bucket list

[Mescalero]

How does the outboard inside the boat work?

[Grizz]

Yeah I like those radials too. You've heard this I'm sure but pilots said "if God wanted engines to be flat Pratt and Whitney would have made 'em that way."

I don't know when my first DC-3 ride was, but when I was around a year old my Dad got hired to fly for Pacific Northern out of Anchorage. We flew to Anchorage in a DC-3. What I didn't know until I read his log books was that he ferried the plane up for his new employer. What I remember about that is his story of getting to the hotel room, exhausted, with a bouncing baby boy jumping on the bed and turning the light on and off with the pull cord.

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Rode in lots of beavers and Grumman Geese ( ) with the radials. Love the sound but they are so old and running on rebuilt rebuilt rebuilt parts. Rode around behind a lot of flat engines too. And some turbines. Have a couple of aquaintences splatted on the mountains near my place too. Not good to land too soon.

[Ji in Hawaii]

JI,
You and your dad built that?
That is some serious talent, getting hardwood to bend like that is no small feat.
How does the outboard inside the boat work?

Thank you, it was a fun father/son project. The outboard motor well works very nicely allowing for a high, angled stern transom which kept her dry in rough following seas or when beaching in surf. It also allowed working on the motor on the ocean much more comfortable and dry the one time the reliable Tohatsu motor gave us any trouble (throttle linkage disconnected, easy 5 minute fix).

[Ji in Hawaii]

Great memories of Dad Grizz, thanks for sharing. I love the old Grumman radial engined flying boats too. Flying a PBY Catalina would be AWESOME too. During the war my dad flew a mission with the famous "Black Cats" on a night time raid of a small Jap island base, he said they were tossing bombs out the bubble canopy windows onto the moored ships at low altitude. Japs shot out one engine, and their radio but they made it back with no casualties thus I exist to write today. A few years back I got in contact with the daughter of pilot/captain of that mission. She told me her dad had recently passed away from cancer but that after the war he started flying Grumman flying boats for an airlines in Florida, pretty interesting stuff.

Back when I was a teenager there was a local interisland airlines that briefly flew a couple DC-3s mainly between Oahu and Moloka'i. I had a friend that worked for that airlines and could have gotten me a free ride but I procrastinated and they switched to more modern twin engine Cessnas, you snooze you loose.

[Grizz]

Ji, I always want to fly in a PBY. A long haul iron butt type trip where you could really see some country. I missed out on that experience. By the time I got to Alaska their run was all but done there.

In case anyone is interested in a semi-dory a little smaller than Ji's Carolina model, here is a classic with all the info necessary to build. This boat was featured in 2013 edition of Small Boats, an annual publication. There are other versions of the same boat, it's as old as outboard engines, in John Gardner's books and in the boat building series like "How to Build 20 Boats".

This one is a little smaller, so a little easier as a starter boat design. Not designed for rowing but can be rowed. It's basicly the F-150 of water world. Could be built of plywood using stitch and glue, or glued lap, or from timber using traditional techniques. With a tarp tenting the forward two thirds it would be a handy camp cruiser. Just another dream boat for ya!

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She's out of trim, the bow is a good spot for a heavy anchor and 20 gal extra fuel, and maybe some rocks. Not a speed boat, but not slow either. And ABLE. That's a very good boat word for a very worthwhile boat characteristic.

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Very common lines and construction techniques. This one is built just like the dory boats it came from and is properly known as a dory boat or semi-dory.

Sweet dreams...