29 Apr 24:
More paint removal on our Abaco Dinghy HENNING today. But first we spotted some turtles during our walk at Lake Mariner/Noland Trail, part of the Mariners' Museum complex.
Log of HENNING.
29 Apr 24:
More paint removal on our Abaco Dinghy HENNING today. But first we spotted some turtles during our walk at Lake Mariner/Noland Trail, part of the Mariners' Museum complex.
27 Apr 24:
We shifted our paint removal focus up to the bow for a few sections. Heat gun, scraper, then a light sanding.
26 Apr 24:
Removed some more paint and spread some river rock.
19 Apr 24:
We visited the USS Wisconsin in downtown Norfolk, she just turned 80. We checked out one of the boilers and also the radio room.
Happy Birthday WisKy!
26 Apr 24:
We commissioned a piece of art from our friend Richard, one of his mediums are beach bits that he collects near Boston.
03 Sep 23:
I found an old paddle in a junk shop last year, and planned to repair it. After tripping over it for a year we decided it was too long and that we could cut it down to a shorter length, trim the blade to a Greenland shape and make it a paddle suitable for a wee lass and/or Sunfish cockpit.
23 Apr 24:
Finished!
14 Apr 24:
We started our blog in January 2013 with a purpose "...to share information on small boat restoration, sailing and maintenance." This is our vehicle to pay forward what others have shared with us. A little over 2000 posts later we passed the One Million Views mark!
Views started to rise during the pandemic, and took a big jump in 2023.
So thanks for tuning in. Keep an eye out for exciting changes coming in 2025, "Clark" Kent (me) will be retiring from a 25 year Air Line career, and be freed up to play with more boats. Skipper and I hope to expand our hobby adventure a bit into a small, fun business, offering more Small Boat Owners Manuals, plans, patterns and build guides. We also plan to build more boats, on speculation or commission. And Skipper will be creating pirate clothes under her brand "Pirating About." If you need a pirate coat, she's the best tailor out there!*
Give us a shout,
"Clark" Kent and "Skipper" Audrey
*Everyone needs a pirate coat...
13 Apr 24:
The first photo is of our shop's light switch. The switch has a motion sensor on/off option, which can be fine tuned to function any time of day or only when it is dark. There is a sensitivity switch and also a vacancy timer which will turn off the lights as soon as we stop moving around, or after 1, 5 or 30 minutes.
I thought a motion detector light switch would be handy for when I had my hands full entering the shop, and to turn lights off for a while if we leave the shop and get pressed into service on some other project. The switch has been a very welcome addition.
12 Apr 24:
The spots where we put our LEWIS BOAT WORKS and HEUER GARAGE EAST sheds started off as a muddy clay spot, too shady to grow much grass. Over the last few days we added a small deck to the back end of the HEUER GARAGE EAST, and a walkway between the two sheds.
11 Apr 24:
We scraped and sanded 3 more frame sections and the inner port transom of HENING, the little Abaco dinghy. Next we'll roll the boat to starboard and work on that side. We're also working on a bronze order to replace some tired fittings. They screw eye on the quarter knee snapped loose in my hand when I went to remove the nut.
10 Apr 24:
We made a small bench out of cedar, set at about 18 inches for a good sitting height. It will be used in a shower, the cedar should smell great with a little hot water splashed on it.
I laid out the templates...for the shop stool...To make a bench I needed taller legs, which I remembered when I got to the assembly stage of construction.
31 Mar 24:
This 1964 Sunfish hull ended up having not only a soft deck but also the hull is cracked all around the edge of the cockpit. Add in a few other leak areas and the fiberglass is beyond economic repair. So today we removed the hardware, trim, coaming and bailer to be used on other restorations.