I finished the book Go Like Hell by A. J. Baime the other day. It's the story of how Ford took on Ferrari with their GT40 in order to win Le Mans. While recapping the history of the event leading up to the epic battles of Ford vs Ferrari, the author mentions the first postwar Le Mans was won by a Ferrari 166 MM roadster nicknamed barchetta or little boat. Seems that I now have a name for the pond sailer - barchetta. The book's a good read, by the way.
As you can hopefully see in the photos, the boat is all done except for the sails. The Missus came up with some cloth that appears to be suitable for the job, so it shouldn't be long now.
I found myself a couple of nylon flange bushings this morning as well. There's a hardware store a few miles away from the gym and a gas station that sells kerosene over that way. I thought I might as well give the hardware store a try while I was getting some fuel for my shop heater. I'd been in the hardware store a few times before but it was always just in and out. I took a few minutes today and checked the place out a little closer. Good selection of stuff a tinkerer like me is always looking for. Socket head cap screws in both coarse and fine thread, metric, stainless and chrome bolts. I have a feeling they're going to be seeing more of me in the future.
The photos were taken with my new digital camera. They look a little darker on the computer than they did on the camera screen but there's a setting for that. In fact, there's a setting for just about everything. The camera's a Nikon Coolpix L100. It's got a 15x optical zoom and plenty of features - probably more than I'll ever use. It even has a food setting for taking close up shots of food on a plate. Food never stays on my plate long enough to photograph but it's probably worthwhile for someone. They make another model similar to the L100 that's got a little more zoom and higher resolution but it's about double the money. It's about the best you can get in a point and shoot without getting into a digital SLR. I'm thinking the L100 is going to suit me to a "T".
The one photo shows the beginning of my miniature photo studio. The base is a steel patio table with a piece of paneling I put on top. The back stop is also a piece of paneling. Both pieces were left over from the parlor remodeling job. I bought a couple of small floodlamp bulbs the other day to go in my reflectors. I'm going to braze up a couple of stands over Christmas vacation, do a little painting on the paneling and start experimenting. It should be just the thing for small project photos or eBay listings. I definitely need to start getting rid of things.
Now that I've got the bushings I can finish up the steering on the little train and everything should be ready for Santa's sleigh.
4 comments:
barchetta sounds more like some kind of cheese. But what the hell do I know?
Looks real nice bro.
Most everything I do seems to be a little cheesy, so I guess that would fit. It's been a fun project, though. We'll see how it turns out with the sails on it.
I've got a model airplane project I think I'm going to start on next. Either that or do some work on my HO train layout. I'm sure as hell glad I never grew up.
That's about the worst color ever. There is a Rush song entitled Red Barchetta. I guess if you were a Rush fan you would have painted it red. In fact, anyone I know whom I told I had a boat named barchetta would ask me "is it red?". But then again, I don't have a boat, didn't paint nor name a boat. There you have it, an unsolicited testimonial.
The color is Blue Ocean Breeze. Rather fitting, I thought. On the other hand, had it been a little corvette as opposed to a sloop ...
Of course the new owner will have the option to name it whatever he likes, but I am glad that you're living up to your name.
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