CLC Winter Open House: Saturday, Dec 2nd

Builder's Forum
1

Our eighth annual Winter Open House is in two weeks, on Saturday, December 2nd.

Lots and lots of cool stuff this year. Especially seminars:

CLC Winter Open House for Boatbuilders

  • 10am: Epoxy Fillets for Dummies with John C. Harris

Bringing this one back by popular demand. If you're still pronouncing "fillet" as in "fish filet," this is the seminar for you. It's pronounced "FILL-it" if you're building boats, and it's fillets that hold modern wood-epoxy together. Easy to do, but hard to do well; John will show you how to do it well.

  • 11am: Intro to Strip-Planking with Nick Schade

Designer, artist, and author Nick Schade is the only boatbuilder with a kayak hanging in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art. His strip-planking how-to videos have been viewed millions of times on YouTube, but you get to see Nick fit cedar strips on a kayak, live and in three dimensions.  Many thanks to Nick for making the trip down from his home base in Connecticut.

  • 12pm: Basic Fiberglassing Techniques with Travis Guthrie

Fiberglass and epoxy provide wooden boats with a rugged, clear sheathing that's both structural and attractive. Wrinkles? Runs? Air bubbles? Not after this seminar with CLC boatbuilder Travis Guthrie.

  • 1pm: Advanced Fiberglassing Techniques with Joey Schott

You're starting to get a feel for fiberglass and epoxy. Now take it a step further and explore different kinds of fiberglass, and advanced application techniques such as using "peel-ply." Joey Schott, who started his own boatbuilding shop after a long tenure in management at CLC, is an unequivocal master.

  • 2pm: Maximum Performance with Traditional Sails with Douglas Fowler

Douglas Fowler is the preeminent maker of traditional smallcraft sails in North America. His sails appear on numerous magazine covers featuring traditional boats. We tried several sailmakers before hiring Douglas about ten years ago to make the sails for all of CLC's small sailboats.  Douglas is traveling down from his loft in Syracuse, NY, to talk about how to rig and set up traditional four-sided sails. If you've always thought sails were just some nice fabric with a hem around the edge, come and learn about the scientific three-dimensional shape of well-cut sails.

  • 3pm: Varnish Like a Pro with John C. Harris

Once again by popular demand: here's another one of those procedures that LOOKS easy. Just open the can of varnish and start brushing it on your boat, right? Three coats later you've got a sagging, mottled surface that doesn't look very nice at all. Watch and learn how we apply and maintain the varnish on our own boats.

2

   Damn, I'll be out of state but I'd love to hear about Douglas Fowler's input on optimizing these lug sails!  Any chance these will be video recorded?

3

I'm actually flying through the east coast on my way to Puerto Rico to check on our boat during that time.  Hmmm...

Are you guys going to do it like a cooking show? Like doing the fiberglassing on a boat, then magically the same boat with the glassing already done and cured appears ready for the next step.

I'm in the process of developing a YouTube channel and one of the things I'm looking into is editing so I can show the finished product then go back and show how I built it.  This translates directly to a Passagemaker build.

4

Mummichog, I think (hope) you can assume that it will be on web cam, so you should be able to view it live. I’m certainly going to try to do so.

5

   They have had the audio on for past open houses which is how I learned that the wood flour we use is from the food industry. Adds the fiber to your muffin. They have it off because folks are human and boat building can sometimes be frustrating. Then there's the occasional skinned knuckle.

6

Can't hear sound from the web cam.  Perhaps it could be on just for the day?