Over the last few weeks I've been focussing on getting my Foxer dinghy up and running and have only made a few bits of CG580 progress here and there. Things that have happened include:

CG580 Stainless Steel Pack

The stainless steel pack has arrived! There was one small problem with it, which was that the official build plate has been produced pre-populated with Trekka's build/launch info rather than being left blank ready for my build info. I've let Jane know so that she can hopefully fix it for future builders and I'll hopefully get mine either corrected or re-made locally.

Keel

I'm not quite ready to pour the keel yet but I have done an initial melt of the first half of the lead in order to remove some of the impurities and also get an idea of whether or not the melting pot I've prepared is big enough.

The vessel is probably just about big enough, which is a bit odd because my initial calculation was that I'd need just over half of the volume of the old gas cylinder, whereas I actually need almost all of it. I had intended to drill some holes in the side of it to pass a breaker bar through to act as a pivot but I've scrapped that idea now because the pot will be too full. I'm now planning to ladle the molten lead out with an old saucepan and keep the stuff in the mould molten with a propane torch.

The camping stove that I was using doesn't put out enough heat to keep the whole pot molten, so I've bought a catering-style 12.2kW gas stove which will hopefully work a bit better.