Hello building a Roberts 37.

[milly]

Hi everyone,
Just joined today as i have been lurking around for a few months and find this community is really supportive and full of experience!
My husband and i live in Darwin Australia, and are buidling a Roberts 37 E, we started earlier this year but it has been a dream for a long time (we have owned the plans for many years). We feel we are finally in a financial postion and the right headspace to do it.
We are not sailors yet. My husband has has lived on his uncles yachts in the past (his uncle has built 4 yachts). We have no experience in sailing or cruising. We are however gypsys at heart, have never settled very long in one place and probably never will. We are keen learners, tenacious and persistant.....The cruising lifestyle has been calling us for many years and we are now on our way to make it a reality.
I am hoping that this forum provides some support, encouragement and great advice, as we have had a lot of eye rolling and "you cant do that' statements, and are looking for a positive helpful place while we acheive our dream.
I look forward to making good friends here and benefiting from your vast experience!

[GordMay]

Greetings and welcome aboard the CF, milly.

Good luck on your build!

[alpin]

congragulations, to make your own boat is a very important experience in life, I made my boat too, you are lucky to have an uncle who made 4 boats.
I have to say be carefull this is not a toy, you will live and sail with your boat.
be patient, if you make any thing wrong it takes too much time and money to correct it.
be clever, when you think about the all production it may takes your motivation down. so just think and plan the step which you will begin, it is important for concentration.
be happy imagine the days you will sail with your boat.
but when you finish your boat you should have the skills for being the captain of your boat. please don't forget yourself under the pressure of the production, sail and learn cruising. this gives you perfect motivation.
but I have to say if you are making your boat just for the idea of it will be cheaper it is not true. because you will spend more money you think and there are lots of second hand boats you can buy and begin sailing after a few minutes later.
I couldn't stop myself to write this. I believe you can make your boat. do you have pictures about your building step.

[Waterway Guide]

Welcome aboard! Best of luck on your grand project. I posted an article recently on a gentleman in Green Bay, Wisconsin, US, who built a Roberts 434...it's gorgeous.

[capttman]

Welcome and best of luck on your building. I built my Roberts 434 and ended up being 47' careful you might do the same to fit everything in he says laughing,

[Celestialsailor]

Welcome to the forum... I built a Roberts 34 in the 80s.

[milly]

Thanks everyone for the welcome. Its great to know others have built and got to the end and a re still sane! You are all sane, aren't you?
Thanks for the words of advice alpin. They make a lot of sense.
The boat will be our home, it is an investment in our future, so we are building it with care. We know it is not a cheap option, but it has been a dream of my husbands for many years to build it himself, and it means we will not be in debt by buying a boat either, which is important to us. The build is exciting, challenging, hard work, exhilirating, and frustrating all at once! But you all have probably experienced this yourselves when you built. WE work hard every weekend and generally make good progress, however things took a strange turn last weekend when we set our rented bush block on fire with the plasma cutter and had to call the fire brigade to put it out (that took several hours and a few water dumps from a helicopter.....sorry neighbours.....) the boat was ok (thank goodness for steel). It was all very ironic as we were supposed to go to the annual viking boat burning at the crusing yacht club that evening....thiers was cancelled due to a total fire burn that day! They could have come to ours......
I am constantly dreaming of the days when it is finished, but want to enjoy the journey there too. We have joined the local crusing yacht club and plan to get to know other cruisers here. They hold wet season racing here and there may be a chance for us to volunteer to crew to get some "thrown in the deep end" experience. We will also take sailing lessons next dry season (next april).
I will try to post a few pictures of where we are up to, once I have worked out how. I will try to put them in my gallery under my profile.
We are also going to set up a blog and try to post regularly there about our progress so will put up the link once we have set it up.
Once again, thanks for your welcome. I look forward to many more conversations.

[LakeSuperior]

My father's 5 year project to build a 37 foot strip planked teak yawl took 20 years. He was a perfectionist and the boat is amazing. His goal was to make progress on it every day no matter how small a step. I am still sailing it today.

[SkiprJohn]

Aloha and welcome aboard!
Good to have you here.
kind regards,