This has been a really busy weekend. Sorry I haven’t been updating as much as I would like. It has just been a lot of work, but I would like to get you caught up right now.
We have all the hydraulic lines installed. It took three days to get them all in and over 120 ft of hose and 65ft in hard line (pipe) to get everything hooked up.
We have the engine installed. Unfortunately are electronics are keeping it from starting. All our connections were corroded. We’ve been changing them out, with all new switches, relays and connectors.
Railing is going in.
The Stairs are going in.
We are still need donations. There is a bit more that we need. Please check out the new Video and the KickStarter website.
I am leaving the house in about 20 minutes for my first and last camping trip of the Summer. SOAK is our regional Burning Man event and the one weekend I said I would take off and not work on the Ship.
http://www.burningmanportland.com/
So I’m going to have a great weekend and I hope you do as well. I will leave you with this very happy making video.
A lot has happened since we sold all our Tripods. Our 3 cylinder Kubota Engine was removed and is going to get rebuilt. Andy L cut the frame around the engine mounts on the scissor lift. We plan to reuse the frame to save time because we won’t have to drill new mounting holes.
Josh, Aaron and I got the steering joints taken apart.
They were rusted in place, it took the 20 ton press to break the “pivot point” free. We are going to replace the bronze bearings with new ones. This was about 10 hours of work between the 3 of us, one of those things you don’t plan for but has to be done.
We made the the hydraulic motor mount for the front drive motor. It is made from 3x8x1/4 tube. The mounting bolts are 3/4″ grade 8 because they go through a slotted hole. The slotted holes through the tube were reinforced so that we don’t crush the tube. I am going to add another set of screws to to help pull tension on the chain as well. We don’t need it super tight because we have nearly 180deg of chain wrap on both sprockets, but I would like to get it set right.
Jules has been working on the lathe all week. We need (8) more 4″ roller wheels to guide the huge 10ft diameter front wheel. There are a lot of steeps involved to make those.
Just as I was about to go to Bed Sunday Night the first email came in, then another one. People were buying Tripods, people were helping build the ship. I looked at the View counter on the Video and it had shot up 200 more views than an hour before. (currently over 9000 views)
I looked at Boing Boing to see if my link was up, and there it was. Right there at the Top of the page was the video describing the Ship and the Tripods. Then a third and forth order came in, it was now 8am on the west coast. Then another order, I wasn’t going to sleep yet. As the Tripods sold I updated the site. This was exciting; I started messaging the rest of the ship’s crew.
We had about 30 Tripods on the site, but I also had 20 Tripods that still needed their picture taken. I managed the Sales as they were coming in. At the same time I set up to take pictures of the new Tripods. I worked fast to get them up on the site.
By the end of the Day over 30 Tripods had sold. Tuesday slowed down a little bit but the Tripods were still selling.
Then Wednesday comes and the link to the video is in “The Jack Rabbit Speaks”, Burning Man’s news letter. Orders started coming in fast and it didn’t take long to sell the remaining 20 Tripods. As of Thursday, 53 Tripods had been sold…. But our work had just begun.
It is now Friday Morning, my house is torn apart, packaging materials are everywhere. Pirate Ship Crew have been helping me get all the Tripods boxed up and ready for shipping. And now, 53 Tripods are ready to be taken to the Post Office. Some of them going to the U.K., Canada, Australia, and all over the United States. In a few days time all over the world people are going to meet their new friend.
A lot of people put a lot of work into the Tripods. Some of the crew was starting to question if this was the best way to fund the ship and maybe we needed to try something else. But here it is, out cost have been covered and we have enough to finish the ship and get it to the Playa.
We’ll continue to fund raise; there are a lot of things that we always said: “It would be nice to have X,Y,Z” and now X, Y and Z are much more of a possibility.
We have ~10 Tripods out at galleries that I will bring back this week and get up on the Website.
We will also sale the 3 huge Elder Tripods.
The important part is that we are funded.
So thank you. If you’re here reading about what we’re doing then you are helping us, if you bought a sticker, a patch or one the Tripods you are supporting us in a big way.
I have dreamed about this ship for years, being able to now build it without wondering where the Money is going to come from is a gift. Thank you,
A few years ago I made some Steam Punk Goggles that had spinning gears that did nothing. The 17 second video on YouTube went a little viral but the non-functioning gears always bugged me.
The Pirate Ship is about functional gearing and the steering system is perfect place to use them.
Turning the Ships Steering Wheel drives a whole series of gears that move a “rack” up and down. The rack is connected to a hydraulic ram. As the ram moves oil is pushed through a hose that then pushes and pulls another hydraulic ram which will steer the ship.
There are 78 pieces in the steering column, 32 of them were custom made including the gears. The gears are made from 3/4″ plate steel, there are a lot of brass and copper spacers and pins. The column is made from 3/16″ thick 4×6 steel tube. All the gears are supported on a shaft and pillow blocks on both sides for the column.
Initially the Steering was going to be done with a tiller, but as the ship got bigger a wheel became to way to go.
This is the Video!! Please share this Video with all your friends and family. We’ve needed an adequate way to explain the project and Christopher Darrow came though with this awesome video.
We found out this week that we will need a new Engine for the ship. Our scissor lift had most the parts we needed and we were hoping for an easy fix on the motor but it not to be. We will need a new motor. Please forward the video to anyone that would like a Tripod and would like to support this project.
Monday I drove up to Vashon Island in Washington to meet with Bob Powell. Bob was in the process of water jet cutting the gears for the steering system and the two sprockets for the front wheel drive.
I got there in time to see the last sprocket being cut.
The water jet does in incredible job cutting these parts out of 3/4” plate steel. With the last part cut Bob and I got lunch where I had the biggest chicken burrito I’ve ever seen.
Today I got to work finishing up these parts. The parts need an accurate hole bored through the center. Bob left me just enough metal get a clean cut without spending forever getting the holes in.
The sprockets needed a lot of work, the nearest size the plate steel comes in is 0.75” and the sprockets needed to be close to 0.68”. I have a small lathe but it was up to the job.
The bigger sprocket was bigger than the chuck but with a dial indicator I was able to tap it into place and then face the plate and put the relief angle on the teeth.
There are still some key ways to cut and the teeth need to be deburred but some major progress in the last two days. I’m not sure if I’m going to finish up the chain drive tomorrow or start working on the gears for the steering system. I should know by the time I wake up : )
We’ve spent the last few weeks working on publicity for the Pirate Ship. While we have a lot of parts ready to be added to the ship the account was running low and we weren’t going to be able to work that long before funding ran out.
With that in mind we put on a “100 Days until Burning Man BBQ” and invited over 100 people to come look at the Ship.
We had that BBQ today and what an incredible turn out, despite the rain I think we had over 100 people at the shop throughout the day.
We showed off the Pirate Ship to some great friends and family all the way from the U.K. including a builder of racing yachts. He and I had a great time talking about construction; (I had no idea that they weigh the dust after sanding the fiber glass hull to help keep a running total of the Yacht’s weight).
We had an incredible pre-screening of Christopher Darrow’s video on the Tripods and the Pirate Ship. This video will be ready for release this week so expect an update at that point, but for now I can say WOW!!!
Jesse our Electrical Engineer brought over his Rail Gun and we had some live firings in the shop for an audience. (Check out that traveling spark)
(Sorry I don’t have more photos, I kept setting my camera down. If you have photos I would love copies, please. )
This month we also became armature screen printers and made patches to sale for future events. The patches have been selling well and we plan to make more of them. Look forward to seeing them on the website soon.
I also spent a lot of time this month working on the Steering System. With the name “Clock Ship Tere” I wanted to put in some more gears anywhere I could. The Steering Column now goes from the steering wheel through a series of gears to a rack that pushes and pulls an oil filled hydraulic ram. The moving oil is used to push an identical ram at the rear axel that will turn the wheels and steer the ship. I am very happy to say that those gears are going to be Water Jet cut tomorrow. This is worthy of its own post so I will leave it at that.
Sorry that is has been a while between post but expect some good posts in the next week.
There are many prefixes associated with boats, probably the two most know are H.M.S. for “Her Majesty’s Ship”, and S.S. for “Steam Ship”.
The Pirate Ship has a lot of gears, the same type of gears that made clocks possible, it was our Navigator, Happy Mel that came up with the prefix C.S. for “Clock Ship”. I particularly liked this and it works well with the rest of the name.
I wanted to wait until the time was right and here on Mother’s day I am announcing that the ship will be named after my Mom and will be know as, “The C.S. Tere”.
My Mom (now retired) was a high school teacher where she changed hundreds if not thousands of people’s lives. The movie “Stand and Deliver” could have been made about my Mom, she took students that were never expected to accomplish anything and are now college graduates, business owners and other contributing members of society. The influence and positive changes she has created in the world can never be measured. She deserves more than a ship named after her but for now this is her Ship.
In a few hours form now I will sit her down at the computer So she can read this.
It started when Happy Mel and I went out looking for needed parts for the Pirate Ship. I wanted to use hydraulic motors driven by a pump powered from an electric motor. This system has many advantages over powering the ship directly from the electric motor, but we needed to find a good source for these parts.
Mel and I put together a list of forklift repair shops to go visit. We set out for the first one, but before we got there I saw on the side of a building, “Spencer Fluid Power” (aka Hydraulics). I hung a U-Turn and we stopped in. They were very helpful and refereed us to a customer of theirs (Annette) that was in the store at the time. Annette from “DNA Hydraulics” was about the best person we could have talked to. We learned a lot from her, she also took us over to her mechanic Dan who had good advice and she then sent us to talk to Jeff at IVY Equipment.
This is the big break we needed, because through IVY we bought a used off road Scissor Lift.
(look at the tire size compared to my Dog da Vinci; the thing is H U G E)
The lift fully loaded weighs about 10,000lbs, the same as the Pirate Ship fully loaded, it has all the hydraulic motors we need, control systems, pumps, hydraulic rams, valves etc. Buying all of this separately was going to cost several thousand dollars, but we were able to pick up the parts we needed for $800.
The Scissor lift has a 3 cylinder Kubota engine that can run off propane or gas. I was hoping to make an electric vehicle but there are huge advantages of using a internal combustion engine. The engine is small enough to fit in the area already reserved for the engine room. It does needs some work but I think we’ll be able to get it running.
It will also be nice to drive all day and all night where with batteries we were going to need to recharge every 4-5 hours.
Also, this week we received a private donation of $500 to the Pirate Ship Project. This comes at a great time after draining the account to buy the Scissor Lift. We now have money to get the engine running and pay for all the consumables that keep getting consumed (Oddly enough). Thank you for that.
The last bit of Awesome news this week, something all of you should be excited about:
We have Patches that have been donated to help raise funds for the ship.
This means If you would like to help build the ship and don’t have $65 for a Tripod you can get a patch for $5. I set the button up so you can donate more if you like ($5, $10 or $20).
$5 is a cup of coffee in some places, but it could be part of a Pirate Ship. You will forget that cup of Coffee but it is not so easy to forget that you helped build a Pirate Ship.
(If you would like two patched donate $5 twice. )
So yeah, wow, it has been quite a week with a whole lot more to come. Thank all of you for the support. Thank you for telling your friends about the project, for buying Tripods, (and Now patches). Thank you for your donations, and your encouraging comments, they all mean a lot to me, a lot to all of us. A big thank you to those that come over on the weekend and pick up a tool to see this thing happen. Thank you.
Welcome to the Construction Blog of the Pirate Ship. I plan to have it done for Burning Man 2010 as time and material present themselves. I am trying to use as much recycled and reused material as possible. Some things I will have to buy, for that we are making and selling Tripod-Sentinels. Please Visit the main page to lean more.
Welcome to the Construction Blog of the Pirate Ship. I plan to have it done for Burning Man 2010 as time and material present themselves. I am trying to use as much recycled and reused material as possible. Some things I will have to buy, for that we are making and selling Tripod-Sentinels. Please Visit the main page to lean more.
LostMachine.com