2835Hrs – Almost There

Another solid session today although unlike yesterday I ended up doing less than I’d anticipated.

I underestimated the time it would take to drill the 6 elongated locating pin holes. I needed to take care that I marked the positions correctly and then the actual drilling took time. I first drilled the two 22mm holes on one side of the beam as far down as my drill bit would let me which was a little less than halfway through the beam, then I chiselled out the centre section before flipping over the beam and repeating the process on the other side.

Once that was done I swopped bits and drilled out the remaining timber in the middles. I used the chisel and some files to finish of the inside of the holes then sanded off the sharp edges on the tops.

There were five holes to do today so it took some time.

As I worked on each end of the beams I also fixed the UHMW PVC spacer blocks in their correct positions. Again these needed to be drilled, countersunk and screwed down on bedding compound.

I’ve now completed all three of the long crossbeams, I just have a couple of hours work to do on the shorter mast beam then I can touch up the paint and I’m there.

It’s been a long haul, I started work on these beams in April last year so they’ve been work in progress for 14 months. There were periods when they were put on hold whilst I worked on other things but I estimate it’s taken some 450 hours of work to build these beams.

It feels great to have finished the last major construction job of the build (remember I have aluminium masts so I don’t have to build masts) there is nothing remaining that even comes close to needing this amount of work and for that I’m extremely grateful.