The timber provided for the whole companionway structure is beautiful, clear Ash and will be very strong as well as handsome.
Here I am marking out the two side pieces, using the pattern provided.
And here I am marking out the front face of the hood with the full size pattern.
The front face is angled backwards at 66 degrees, and of course requires a curved bottom edge to fit the transverse curve of the cabin roof.
So some very careful cutting is necessary.
As usual the build manual exhorts us to use our non-existent band saw with tilting table, and as usual some imaginative use of whatever tools we possess is required!
The jig saw seemed to be the only viable solution to cutting the curves, but I soon found that my Festool does not have a tilting sole. Huh?!
No doubt Festool would sell me one for a large sum, but I'm only going to do this once so it would be a waste of money.
Luckily my son has a jig saw which satisfies the requirements. It is a nice cordless DeWalt.
I immediately liberated it from his garage (thanks Nick!) and made a few test cuts on scrap MDF.
It worked well and produced a clean, accurate cut at pretty well exactly 66 degrees, so that was the way ahead.
I was reluctant to cut wood until I had thoroughly thought through what to do, and for now I simply labelled the piece with how the bevel should be cut on the front face, like this.
I was still not sure if this was the best way to make the cuts, so left it alone for a day or so to think.
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