Floatation blocks

April 1, 2011
We're getting a heavy, wet snow today, which makes it a good day for boat building. I worked on the foam flotation blocks that will be glued under the thwarts. I wish I had thought to trace the bulkheads before I started--it would have been so easy to get the correct shape for the blocks if I had a pattern.  Instead, I took a piece of newspaper and traced the shape of the bulkhead, cut it out and then transferred it to a piece of cardboard.  After cutting out the cardboard, I had a rough pattern that I could transfer to the 2" rigid foam insulation board that I bought to make the blocks. 

Cardboard pattern to make the flotation block for thwart 2.

I had a little detour while cutting out the blocks.  The insulation comes in a sheet 2'x8'x2" and I needed to cut it into a six inch strip for the flotation blocks. After cutting two strips, my table saw wasn't working right.  I discovered that the pulleys had slid sideways on their shafts and that the one under the table was bent.  It must have rubbed against one of the bolts supporting the table saw.  Anyway, I made a trip to the hardware store in town and bought a new pulley.  Fortunately, I was able to find the woodruff key in the sawdust under table and put everything back together.

Of course, each bulkhead is a different size. I was able to use my cardboard pattern for thwart 2 but had to adjust the length for thwart 3.  For thwart 1 I had to abandon it completely and had to figure out the new shape and size.  Because of the sailing parts for my dory I had also work around the mast step and dagger board trunk to shape the flotation blocks.

Rough cut foam flotation block

Fitting and shaping the flotation blocks to the bulkhead.

Checking to make sure the flotation blocks will fit under the thwart.