Port Settee Work

With the main tabbing completed, I could turn my attention to the settee design and bits.  This photo is about all I have for what I'm sure was many hours of thought when I laid out the starboard side. There are kinda similar marks on the port side bulkhead - but mostly I'm cursing myself for not taping plans or schematics or... something to the boat somewhere.  Or a notebook. That's what regular people do.  My memory is truly terrible - so this loss of brainwork over the last two years in which the project languished fallow is a real drag.

Anyway, I know the original plan was to make the settee seat slide UNDER the settee back, with a cushion on it that magically revealed itself as the seat was pulled out into a berth.  The problem there is that the forward-most portion of the seat actually meets the hull in the closed position, so there's no room to hide the cushion.  This would lead to a strangely shaped infill piece needed for that.  Two strangely shaped infills, actually, because the berth will have two different available depths - 22 inches wide for rough seas and a lee cloth, and 28 inches for calmer weather sleeping. 

Also, the hidden mattress trick (which is what the original Pearson 10M had on the starboard berth) is a bit more challenging construction:  the seat backs need to float above the sliding mattress.  The payoff just isn't worth it.  So it will be a simple slide out berth with infill pieces stored somewhere around the saloon lockers. Somewhere.  Maybe in the bottom of the locker where the slid-in mattress would have been.

In putting in the cleats for the settee back and main shelf, I somehow let this horizonal cleat slip upwards.  Since I also stripped the silicon bronze screws holding it in (glued and screwed), this piece could not be simply unscrewed while glue was still soft.  

I had to let it cure, then came back the next day and used the miracle that is an oscillating tool with a wood blade attached to slowly rip the cleat to the correct height.  It worked a treat.

The underside of the side deck is very unfair.  There are huge globs o' polyester resin from the original liner-to-deck construction.

A few years ago I had taken down the worst parts with an angle grinder, but it's still very uneven. Here you can see some of the gaps for the cleats are up to 1/2 inch thick.  It's epoxy and wood flour to the rescue

With the cleats in place and the decision to not put a sneaky under-the-settee-back sliding berth base in, I cut and fit the settee top, the back and the shelf.  This settee top is not the thing that will be sit upon - it's more like the locker top.  Attached to this top will be wooden sliders, and attached to the slider top will be the settee/berth bottom.  So these holes we see here don't get hatch covers.  The settee/berth bottom will get those, and when those are lifted I'll be able to reach down through this under-bottom into the locker. 

I'm also not sure about keeping the openings in the face of the settee above the sole.  The lockers are low, deep, and slope forward, and these openings are very close to the sole itself, so there isn't much room for hinges.  Plus I haven't figured out the saloon table situation, and it's possible that the forward most opening, and maybe the middle, will be inaccessible with the table in place. So I may end up glueing the cutouts back in place.  My goodness am I glad I've decided that this thing will be painted.  You can cover up a multitude of design changes with Boat Fair, moulding, and paint.