Tag Archives: Capt. Barr

The Work Continues.

Just returned from ten day trip to Santa Fe, Taos and the Canyons of NM, AZ, and UT. Must say that our RELIANCE is certainly the equal of the great art of Santa Fe and Taos (no bias all all!) but it is very hard to compete with the grandeur, scale, and beauty of nature. No contest, it is nature every time…. We flew home from Las Vegas: I am still struggling to wrap my head around the mirage of Las Vegas appearing out of the desert after visiting Grand, Glen, Bryce and Zion Canyons and Monument Valley…..

In my absence, work continued on RELIANCE with multiple efforts underway.

We are starting to splice wire. In the first photo Herb and Bill are developing splicing jigs. In the second photo, hands of our new “expert” are worming, parceling and serving – complete with miniature serving mallet – (see 1938 instruction manual in background)
Bill is also working on the spreaders (photo 3).
Keith is placing miniature rivets in pad eyes (photo 4). (These latest fittings bring RELIANCE into conformity with our “Configuration Date” (First AC race). From pictures we can see that fittings and components were added, moved and changed during the racing campaign.
Steve is working on the boom crotch (photo 5). Although our RELIANCE will ultimately be posed underway with sails, we anticipate that for a short interim period until the atrium is built, she’ll be displayed at a mooring with topmast housed, and gaff, boom and mainsail resting on the boom crotch.
Meanwhile Mike and Harrison Casting Co are making our gooseneck assembly, and Burr is completing the capstan assemblies.

Configuration Management

There is a lot of effort going on behind the scenes to make sure our RELIANCE is accurate. Boats, especially race boats, change during the season. We chose late August as our configuration date, when RELIANCE was measured and raced for the Cup, since this timeframe is when we had the best pictures. Ours has been a constant battle for configuration management.

For example, NGH’s approved drawing 86-126 (from MIT Hart Collection) shows the original placement of three topmast backstay staples and a trysail staple as shown in picture #1 and as placed on our model as in picture #2. Our visit to the NYYC in NYC last Spring to see their model showed a discrepancy which was confirmed in picture #3 as blown up in #4.

Our metal casting expert, Mike Mirman, then used this picture to created a new fitting, shown in #5.

Come Visit us today, FREE DAY 11/16

Our annual Fall Free Day is currently underway today (11/16). Come join us for a fun day full of activities including: guided tours, kids activities, hot cider, and so much more! And FREE ADMISSION! We hope to see you here.

Much progress has been made this week as you’ll soon see in the next few blog postings, coming soon.

We’ve assembled a diorama, several RELIANCE benches, augmented the RELIANCE PROJECT with ten other exhibits, and have cleared our spar bench to display other parts of RELIANCE. Come meet Capt. Barr and one of his crew. See the Education programs as well.

This week we assembled a diorama of RELIANCE’s wooden Spars – 4 foot sections of real-sized topmast and topsail spars.

Picture no. 1 shows (l. to r.) the no. 1 club topsail club, no. 1 club topsail yard, and topmast. In the background are the spinnaker boom and bowsprit which will have their own display. The diorama base will have aluminum plate covered in cork as on the real RELIANCE’S deck

The second picture show a bench we’re building, the seat of which is a 4′ section of the club topsail yard

Photo 3 shows the metal base that when sand-blasted and painted will become the base for the bowsprit section. We’ll drill holes in the bowsprit to receive the rods, so she’ll stand about two feet off the floor

Hopefully, we’ll have the spinnaker boom on its own stand and ready to go by Saturday

In real life, the topmast was 58′ 3″ long, the no. 1club topsail yard 68′ long, and the no. 1 club topsail club 57’6″ long. These would have held a no. 1 club topsail which luff was 105′ long! The spinnaker Boom was more than 83′ in length.