When will we be finished?

We are frequently asked “when will the boat be finished” or “what takes so long?” Today we opened another bag of zip ties. You might ask what in the world that has to do with taking so long! Well…this happens to be another bag of 1,000 zip ties. That’s related because we have already used three bags (3000 zip ties). If you estimate that it only takes 5 seconds to apply a single zip tie, then that’s 15,000 seconds (4hrs10mins) to apply 3,000 zip ties. Usually it takes longer to position yourself in an odd crevice of the boat, then cut off the zip tie tail. So it’s probably closer to 45,000 seconds (12.5hrs) to actually do the work. That’s an entire day from sunup to sundown without breaks, to apply all the zip ties.

Now imagine that there are literally hundreds of electrical connections that we mechanically crimp, solder, and apply heat shrink tubing, the kind of heat shrink tubing with glue inside, to every electrical connection. How long does that take to complete? The answer is in days and weeks..or simply until they’re all done. Then there’s fuel hose, fabricating tiny fittings, fabricating big fittings, routing wires, routing hoses, making rigging, etc…etc...the list is long!

Oh yeah…our usual response to when we will be finished is usually “not last May, but the one before that.”