Pelican’s progress

I hope everyone had a good St. Patrick’s day!  I didn’t wear green, but I did have an extra helping of ‘spirits’ to mark the occasion.

The owners of the Pelican new build stopped by for a visit the other day.  I had actually only communicated with them through email up until now, so it was nice to meet them and talk about the project.  They also needed to pick the paint colors and decide on some other boat details.  I was able to get the deck fit before they came, which is nice because it really looks like a boat now:

The fasteners you see are just to clamp the deck down while the glue cures.  They’ll be removed and filled once they do their job.  I’ll also shoot in some stainless nails here and there.  The boards on either side of the centerboard trunk are just placeholders for the actual mahogany seats.  I just put them there so the owners could get a feel for the placement.  We’re shooting for a May launch.

I’m also working on a slightly different project for a local street rod upholsterer.  I guess many cars from the 20’s and 30’s had a partial wood-framed fabric roof panel because the metal stamping technology for that part wasn’t available or practical.  The wood part of this particular car had deteriorated and been repaired poorly, so the upholsterer talked the car owner into getting a whole new frame built that he would cover with his fantastic sewing skills.  Here’s the start of it:

O.K. it really just looks like a giant picture frame at the moment, but it also gets about six wooden ‘bows’ that help support the dome light and the roof fabric.  What you really can’t see is that the frame is curved in both directions as if it were a small section of a giant sphere.  I’ll post some more pics of the frame as I move along.  Maybe even a picture on the car.

Erin go Bragh