With our great and unexpected success in removing the six, 3 to 4 foot long 3/4 inch bronze bolts that hold on the tailfeather and pull together the deadwood and keel, we now needed all of our stock of 3/4 bronze rod to make the new replacement tailfeather bolts. Meanwhile, we wanted to finish up the last floors and frames in the main cabin and forward. Floor 24 was made and ready to install. It originally had 3/4 inch bronze bolts holding it to the keel. The keel bolts were generally 3/4 inch diameter, but there were some 7/8 inch and 1 inch bolts. We had some left-over bronze in both of those two sizes. Frame 24 is a "fat" floor near the middle of the keel. It seemed the ideal candidate for an upgrade to 1" bolts. Not only would this use up our remaining 1" bronze, we would be able to postpone an order for more bronze rod.

There were two obstacles to this plan. First, we only had one and a half nuts in the 1" size. For those really keeping up with this blog, you may remember the photo of the remaining nuts (one being the squashed sacrificial one we pounded on). The yard shipwright pointed out that we really needed an even 4 nuts. So, we ordered three more of them. The same post with the nut photo also mentioned that the die had been broken. The yard had just gotten their lathe working when the last 1" bolts were threaded. We had opted to use the die since we were unfamiliar with the lathe. It was time to see if we could make the lathe thread our bolts.

Having never used a lathe, it was a little bit of an adventure for me. Setting the threads-per-inch and cutter were relatively straight forward. The problem was that the lathe wants to thread from right to left; from the end of the bolt inward. I wanted to thread towards the end of the bolt. That allows me to start threading closer to the clamp which reduces rod bending, keeps me from ramming the threader into the holder, and allows me to be increasing cut depth rather than backing off during the pass. It was also important for the threads to conform to such standards as right-hand-threads. Eventually, we found the settings that permitted this.

The two keel bolts for floor 24 were 34 inches long each. With our 6 foot of 1" diameter bronze stock, we had two extra inches for mistakes. Not a lot. The first keel bolt threading went well. I undercut the thread depth with the plan of running the broken die (held together in the holder) over the threads to take off the last little bit and ensure the cut depth and pitch angle were right. With the pre-cut lathed threads, turning the die was much, much easier.

With my new-found confidence, I started on the second keel bolt. On the second cut pass, the cutter moved. I tightened it down and and realigned the stock so that the misplaced cut would be removed in subsequent passes. On the second pass, the cutter moved again. This time, it wouldn't tighten. On inspection, I discovered that the stud going into the tee-nut on the lathe had stripped. After fixing that, I was able to finish up the threads. It's never the first go at something new that you have to watch out for, its the second one...

...Back to being really cautious, I then threaded the remaining 40 inches of 7/8 inch diameter bronze rod for a bolt to hold on the stern post. That, I thought was the last of the big bronze that would go into Mahdee; everything else was 3/4 inch or less. Unfortunately, Friday afternoon, while drilling the 3/4 inch holes for the stern post drifts, the 7/8 inch bit found its way onto the drill. So now we are buying more 7/8 inch bronze! The elaborate plan to postpone the purchase of more bronze rod failed. On the other hand, we sure will have some hefty bronze rod holding Mahdee together--that will be confidence inspiring some day when we are pounding through heavy seas in some remote part of the globe.

David