This summer's project

Bumbo's crew has always talked about sailing out to one of the many little coves around her home waters, dropping the hook and going for a swim on a hot day. Unfortunately, the curve of the hull makes regular boarding ladders a bit problematic for all but Olympic gymnasts, while the transom is too narrow for one to be usefully mounted there.

So what's a sailor to do?

Steal someone else's plans and make one yourself, that's what.



This is a 1930s-vintage Sparkman and Stevens design for a folding boarding ladder, discovered using the miracle of the Google. Matt made a few tweaks for simplicity, eliminating the brass rail at the top and using red oak (same wood as Bumbo's rudder) rather than mahogany.

Each of the sides were cut from a single 12x24" sheet of 3/4 inch wood, with the treads cut from 1x4 plank. Thanks to George's ongoing home projects, he's developed quite the basement workshop -- so he and his dad notched the sides for the treads and set the pilot holes in a single morning's session.




The project was more challenging than expected. Matt managed to gouge himself with a nice, sharp chisel right off the bat; a couple of screws and a drill bit broke off in the hard red oak; and finding hinges in the proper dimensions took a couple of weeks of searching. (They can be found here if anyone else wants to try.)

But those obstacles were soon overcome with a relative minimum of bad language and another trip to George's basement. A couple of coats of varnish later, Matt mounted the apparatus on the back porch and started to climb, as the lovely Mrs. Matt stood ready with the phone to take pictures (and call 911 as needed).


"Hey, y'all, watch this!"

And it actually works on the boat, too:

Sadly, it's unlikely we'll be able to use it until next summer. But it's now stowed neatly in the lazarette, awaiting the first hot day of 2012!