The bitter taste of defeat or elbow room.

Over the last few weeks i have been putting the finishing touches on the drawings for the prototype I.R.H.. Followers of this blog may notice that i have dropped the full rocker bottom. Knowing what type of water this boat will be used for i realized that a shallow draft was more important to me than the rocker profile. If it doesn't work out i can always change it in version two.

MMMM not great pic. Try this,

Still not perfect but you get the idea.

So the goal is to do the shell developments and stitch and glue this hull together. I have found only one publication with instructions on shell plate developments,

It's a great book. There is a heap of good information, classic drawings, and that old time reference feel. All the things i love about books like this. Only one problem after reading the section on shell plate developments ten of fifteen times i am no closer to solving my little drift boats panels. My gut feeling on this is that the book is over complicating things.

I generally pride myself on solving complex problems. This problem is kicking my ass. So it was with the bitter taste of defeat in my mouth that i e-mailed Roger Fletcher of Drift Boats and River Dories. I hope he can help out with this problem. Otherwise there are going to be some unnecessary steps in this build.

For those of you who know me know i have a bit of a boat addiction, as in i have a couple of them. The issue here is i have no place to build the I.R.H.. For anyone who has built anything in their spare time you know that if the project isn't close to home nothing will get done. You need to be able to walk less than a hundred yards from the comfort of your bed (or the beer fridge) in order to be efficient with your spare time.You don't want to wast it in transit.

With that in mind i hit the garage hard last night and rearranged it to do a little deck work on Flo and perhaps in the near future build the I.R.H. 1.