Serenity

More progress on the boat hull.. Siding is now on, and a lot of ugly patching was added (which will be painted over). I also made a simple boat stand with some PVC pipe and nylon straps. I'm quite proud of my work with Lizzy's sewing machine on the straps! I also added the brass tubing that runs from the deck to the bottom of the hull for the rudder. (not shown in picture).

The next steps are:

A new image was added to the Sailboat page showing the boat with it's siding and the new boat stand.

A bit more progress on the hull was made this week. The bulkheads are all cut out, and the first of the siding has been attached (the bottom 'skin'). Luckily the thin siding wood cuts very easily with the jigsaw. The main challenge was to come up with the template for the skin since it is a curved surface. I ended up taping newspaper to the bulkheads, and using masking tape to trace the edges for the templates. I then removed it from the bulkheads and traced it out onto the siding wood. Images and basic specs were added to the Sailboat page.

A few images and a video were added to the Sailboat page. Worth noting: cutting 3/4 inch plywood with a cheap jigsaw is a lot more work than I remember. I had planned to cut all the pieces out tonight but decided to take a break after only cutting 2 out of 6. :O

I've finally posted some videos of the current state of the software simulation. When in auto-navigate mode, the 'tacking'/intermediate waypoints are not quite right yet, but you can get a general idea of the approach being used. (also under Software > Simulation > Videos section)

• Sailboat mode(Note this is the latest video as the previously posted videos were in a poor format)

In other news, I finally finished building a workbench in the garage which will be a great help with regards to building the actual boat. I need to finish up the hull design (pictures of that to come next) and I will begin construction! I haven't ordered the electronics just yet, but will begin soon on that as well.