Alan has kindly sent us another update and more pics to bring us up to date on C54s construction.
In this first group of shots you can see the buoyancy templates being built by Simon, the boat then goes back to Brightlingsea for them to be taken out and the tanks made and glassed in by Rob.
In the second batch of pics the tanks have been made and fitted and the boat has gone back to Simon who has made the deck beams, ready to be epoxied.
With this next group you can see the centreplate cladding has been made and the supports for the floorboards are in place. Note the fixed floorboards forward of the side buoyancy tanks up to the bow tank. Two of the pictures show the main floorboards are also ready. Now the thwarts are made and ready to be fixed.
Here you can see the decks cut and ready to fit:
This final batch are from 2/01/14, the decks are now fitted, I have gone for the jib sheet cleats to be on swivels that Simon has let into the decks to get the best angle from the block fairlead. This is so that both the middle crew and me when sailing solo can easily cleat the jib from any position. He has rebated each of the joins of the deck so as to allow him to epoxy tape over the joins to prevent any cracks occuring. The centreplate winch has been fitted and the plinths for the mainsheet, kicker and centreplate are in place.
On non build items the mast and boom are ready for delivery from Sailspar, I have confirmed the order for the sails to be loose footed main and also for the boom height to be 75mm above the standard measurement. The floorboards have been lowered by about 25mm to follow the line of the hull rather than be horizontal across the boat thus gaining another small element of headroom for my rather non supple frame.
I intend to go with option of the battery whale pumps and although I tried to think of ways so that the water exit could be lipped into the centreboard case, the plate winch seems to prevent this option so it looks as though I will have to bring the pipes to exit just underneath the rubbing strakes. I will still have the holes in the floorboards for manual pumping as required.
Simon seems confident of getting the boat to me by mid Jan and Rob thinks that he will need less than a couple of days to finish the hull off. That leaves me with the task of fitting it out and experience of my own and others suggest that what could be done in a week by a professional is likely to be months as I dither before drilling the necessary holes.
More later.
Alan
Brightlingsea One Design 
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