Building The Vera Cruise

[Milhouse]

The instrument cluster looks great Carl!

[mrintense]

Thanks Jim.

Slowly getting the motorwell installed now. The bulkhead and about 60% of the structure has been glued into position. The weather's turned colder so epoxy cure times are slowing me down. I do have some new pictures, but they are essentially identical to earlier sots of this area, except minus the clamps. Once I get a little more installed, I'll try to get a more detailed picture, however it's not easy to get all of this into one shot.

[psychobilly]

Carl, Are you ok?? Been 4 weeks buddy. Hope all is well.

[mrintense]

Carl, Are you ok?? Been 4 weeks buddy. Hope all is well.

Thanks Billy,

Yes all s fine. Thanks for asking. I've been slowly making progress on the motorwell. Not a very photogenic part of the build and the progress has been somewhat slowed by work commitments before the holidays. The motorwell consists of three compartments, two side compartments which will house the batteries and extra storage and a center splashwell with additional storage below that.

The two side compartments are mostly installed with just the upper section to go. Access to the lower side compartments was added. I'll be installing the center compartment soon and then cutting an access to that.

Here is an overall shot. You can see the three motorwell compartments.

Here is the battery tray as I am working on a means of holding it in place

Staring on installing the upper structure for the starboard side compartment.

[mrintense]

Here are a couple more

Shows two fo the three acess oopenoings in the motorwell bulkhead to give access to the battery compartment and extra storage. The third access will be cu in between these two openings.

Access to the battery compartment seen from the motorwell side

[chugalug]

looking good,Carl. Nice to see you back at it

[denbrlr]

Carl,

I was wondering too. Looking good.

Lee

[steveh41]

Solid progress Carl... looks great!

Steve

[mrintense]

Thanks Tim, Lee, and Steve. Sorry I am not on line more often. But I am fine and still working on the boat.

[psychobilly]

Thanks Tim, Lee, and Steve. Sorry I am not on line more often. But I am fine and still working on the boat.

Yeah with the COVID21 going around, you never know. It just wasn’t like you not to be posting. Glad you’re ok and as Steve said, solid progress.

[mrintense]

Well, another year has gone by, and I was able to get in some decent progress this last two weeks while off for the holidays. My main goal was to try and get the motorwell mostly completed. It's not quite there yet, but most of the parts are now installed. It took awhile because I needed to build up a frame work to give additional strength since I was planning on three openings in the motorwell bulkhead. I'm happy to say that the framework worked out fine and the three openings have not diminished the strength of the assembly. I'm confident now that it will be able to take the strain of the outboard when the time comes.

Here's the latest in progress photos.

All three openings are now cut out. I'll be making access panels for these later.

Splashwell access opening. I still need to install the actual splashwell shelf.

[mrintense]

Here's some shot of the upper compartments. I haven't finished cleaning these up yet and the hatches have not been made yet. But I like the look this is going to add to the boat. Trim work on all of this has still not been accomplished yet .

The closest compartment (port) will house the battery switch and AC charger and provide some additional storage. The farther compartment is going to have an ice chest built in sometime in the future.

[kens]

There is so much attention to detail in this build, I can't wait to see it.
Will it be at the Gathering?

[DrBryanJ]

Very nice Carl. Glad you're OK.

[mrintense]

Thanks Ken and Bryan. I am still not sure that the boat will even be ready for launch by September at this point. I am going to have to play it by ear for now as regards the Gathering.

Today, I am waiting for some epoxy to cure so I wanted to start experimenting with ideas for trimming out the cabin sides. I don't have a good idea of how I want to do this, only that I should probably incorporate a hand hold along the edge. I want the interior top edge to also appear more finished as well.

Here are the items I want to consider. If you look at the photo, you see the curved doubler coming down from the roofline near the helm station. It ends abruptly at the top edge of the cabin side. I was thinking perhaps a similar width board running aft to the motorwell bulkhead, perhaps eventually covered with foam and upholstery. But initially just the wood.

On the outside of the side closest to the camera, I taped up some foam to try and simulate a hand hold on the outside of the cabin side. It wouldn't be quite that thick (tall or deep) and I was thinking maybe tapered on the forward end. It would also be rounded along the edges rather than square cut. It could end where it does now, or perhaps further forward. Maybe even tie into some other piece of trim.

On the aft end, I was thinking about an angled piece of wood (maybe painted to contrast with the wooden sides). The taped off piece in the photo shows what I was thinking about.

I'm fishing for ideas and suggestions here.

One other thing I am considering is whether or not to have the aft compartment hatch covers flush or lying on top of the compartments. These compartments are tentatively planned to be painted white to match the hull sides. The outboard surfaces will remain unpainted wood.