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The assembly was done upside down, the idea was to finish the bottom in the right position, including two
layer of epoxy, without fiberglass, painting and fixing the false keel. I started by linking the outside surface,
side panels in one piece, rear and front transoms. Then I added all the bulkheads, vertically inserted the 4
parts of the keelsons and all the main structural parts.
The bottom was bent with boiling water, and the help of heavy loads, the epoxy phase was a very sticky job,
it was a nice warm spring, and flies and insects got stuck on the hull. After a bit of sanding I finally applied
concrete floor paint, the most resistant I found and as there was a special offer, affordable. I choose a red brick
colour for the hull, and a light sand for the deck and roof.
Turning the boat by myself was very stressful. I used my car and a very inadequate improvised crane, and with
a lot of sweat, some Captain Haddock vocabulary, the turtle was turned the right way up! I then added foam,
a mix of isolation foam, plastic bottles and expanded cork for buoyancy before fitting the deck and the roof.
It took me the whole summer to finish the boat; I sewed a small square sail from grandma’s cotton sheets, a
small jib and an even smaller mizzen. A small tree did for the mast. Then by the first week of September, at
dawn, the newly named “Norwegian Wood” was launched. (Well I am a huge Beatles fan).
right: the interior of the Scow 450 is vast for a boat
of this size. Jerome even included what our Aussie
cousins refer to as a ‘dunny’. Under the rear deck
is a compartment where a box containing a bucket
filled with saw dust lives, the box has a hole and a
lid. One simply moves this home made porta-potti
into the cabin, does one’s business and then returns
it to its stowage.