The current costs at the end of July (£2643) represent the expenditure on the basic coble hull in 9mm ply, together with seating, lockers, floor, and foredeck. It also includes varnish and paint, a battery (£60 - which many builders won't need), an auto bilge pump (£53), anchor (£35) and a 10mm steel centreplate (£150). In other words, a floatable hull can be built for about £2300 - not at all a bad cost considering the price being asked for boats these days.
Looking ahead, a trailer will cost about £800, a motor £1000 and then the sails and spars will probably account for another £1000. With the addition of ancilliary items, a sum of about £6000 should see a well set up boat ready for sailing. Checking out the prices asked for new boats of comparable size this does seem to represent a considerable saving - perhap as much as a further £6000 - but this is all pretty speculative. I think that in idle moments, I try to persuade myself that it's all worth the time and effort whereas, in reality, it was never to do with saving cash but with the pleasure of construction.
Progress continues to be slow - locker lids are fiddly and coats of varnish need to dry. The centreplate is more massive than suggested on the plans and weighs in at 47kg but the reinforced structure of the centreboard case and the use of bronze bearings to help spread the load, should ensure that no undue strain is produced. To raise the plate a straight force of 53kg is required so will probably need a couple of triple blocks to reduce this pull down to about 9kg. Some experimenting needed here of course. The more immediate problem is dropping the plate into the case and then removing it several times over before final fitting; friends will help once but more than that is asking a bit much - possibly some sort of hoist will have to be built. To have the plate galvanised proves to be pretty expensive and I'm thinking that I'll use the same Hempel 2-part primer that I used on the outer hull - very hard finish and suitable for metal, wood and glass fibre.
The quoted weight for the boat using 6mm ply is 170 kg; using 9mm you'd expect about 255 kg and in fact the current weight - including centreplate is around 300 kg. Even with motor, mast, sails, etc. the final weight should be a bit under 400 kg.
With the floors down the amount of space is quite impressive - certainly enough for sleeping under a boom tent. This was achieved by setting the side benches/lockers back a bit to follow the hull curve more. The floors rest on rubber strips since the vibration of a motor commonly causes constant irritating, sqeaking and rattling from floors that aren't screwed down.
Finally, having installed a battery to feed the auto bilge pump, it's as well to provide additional power outlets. Hence, the mini switch board.
To maintain my sanity and motivation, I enjoyed a couple of brief jollys recently; one to the trad. boat festival at Port Soy - which seems to have dropped in visitors compared to last year (in spite of the appearance of Iain Oughtred), and one to Lindisfarne where, of course, I spotted several working cobles.
The quoted weight for the boat using 6mm ply is 170 kg; using 9mm you'd expect about 255 kg and in fact the current weight - including centreplate is around 300 kg. Even with motor, mast, sails, etc. the final weight should be a bit under 400 kg.
