The weather heated up nicely this week here in Antalya and so did the temperature inside the GreeNaval Shipyard with all the welding and progress this week.  As per the title and photos below the most visible change is that the first two rows of hull plates are now all tacked in place and Ms. Möbius is feeling much less naked.

What you can’t see quite so well is the thousands of welds on the inside as Sezgin continues his non-stop welding trying to keep up with the rest of the crew who are tacking on more parts and plate by the minute.  And there were a few other fun new things that happened this week but I’ll leave you to find out what those were as you read through this week’s update. 

Thanks for joining us and don’t be shy about adding your questions and suggestions in the Comments section at the very bottom of this page.

And of course your video “reward” is at the very bottom of the post for those who are in a hurry and want to jump to the time lapse quick summary but let’s jump right in starting up at the bow now.

IMG_20180625_141228This is what the Bow looked like when we left of last Friday and now Uğur and our newest crew member are getting the bow framing all finished up in preparation for putting on the front 6m/20ft hull plates.
IMG_20180625_141344You may recall from last week’s post the two sides of the “crash” bulkhead area are different because when the 2nd side goes on there is no way to access to the inside any longer so there needs to be the flat bars on each of the triangular stringers you see here which line up with the elongated slots cut into the hull plate on this side which allow the plate and the flat bars/stringers to be all welded up.  You’ll see that next week in progress.


IMG_20180625_164137Might take you a bit of mental gymnastics to figure out where this shot is taken and what all those holes are for?? 

We are inside the crash bulkhead looking “down” when the boat is right way up, through all of those triangular stringers which you can see are welded to the front side of Frame/Bulkhead #1. 


PGL sketch 33Those holes are for the Samson Post which you can see better here in this earlier rendering when there were a pair of them but we’ve decided to go with just one.  A Samson Post needs to be able to take several times the force of the entire boat as this is where we tie the snubber line to when anchored and where we could attach a tow rope in the highly unlikely event of needing to be towed by another ship somewhere.  Our Samson Post will be a solid aluminium round bar 100mm/4” in diameter and so all those holes you see in the photo above are where the Samson Post will slide down about 1.4m and be welded to each of the stringers it passes through.  We could probably lift the whole boat up on a crane from this post but I don’t think we’ll test that out.


IMG_20180625_182838All hands on deck and the boys quickly had this first hull plate wrestled into position overtop of the anchor roller cheeks and clamped in place.


IMG_20180625_183036Uğur checks to make sure the hull plate fits properly around the anchor assembly and clamps it snugly against the frame and stringers before tacking it in place.


IMG_20180626_103047This continues for the whole plate with one man outside and …….


IMG_20180627_142249….. one outside as the plate is pulled tight against the frames and stringers and then tacked in place.


IMG_20180626_103058Peeking in from the open Starboard side of the crash bulkhead you can see how the bow hull plate is tight up against the stringers and how all the areas to be welded were cleaned up with a light wire wheeling just prior to being put in place here.


IMG_20180627_121858Once they had the first plate in place they quickly maneuvered the next one into position and repeated the same procedure of clamping and tacking.


IMG_20180627_121844As you may recall from seeing other hull plates being tacked in place last week the same technique is used for keeping these large plates all lined up and true by tacking a long length of flat bar on edge just below where the first plate ends while the 2nd plate is tacked on.  This keeps everything lined up such that the two outer surfaces are perfectly flush. 

The lower plate you see here extends about one meter up/down from the deck is 6mm/ 1/4” thick and the 2nd plate above is 10mm thick.


Hull plating thicknessHere is a quick screen grab of the model with each hull plate thickness a different colour so you can see how the hull plating gets thicker and thicker as it moves from the deck down and around to the 25mm thick Keel Bar running down the center.

The maroon colour at the deck is 6mm/ 1/4”, Purple = 10mm/ 13/32”, Green = 12mm/ 1/2” and Cyan at the bow is 15mm/ 5/8” (think ice).


IMG_20180626_181549The inside/outside tag team continues as the plates are tack welded to the stringers on the inside.


IMG_20180628_123626Team Möbius is awemazing and they no sooner have that first 10mm plate at the bow all fitted when they hoist up the next one and set it alongside the mid section of the Port side resting on some brackets they have tacked to the jig to hold it here while they get the chain hoists ready to lift it up into position.


IMG_20180627_142050

Same technique with the flat bar and this plate is soon all pulled into position and the work continues aft.


IMG_20180625_141617Over on the other side  standing aft looking forward you can see that the Starboard side team with Enver and Umit have been equally as busy putting the hull plates on this side and working their way from the aft end forward. 


IMG_20180625_141435Moving forward to get a shot looking back at them you can see how the hull is very quickly taking shape now.


IMG_20180626_103459and before you turn around they soon have that whole side plated with the first 2 rows.


IMG_20180629_142805Not to be outdone the Port side Team soon has their side all plated aft as well.


IMG_20180626_103348Peeking inside we find the always busy Sezgin welding ……….


IMG_20180627_142426 ….. and welding  ……..


IMG_20180627_181231…….. and welding ………


IMG_20180626_103356Doing this.


IMG_20180629_145100And lest you think all the action was on the inside of the building, here is what I saw when I looked out my office window around lunchtime on Friday.


IMG_20180629_142425The yard next door was moving this little fella outside so they could put on some of the upper deck gear which was too high to clear the ceiling inside.

Look closely and you can see how they had to cut out part of the top of the doorway to get it out to begin with


IMG_20180629_143508She is now on stands outside in this spot while they mount propellers and finish other jobs to get her ready to launch.  Those two big doors you see up on deck are for the massive storage area up there which extends all the way forward under that round helipad at the bow.  In case you were wondering we decided to forego that option on Möbius, sorry to disappoint some of you. Smile


IMG_20180502_172128And that’s the week that was June 25-29, 2018.  Hard to believe another month has zipped by in a flash but if you look back at some of the previous posts you’ll see just how much work has taken place in this short period of time.  Here for example is what it looked like a mere 6 weeks ago on May 15th when the jig was being built.

Team Möbius and Naval Yachts is AWEMAZING!!  Thank you all.


Here as promised is your weekly fast forwarded video synopsis of the week.

See you next week!