Atkin specifies Valgerda's mast should rake five inches in 10 feet, that's one in 24 or about two degrees. You don't have to hang around me long before you discover that I'm not a whiz at math or even simple arithmetic. Finding where Ravn's mast step needed to be had me scratching my head for a while. Finally, I took an eight-foot two-by-two, stuck it through the mast partner and marked it. Then I measured five feet up from that mark and made another mark. I made a block two and a half inches long and found another stick longer than five feet. I taped the whole thing together making sure one end of the shorter stick was at the five-foot mark and the block was level with the mast partner. Then I taped a spirit level to the whole lashup. Ravn's keelson is level so I was able to gage when the second stick was perpendicular. I made a mark. Phew!
A pattern, a chunk of purple heart, some time on the bandsaw and hollow-chisel mortiser, rasp, files and sandpaper and PRESTO! A mast step! I also added an screw eye to anchor a downhaul for the boom at the jaws. A little epoxy and I checked another item off the list.
Speaking of lists: I don't have an exhaustive list of jobs left to finish. I only make a series of short lists - with never more than six or eight items. I made the mistake once of ticking off the items remaining to be finished while talking to a friend. This was not written down and I skipped a lot of the small stuff. Still, that experience nearly sunk me into a state of depression. So, to keep off the Prozac, I make my lists short. When I get everything checked off the list I'm working on, I throw it away and start a new one.
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