It's pretty quiet at the shop these days. After graduation, Restoration Hall is a very different place.
Beetle cats all lined up, waiting to be moved off site.
They're for sale , you know. Only $11,500. Boat sales are a part of how IYRS remains a viable entity, and honestly, it's pretty rare to buy a boat that you've followed throughout the whole building process!
Following a post-graduation break, the students returned for a week of sailing instruction in their Beetle Cats. No photos from this year, unfortunately, but here's something very similar to what you would have seen had you been out in the bay that week.
It can get a little crowded out there on a nice day…
(ok, ok, that was a classic yacht regatta, not Beetle cats. You got me.)
After the sailing segment of the program, the students scatter to the winds for 6 weeks to do independent study projects. Some folks work on boats of their own, Others go off and work in a shipyard. This year's class has a group of students heading over to Italy to work in a boat shop there. Not too shabby, eh? The students each come up with their own projects, and then work with the school to make sure that the project is both challenging enough and workable.
One student is staying put in Newport and working on his Haven 12 1/2 at the school. The Haven is a Joel White interpretation of the Herreshoff 12 1/2 that has a centerboard rather than a fixed ballast keel.
He bought the boat a while back in a partially finished state. There are some issues with planks splitting,
some butt blocks need replacing
and the decking needs to be finished.
Projects like this are a good test of your ability to both accurately assess the condition of your boat and how long it will take to do the work. Although there are instructors on site that you can consult with, no one is pushing you to work at any particular pace. It's all about being self-directed.
Of course, it helps A Lot if you own the boat you're working on.
Down in Mystic CT, another student is doing his independent study at the Mystic Seaport Museum. He'll be working with the museum's staff reframing the whaling ship
Charles W. Morgan.
Inside, it's a bit cramped. Everything is set up to work with huge, heavy parts. A single futtock (frame member) may weigh 500 lbs. The tracks you see overhead allow the builders to hoist up these big timbers through the little hole in the bilge
and then roll them along the track like meat in a packing house.
You can see just how closely the frames are spaced in this boat. This is totally different from the light construction of a racing boat.
The frames are made from live oak, a particularly tough species of wood. Here's the student with one big log by the Lucas Mill.
This mill has a chainsaw that runs along the tracks to cut slabs of wood horizontally from large logs.
These slabs turn into frames, knees, whatever they need. Here's a knee with a pattern laid on top of it in preparation for final cutting and shaping.
We'll have more from this project and others as well coming soon!