First Attempt: Joel's "Lovely Wooden Blocks"

I needed to take a break from the hull as I contemplate exactly how to go about getting the coamings on and looking shipshape. In the meantime, encouraged by the relative ease in which I was able to knock up a few wooden cleats, I thought I might tackle a couple of blocks (ha! tackle blocks!).

This is one of the cleats that will be used on the side decks for mooring and fenders and such. I modified the basic design of the S&S cleat dimensions. These are 6" long and have a cut out between the two mounting posts. I made them out of some Brazilian cherry that I had laying around. 

All 4 of the side deck cleats. These are roughed out and not finished sanding or sealing yet. I also need to countersink a little deeper so that the head of the mounting bolt lays flat. 

So anyway, I had downloaded Joel Bergen's pdf on "Lovely Wooden Blocks", and figured, how hard can THIS be? Well, it turns out, not as easy as I originally thought. Making these blocks requires a pretty good level of precision in your woodworking...something I strive to achieve. I'm getting better but I have a long way to go.

I found a cheap source of 1/16" x 1/2" stainless steel straps and ordered up several of them in various lengths not knowing exactly how long I was going to need (I suppose I could have calculated it out, but it was late and I was tired and frankly chose the lazy route). I bought some nylon sheaves from our friends at Duckworks. I ripped and planed some walnut and maple and white oak I had lying around and set about making all the parts. So here's where things went wrong:

1) For some reason, for the life of me, I cannot rip a piece of wood on a table saw that is of uniform thickness from one end to another. When I eye-ball it, it looks to be 2" wide all the way across, but by the time I get down to detail work, there's ALWAYS some variation.

2) They say it's a poor craftsman who blames his tools for shoddy work. I literally have a poor Craftsman; router and table, that is. The thing must be 30+ years old. The router bit spins well enough (although it sounds like a jet engine in takeoff mode). The problem is I can't set the depth of cut with any precision. I dialed in 1/16" and measured it out, and it was 3/16". Even after setting it at the right height, it would shift down during cuts. When I would go back to make the cut deeper again, the fence would shift ever so slightly to ruin my first pass. I need to get me a nice bench table for my nice Bosch router for the next project.

3) I glued up the pieces, but found that my spacers were ever-so-slightly (I mean 1/64") off which knocked the glue-up out of alignment and subsequently the open area where the sheave goes is too narrow for the sheave and bearing.

4) Trying to fix all my errors pretty much destroyed the nice blank I had made.

5) I don't have a great way to accurately bend the stainless straps. They bend easy enough, but I need a metal workers vise or something and round nose vise grips or something.

Anyway...I had fun making this first one. I have lots of pieces made up for the next bunch of them, but I wanted to see what the obstacles were going to be. Having learned on this one, I think the next ones will be better.

I used walnut for the outer cheeks, maple for the center cheek, and white oak for the spacers. Not sure I'll do that again. I don't really care for the look.

You can see my bent straps aren't perfect. 

This gives an idea of the size of the double block for 3/8" line.