole in the floor and plugging in downstairs in a different shed.
The wiring is a wee bit messed up in there as I seem to have 220v comin back on a neutral from somewhere.
Video of back feed
It's not something I'm overly worried about at the moment in terms of getting things workin but I will have to chase it down as its just not good practice. There does seem to be some leakage from the electric fence for the farm which is being pulled from the lighting circuit and should really be on a separate fuse with the sockets. Probably going to get hold of a little board and practice my wiring and see if I can organise the all a bit better, might go crazy and even label some stuff!
Will update in a couple of days...

It's a new day and a better day's comin...

Ok so this is what has happened in the last couple of months. As can be seen above (it's a picture of the new bridge in Waterford) we are back in Ireland which of course is the home of currach building. If I wasn't bullshitting in previous posts then the process should be a little easier here than in Canada. Firstly I should be able to get the wood a lot easier, it should be cheaper and of course I should have more space to build it in.
I will be building it in a shed on a farmyaes, it's a 100 year plus building but it's completely dry and apart from some starlings who have taken up residence is all mine.
This building  was previously my workshop but after 6 or 7 years of neglect could really do with a good clean and some rearranging. I also have to reconnect the power there so I can have some light in.
I reckon all this will take a couple of weeks as I have a full time job and nixers (extrs) as well so not much time at the moment. Setting a tentative start date for the next currach as 17th of March which is of course Paddys Day
Watch this space...

Currach saved from fiery end!

Well after many shenanigans and various false hopes last night the currach went to some good people who live near the Fraser River down Tsawwassen direction. There was some scratching of heads but before too long Will and Jacob and myself had it strapped to their utility trailer and with all the ribs and other spare pieces safely ensconced, away they went,
Hopefully they will be able to figure out how it all goes together and we'll see it on the water next year sometime. Great to see it go to someone so I didn't have to chop it up, considering there is already about 500 dollars worth of wood gone into it it would have been a shame on a couple of levels to see it chopped.

After Christmas I hope to be up and running with a start to finish description of another currach build, this one will from the green shores of Ireland. I should be able to take the lessons learned building this one and do an even better 'how-to'. I know a couple of people on the other side that do video work so hopefully there will be more video of each step this time and that'll make it easier for woodworking novices to follow what's happening, till then....
Bon voyage...

Free half-built Currach anyone?

Well we have run out of visa options (thanks Canada) the flights are booked and we'll be home in three weeks ish so if anyone out there knows someone in the Vancouver area who has the space and would like a half-finished 21 foot row boat and nearly all the parts needed then tell them to get in touch as soon as possible cos it's getting chopped up for firewood by this weekend at the latest unless I hear something definite...
Save a currach!!

(This offer conveniently includes instructions on how to build a currach....)

Broken

Just a wee post to explain the hiatus, while assembling the boat we broke another gunnel, got really pissed off with things breaking on it so we decided to take a break from it for a while.
Have also had a number or other things going on, workwise and healthwise for my lovely lady, there's also the small matter of trying to sort out a visa. Despite having been her for 5 years we are having a major problem with not only getting our new visa, but also even getting a reply from the immigration officer involved. There's a good possibility we'll have to leave Canada (possibly in a rush) in the next little while if something doesn't move forward.
If the currach doesn't get built here then I will certainly be building one in Ireland and I will have a lot more video of it if I do it there, either way this blog will eventually be a record of how to build a currach replete with plans so don't give up on it yet ... thanks for your patience.

Currachs are in the details...

Welll nothing too exciting to report at the moment ..have been attaching bits and getting ready for the final assembly.

There's a lot of details to be taken care of before the boat can come together.. all the silly stuff that you don't really think about when ya start building a currach .. and currachs are some of the simplest boats to build in a lot of ways cos they are quite forgiving.









So  what's left to do?

The upper gunnel has to come together. All the wedges of the thole pins have to be done.
The mortices for the ribs and the holes for the thole pins have to be made.
All the wedges have to be cut for the thole pins. Another breasthook has to be made.
The reinforcing gussets for the upper gunnel have to be made.
All the stringers have to be glued together.


We have had a lot of problems with the gunnels cracking when we are bending them. We cracked another one the other night cos I lost the thermometer and didn't know what temp the pipe was at. Looks like it was too low. Anyway instead of buying yet another one we decided to cut it in half and then soak them again and steam and bend the halves while cutting out the bit that cracked, this worked out pretty well and it's all bent up now waiting to be epoxied back together.
We always set this blog out to be a true record of trying to build a currach from scratch having never built a boat before. Hopefully people who are thinking of attempting this will be able to learn from our mistakes. God knows we have made plenty so far and I'm pretty sure there is more to come, they don't bother us though, both of us like working through them.

Scarf joints and stringers

Right so, once the gunnels are done (and we are getting closer I swear) we will move on to constructing the body of the boat that your feet rest on as you row. This consists of ribs and stringers. Ribs are exactly what you would think by the name and on our boat we are making both them and the stringers out of cedar. They will be running in the same direction as the seats and are steam bent into roughly half circular shape as you would have seen in much earlier posts.