CHAPTER
IV.
BOAT BUILDING
BOAT building is
quite a step away from chicken house and woodland
shack construction, in that it requires two qualities
that are not essential in ordinary
building-thoroughness and exactitude. Things that will
"get by" in building a hen coop, like a crack not
tightly made up, or a corner not exactly plumb, will
never do in boat building; but when a boy gets to
sixteen years and older he begins to take pleasure in
honest, exact work, and will not be satisfied with
rough and ready constructions, and it is at just about
this age that he takes great interest in boat
building, boat overhauling, boat rigging and all the
aquatic sports that go with the ownership of a
boat.
As most youths are much shorter in coin than in
ambition, and as a boat costs but a third as much when
you build it yourself, the way to own a really fine,
large craft is to build it yourself, during the winter
months. To do this you need a few tools but these of
the best; for no five-and-ten-cent store articles will
do for boat building. You need a good cross-cut saw,
and ditto rip saw, each of them costing not less than
$1.65; a good jack plane, costing $2.00; a good
hammer, of real steel, costing a quarter; a ratchet
brace, costing a dollar; four bits of the twenty-five
cent kind; a breast drill with small twist drills for
boring holes for nails (for no real boat carpenter
would dream of driving a nail without first boring for
it -- it's the way they so marvelously avoid splitting
things); a spokeshave, costing 40 cents; and one chain
boat clamp, costing $1.50. This latter you call hardly
get along without, unless you can borrow something of
the kind from a carpenter, for the strains on boat
planking are tremendous, and far beyond your strength
to bend.
You often read, in boys' books, of bending
twenty-foot planks 14 inches wide by hand, the writer
slurring over the details of how you're going to do it
because he either does not know himself, or else does
not realize what he is asking the boy to do. As a
matter of fact your whole weight on such a plank will
hardly bend it six inches, while it must bend some two
feet to fit the curves of a boat, and this can only be
done with a screw clamp. This clamp (Figure 10) has a
piece of chain attached, and two interchangeable
hooks, the keel hook and plank hook; and you use it
either to squeeze the planks edgewise against each
other before nailing fast, as in planking a boat, or
use it to draw the planks to the frame in wrapping
them around the molds.
Going at it gradually, you can soon accumulate this
set of tools, and are now ready for lumber. The best
planking is white cedar, costing about 7 cents a board
foot for clear stock free from knots. Next after it
comes white pine; and last, cypress, which latter
though it will never rot is prone to split and is
heavier than the other two woods. For stem, knees,
deadwood, frames, keel, etc., the best wood is sound
white oak. There is no use considering anything else,
as you can always get it.
My own boy is now building a 12-foot sailing
batteau for cruising in Barnegat Bay, and as she is
almost an exact duplicate of my boat, the Margaret
(described in Part One, Chapter I), that I had when a
boy of his age, we will start by telling how to build
her.
SAILING BATTEAU
You want, first of all, a good oak stem, made from
a piece of 4 x 4-inch white oak not less than 26
inches long. Most boys make the mistake of getting the
stem too small, so that when they come to cut the
rabbet for the 7/8-inch side planks there is not
enough wood left in the stem to nail securely to, and
the boat is weak where she ought to be strongest. And
you want length enough to allow for the forward sheer
and cutting across the stem at an angle, top and
bottom, to match the sheer.
 Having
gotten your stem piece, scribe a center line down one
side and lay out from it two lines, 3/4 inch apart,
which are to be the front edge of your bow. Do not get
this any sharper, for when you have trimmed it round
(or maybe put on an iron stem band) you will find it
not any too wide. Lay off the shape of the stem and
rabbet on top and bottom of your block of oak, as
shown in the drawing (Figure 6), and saw off the
superfluous wood, or trim it off first with a sharp
hatchet and finally smoothing flat with your plane.
Then saw out the rabbet for the planks. It is easier
to saw this than to chisel it out, as, once you get
your rip-saw started right she will cut you a neat,
plane surface that simply needs smoothing with the
plane. The saw, of course, will slot the full length
of your stem, cutting a deeper and deeper kerf until
you get down to the bottom of the rabbet. Do not get
these rabbet angles the wrong way (as shown by the
dotted lines). Most amateurs make this mistake and the
stem is ruined, for you then have a great hole in
behind the side planks that will never caulk tight in
the world!
You are now ready for the side planks, the lower or
garboard pair. Too often boys' books waste the poor
boy's money by telling him to use these planks just as
they come from the mill (Figure 13, how not to cut),
yet a little experiment with a cardboard miniature
plank will show you that the only way those planks can
bend around the middle mold with both edges straight
is bolt upright, a most unseaworthy and landlubberly
way for the sides of your boat to be.
No; you must have outboard flare to
the planks, and to get this flare like a regular boat
and yet not have her bottom curve up so much as to
spin around like a wash tub and have no grip on the
water, you must cut the bottom edge of the garboard
planks with a long in-curve of some three inches rise,
as shown in the drawing (Figure 14).
The upper edge can stay straight, as
that will give her just about the right sheer. Cut,
also, the stem end of the plank at the slant shown and
cut up the curve for the counter astern as shown, also
lay off but do not cut the angle for the stern
transom. Do not bevel the lower plank edge as yet.
Both garboards are to be finished alike with square
edges and sawed out with your rip saw. When finished,
paint the inside of the rabbet and the forward edges
of both garboards with thick white lead paste and then
tack both planks to the stem with wire nails. They
will lie out astern at a long angle, and, when
satisfied that they lie true to the rabbet angle, bore
four holes in each plank with your breast drill and
drive in 2-inch 10-penny galvanized iron clout nails,
setting them in below the surface of the planks to
allow for putty above the nail heads.
You are now ready for the center mold. Suppose you
have chosen fourteen feet for the length of your boat.
Planks come in merchant sizes of 10, 12, 14, 16 and 18
feet, with rarely some 20-foot sizes to be picked up.
You will then choose fourteen-foot planks for the
garboard and sheer strake 12 and 8 inches wide
respectively, one each for each side. Tack the sheer
strake to the stem, lapping the garboard one inch, and
then lay out on the planks the angle of the stern
transom, measuring down from near the upper corner of
the sheer strake (about an inch from the end of the
plank to allow something over for the bend of the
plank), and you will then have the right length for
the garboard plank, and this should he done before
sawing it. If the boat is to be about fourteen feet
long (she will come a little less when the planks are
bent) the right beam will be 4 feet 6 inches, and the
flare on each side to throw back the waves will be 6
inches, making the bottom 3 feet 6 inches wide.
Now for the height amidships; the garboard plank as
it came from the lumber yard was 12 inches wide, of
which 3 inches was taken out amidships by the rise of
the bottom curve. This leaves 9 inches for the
garboard width amidships. The top or sheer strake will
be an 8-inch board, and will lap the garboard one
inch, so that the total depth of the side amidships
will be 16 inches.
Get a rough 10-inch board and saw from it two
pieces about 4 feet 8 inches long, cleat them
together, making one wide mold some 18 inches high by
4 feet 8 inches long, and lay out on this the lines of
the center mold as shown in Figure 5, with a 3-foot
6-inch bottom, 6-inch flare, 16-inch sides and 4-foot
6-inch top. Cut out a 7/8 x 9-inch notch on each side
for the garboard, making the actual width of the mold
bottom 3 feet 4-1/4 inches inside, allowing 7/8 inch
for the lap of sheer strake on garboard strake.
Now you are ready to put in the mold and bend the
garboard planks around it. The mold does not go in the
center, but, to get a pretty sailing shape, it is put
6 feet from the bow and a little less than 8 feet from
the stern.
Now to bend the planks: Put on your chain clamp,
with the plank hook bearing against a cleat tacked on
outside the after edge of the strake and its screw
foot bearing on a similar cleat on the opposite after
edge. By main strength you can bring the planks
together maybe a foot or more around the central mold
as brace, and then you catch the chain in the right
link to hold what you have gotten. Next, screw in on
the clamp, drawing the plank ends together until they
are the right width to fit in the stern transom. This
is made of oak, 7/8 by 12 inches wide and is cut,
shaped very like the central mold, with the same flare
angles but narrower. For a fourteen-foot batteau your
stern seat would need to be about 3 feet wide at the
top and 2 feet 3 inches at the bottom; allowing for a
7/8-inch notch on each side for the garboard plank, it
makes the actual bottom dimension of the transom 2
feet 1-1/4 inches, and, as the sheer strakes will take
7 inches of the transom, this notch for the garboards
will only be 5 inches high. (The actual distance you
take off the transom cut of the garboard planks.)
This gives very little to nail to, and certainly
not enough to hold the planks if you take off the
clamp. However, bore for two clout nails and drive
them home through the garboard strakes into the ends
of the transom, and tack a board across the bottom
with nails driven into the garboards on the turn of
the counter. Then work in two oak corner knees, 6
inches on a side, to fit snugly in the corners between
the inside of the garboards and the inside of the
transom. These are secured by two No. 14 brass screws
21/2 inches long, driven through the outside of the
garboard, and two more driven through the outside of
the transom. These knees are very important, for
strength in securing the garboards to the transom.
Even now you dare not take off the clamp, but must
first secure the garboards by nailing on all the
bottom planking, with the clamp still on the
transom.
Turn the boat over and "spot" the garboard plank
edges for beveling (Figure 8). To do this, take a
strip of wood 2 x 1 inches, perfectly true and
straight, and lay it across the bottom of the boat at
various places, marking down from it the outside of
the garboard the correct distance that its inside edge
is below the under surface of your strip. Run a thin
batten through all these points, and scribe a line,
which will be the bevel line to plane to. Finish
smooth and true with your plane, and then put on your
bottom planks, beginning at the transom.
The plank furthest aft overlaps the transom and
nails to it, so the latter must be beveled to match.
When you get forward to the small planks up at the
bow, it is time to stop and put in the keelson, in
which I am a great believer, for the additional
strength it gives, besides keeping the bottom planks
from springing (though plenty of small rowboats have
been built without keel or keelson).
However, we will put one in our boat, as she is to
be an able deep-sea cruiser. Get it out of 7/8-inch
yellow pine, dressed, 6 inches wide and 14 feet long;
and the cheapest thing to do is to pick out a nice
12-inch board at the mill and have them rip it in half
for you, getting thus keel and keelson at the same
time. The keelson goes inside the boat, from stem to
transom, and is bent to fit snug along the bottom.
Each plank is nailed to it with four 8-penny
galvanized clout nails, driven through from the bottom
and clinched (first boring for them with the breast
drill) and setting the heads in to take putty. The
keelson will bend up the counter easily if you begin
nailing at the bow end first and cross-cut it half
through every inch where the turn of the counter
begins to get bad. An oak knee is worked in from
keelson to transom, thus strengthening the latter.
 All
the bottom plank nails are 10-penny galvanized, driven
down into the garboard edges, three to the plank and
set to take putty. When all of the plank ends have
been trimmed off with the cross-cut saw and the rough
ends planed smooth, you are ready for the sheer strake
planks, which are now to be nailed to the stem the
same as the garboards. But, as they must come in
flush, to fit into the rabbet, so you must first cut a
bevel on the tops of garboards, beginning about 16
inches back from the stem; and cut a corresponding
bevel on the bottoms of the sheer strakes. In order
not to get a thin shim edge that will not caulk well,
cut this bevel with a notch, as shown in Figure 11.
Having fitted them, nail fast to the stem and wrap the
planks around the mold, overlapping the garboards an
inch. Nail with 8-penny galvanized iron clout nails
every three inches, boring for each to avoid splitting
the edges of your planks, driving the nails from
outside and clinching inside on the garboard. It takes
two boys to do this, one holding an axe head against
the spot where the nail will come through.
When you get aft nearly to the transom it will be
time to take off the clamp which was on the garboards
all this time and you had best secure them by tacking
a few strips across the top of the boat, here and
there, and wrapping a rope around the boat near the
stern, tightening it by driving a wedge in between the
boat bottom and the rope. I once ruined a nearly
finished batteau by taking the clamps off at this time
without proper security. It was a single-plank,
ten-foot dinghy, and the strains in bending the planks
were very severe. After nailing on the bottom boards
and transom, I took off the clamps without putting in
the corner knees, and while working at them there was
a sudden rending crash, and the whole boat flew apart
in a second. The side planks tore loose from transom
and bottom planks, great strips of wood being torn off
the bottom of the side planks, and the only thing to
do was to cut up those side planks until I got to good
sound wood again, a loss of about two inches in depth
of the sides. It is a classic accident; one that will
happen to all youthful boat builders unless
warned.
However, we have got to get off our clamp from the
garboards, to wrap in the sheer strakes, so we will do
it now, putting the clamp on as soon as possible and
drawing the sheer strake planks in until they lie flat
against the garboards and are snug to the transom.
Then drive and clinch the lap nails aft to the stern,
drive in nails through sheer strake into the transom,
and work in two more oak corner knees flush with the
gunwale. Then trim off with a saw any overhang of the
sheer strakes (which should be left long enough for
the purpose).
Next, put in the sill for the stern seat. It is a
piece of 7/8 x 4-inch oak, and is fitted in on edge
about 24 inches forward of the transom, securing with
two screws, one each side, driven through from the
outside. It should come about six inches below the
gunwale and should notch to fit over the tops of the
garboard strakes. When this is in you can safely take
off the clamp for good, and can handle the boat
without fear. Turn her over and put on the keel, first
trimming off the surplus stem true with the top sheer
and bottom rocker. The keel is to go under the stem
and have a large screw driven through it up into the
stem. But, before this is done, all the bottom planks
must be caulked or you will not be able to get at the
seams under the keel. Caulking takes three
operations:
(1) opening the seam with a caulking tool
(the No. 0 is right for small boats);
(2) caulking the seam with cotton, sold for the
purpose in balls of wicking;
(3) "paying" the seam, as painting over the
cotton is called, and puttying over the paint.
It is quite a job, but when done the keel can go on
and is best secured to the bottom with No. 12 brass
flat-head screws, countersunk to take putty over their
heads. Slot the keel back four feet from the stern,
with two saw cuts an inch apart, leaving a central
tongue which you will spring up over the skeg. Now
screw fast these two keel sides under the counter,
trimming off at the transom. Next, fit the skeg. It
will be about eight inches deep, as you can find out
exactly by bending the tongue of the keel until it
comes in true line with the bottom. Hold an eight-inch
board with its edge touching the bottom of the boat,
the board being exactly in the line of the keel. Now
scribe from the bottom with a stick 8 inches long, and
having a pencil on the end of it, making a curve on
the board parallel to the curve of the bottom, or
"counter" as it is called at this point. Saw out with
your rip, and you have the skeg, which can then be
driven in snug under the keel tongue, fitting tight in
the slot between the keel strips up under the
counter.
Trim off at the transom and put on the stern post,
made of 2 x 7/8-inch oak, screwed to the back of the
transom with 2-inch brass No. 14 screws, also driving
them through the post into the skeg. Finish the job by
driving screws down through the keel strip into the
skeg and also from the inside of the boat through the
bottom planks into the skeg. We are now ready to take
out the central mold.
Before doing it, its place must be taken with
something equally strong, and that is the central
rowing thwart. This goes in just aft of the mold, and
you first get out two side braces of 7/8 x 8-inch
yellow pine, 16 inches long, and tack to each of them
a block 8 x 8 x 7/8 inches to take care of the lap of
garboard and sheer strake planks. These side boards
are secured by brass screws driven through from the
outside, and then the thwart is cut, of 8 x 7/8-inch
yellow pine, and set in to come about 8 inches above
the bottom of the boat. It should drive snug, so as to
spread the boat a trifle and free the central mold.
Take this out, and the boat is nearly done.
Get two yellow pine 1-1/2-inch half-round pieces of
molding, 14 feet long, to be bent later around the
gunwale over the wash board cracks for fenderwales.
Work in an oak breast-hook in the bow, just aft of the
stem and fitting snugly to it.
Two oak knees to the rowing thwart, and the boat is
done, as a rowboat, barring the stern seat, which can
be fitted in, in white pine, leftover.
But we want a sail batteau of her, with deck,
washboards and centerboard. Put in the centerboard
first. The construction I have shown in Figures 1, 2
and 3 is the easiest to make and put in.
The sides of the trunk are 12 x 7/8-inch white
pine, 30 inches long, and are secured to the posts
with brass screws, some lamp wicking and white lead
paste being run along between the posts and trunk
boards, not only to make it tight but to make it a
trifle wider, so that a 7/8-inch yellow pine
centerboard can swing freely inside.
Saw this centerboard out, building it up of 4 x
7/8-inch yellow pine strips, strung on two 3/8-inch
iron rods by drilling holes for the purpose, and
finally planing the whole thing flat and true. About
26 inches long, 12 inches deep at forward end and 16
inches aft is about right for this board.
Swing with a white pine plug, driven through both
sides of the centerboard trunk and passing through an
inch hole in the lower forward corner of the board.
The posts must be long enough to go through keelson,
bottom boards and keel "and then some"; say, 3-1/2
inches longer than the height of the trunk.
Slot through the keel, keelson and bottom boards
with compass and rip-saw, caulk all the seams inside
with a hook caulking iron, and then lay lampwicking
soaked in white lead paste around the slot, set in the
posts and trunk and draw down tight with long, 4-inch
No. 16 brass screws, driven up through keel, bottom
boards and keelson, into the bottom of the centerboard
trunk planks.
To put on the deck you first want a set of deck
carlines, spaced about eight inches. These are of 2 x
7/8-inch oak, and are planed with a slight crown on
the tops. Secure by toe-nailing to the sides on top of
a "riser" strip, run around two inches below the
gunwales, inside on the sheer strake. The first thing
to go on these carlines is the planksheer, which
continues aft to form the washboards. Four inches wide
is plenty, and it must be gotten out in two pieces to
a side. By stretching a string across, from the stem
to a point on the gunwale about 6 feet 6 inches aft
from the stem, you will find a place where the height
of the curve from stem to this point and from inside
corner of transom and sheer strake to the same point
will be the same height, 4 inches.
As you want the planksheer to be four inches wide,
it is obvious that such a curved plank can be cut from
a board eight inches wide, but six feet long for the
plank-sheer and eight feet for the washboard. Lay one
of the 6-foot boards down on the deck with its outer
edge just touching the gunwale about 3 feet 3 inches
from the bow. Then scribe the outline of the gunwale
on the under side of the plank, and batten a parallel
line four inches away from it, which second line will
just end inside your plank corners. Do the same thing
with the 8-foot plank, laying it on the gunwale just
touching at a point 4 feet from the stern, and scribe
your line. Run a second parallel line four inches from
it, and saw out both planks. They will meet end to end
over a block placed a foot aft of the carline which
forms the nail strip for the front cockpit coaming,
which latter crosses the boat five feet aft of the
bow.
4: RIVETING A TILLER THAT SLIPS OVER
THE RUDDER HEAD
Make the port side plank-sheer and washboard
precisely as described for the starboard side, and
meet the two plank-sheers on the breast-hook, laying
one on top of the other and sawing a neat cut down the
centerline of the boat to bring them snugly together.
Nail them to breasthook, carlines and gunwales. The
washboards will need little triangular blocks under
them at intervals of about 18 inches along the inside
of the gunwale, these blocks being 4 x 4-inch
triangles, gotten out of 7/8-inch pine, and fitted
snug to sheer strake and under side of washboards.
The cockpit coaming goes on next. About twenty feet
of 4 x 3/4-inch oak will do, and it should be molded
half-round on the upper edge. Run this across the
front of your cockpit, nailing to the carline, and
around the inside of your washboards, letting it hang
down maybe 1/2 inch below the under side of the
washboards. They are called by this peculiar name, you
will find out as soon as you begin to sail, because
these hoards are awash most of the time when tacking.
Without them you cannot sail much in a stiff breeze,
because the water will always be coming over the
gunwale, but with them you can "roll her down
good."
The next thing to go on is the king plank, or "mast
partner," as it is called in larger boats, because
there are two of them for large masts, each cut out
half-round to pass a big mast. With a small boat like
ours a single 6-inch yellow pine 7/8-inch dressed
plank, five feet long, suffices, and you nail it fore
and aft, fitting snugly into the angle between the
plank-sheers, resting on the breast-hook, and fitting
snug against the cockpit coaming aft. It is nailed to
all the carlines, and you then have left two triangles
to fill on the deck, in between the plank-sheers, the
king plank, and the forward edge of the cockpit
coaming. Fill these with narrow 2-inch strips of
7/8-inch white pine, nailing each strip to the
carlines, and then caulk the whole thing, every seam
in the deck, for it is just as important to have your
deck tight as your bottom.
Next wrap around your half-round fenderwales,
covering the crack between washboards and gunwales,
and then make your bowsprit, working it out of a piece
of 2-inch square spruce, six feet long, and let it
stick out three feet beyond the bow. Bolt to king
plank with 3/8-inch galvanized iron through bolts.
 Add
a wire bobstay and a galvanized iron, two-ring withe
(Figure 9), over the end of the bowsprit; put your
oarlocks in their proper places on the washboards; put
in rudder gudgeons; main and peak halyard cleats on
the cockpit for'd coaming; two jib sheet cleats on the
inside of the sheer strake, aft, just in front of the
stern seat; a main sheet cleat on the inside of the
transom; jib downhaul and halyard cleats on the for'd
cockpit coaming; centerboard cleat on the centerboard
trunk; a chain plate to port and starboard, six inches
aft of the mast hole on the outside of the sheer
strakes; and you are ready to rig her, for details of
which see Part One, Chapter I.
A word about the lower mast step. This is one of
the most strained blocks in the boat and must be put
on with four heavy screws, well sunk into the keelson.
Two screws will not do, as the mast will surely split
the step in half. To get the position of the step wait
until your mast is in, when you can find it by eye.
The mast should rake back about 6 inches, coming
forward maybe three inches when you set taut on the
wire rope jib stay.
DORY
A more complicated boat to build than the batteau
is the dory. Except that it has a set of frames,
around which the strakes are wrapped, its details of
construction are much the same as with the batteau.
You have the flat bottom to begin with, only this time
the planks run fore and aft, and on these the frames,
stem and transom are first set up, after which the
planks are wrapped as described in Part One,
Chapter II.
 SHEER
PLAN AND BODY PLAN OF 19-FT SAIL DORY
Click
here for large image.
FRAMING
DESIGNS FOR A 19-FT SAIL DORY
TRANSOM
FOR THE DORY
When we come to the clinker built boats we are
getting into real fine work and you have hard garboard
planks to fit to a rabbet in both keel and stem. The
planking is beveled and secured to the ribs as shown
in Figure 12.
To build such a boat as the various skiffs shown in
our chapter on catboats and knockabouts, you first set
up keel or bottom plank and then on them the stem and
stern transom, secured by deadwood and the stern
knee.
Molds taken from the designer's lines are next set
up at equal stations along the keel or bottom plank,
and the garboard and upper strakes are put on around
these molds, usually working both ways from garboard
up and from sheer strake down, so as not to come out
with a lumpy, uneven sheer strake. After this the ribs
are steamed and shoved down inside the boat until they
touch the planks equally all around. These ribs are
very small and numerous, about 3/4 x 1-1/4 inches wide
being right for quite a large skiff. When all are in
place and secured, the keelson is bolted over the ribs
where they cross and all the thwarts are put in and
kneed to the ribs, and the clamp (as the oak strip
that runs along inside the gunwale is called) is
riveted through all the rib heads to the sheer
strake.
The molds are then knocked out and the boat is
ready for paint.
In still larger boats, carvel built, that is, with
planks nailed to the ribs and abutting against each
other so that the skin is a flush surface, the keel,
stem, stern hook and transom are first set up and
spiked to all the deadwood with drift bolts.
Next the rabbet is cut, and, as the angle of it
constantly changes, the "bearding line" or inner line
of the rabbet must be found from the plans and the
rabbet chiseled true at various spots, when it can be
cleaned out fair and true joining these spots, and it
will then fit the garboards when they are put on. Next
all the ribs or "frames" are bent to agree more or
less with the set of molds taken from the plans. These
molds are spaced from two to three feet along the keel
and battens are run around them from stem to stern to
get the fair lines of the model.
The ribs are then put in and faired up, also
beveled to lie flat against the future planks, fore
and aft, and then their floor timbers are nailed to
both ribs and keel. This holds them firm in their
shape, in addition to which battens are tacked across
each pair of ribs and across the bend of each rib, so
that it will hold its shape until the planks are
on.
In large boats every third rib is sawed out true to
the next mold, which is taken from the lines. This
gives additional stiffness, as this third rib is
always of much larger stock, say 2 x 3 inches for a
30-foot boat, and they further hold the model true,
since they agree with the molds. The two most
important planks are then put on -- the garboards and
sheer strakes. To fit the garboards a spiling is taken
of the line it must make to fit into the stem and keel
rabbet. This is always a peculiar wavy line, when the
plank is out flat, and, as it must fit snugly, the
only way to find it is to tack on a flat batten,
called the spiling, which roughly fits the line of the
rabbet. The exact fit is then scribed on it by a
marker and pencil, the marker always touching the edge
of the rabbet line and thus transferring its contour
to the spiling batten.
Cutting this line out on the batten and laying it
on the garboard planks you mark the bottom lines of
each of them. To get the top lines, each rib is
divided into as many divisions as there are to be
planks, the narrower planks being at the round turn of
the bilge, and these distances are laid off on the
garboard plank up from the rabbet line along each rib
line as drawn out on the garboard plank. A batten is
run through these points and getting at this line with
your rip-saw you have the outline of the most
important plank and the hardest to fit.
Take time and get it on right, for a leaky garboard
means a leaky boat for the whole of her life. To get
these carvel-built planks on snugly, the chain clamp
is brought into play, sometimes hooked over the keel
to draw a plank snug against its lower neighbor,
sometimes hooked over the sheer strake (or taffrail if
same is already on) to hold a plank tight against its
upper neighbor while the holes are being drilled for
the nails or the rivets driven through planks and
ribs. Each plank, where it passes a rib, should be
hollowed out slightly with an adze, and the edges of
the planks are not cut square but beveled slightly to
open about 1/16 inch on the outer seam (Figure 7), so
that you can caulk the wedge shaped crack thus formed,
and when she swells shut she will crush the inner
edges of the planks tight. A boat perfectly planked,
with edges meeting square, would simply burst herself
when she went overboard, for there would be no room
for all the planks to move in when they swelled under
the influence of the water.
In order not to add up any errors in building up a
planked boat edge to edge, ship carpenters always stop
planking at about the fifth plank up from the garboard
and begin planking down from the sheer strakes. The
final plank is apt to be very irregular in shape, but
is not noticeable if it occurs on the side of the
ship, while it would be painful to see if up just
under the sheer strake. Further and more elaborate
details of how to plank a large carvel-built boat are
given in our chapter on building a power cruiser.
You will note that making molds or frames from
plans is an essential feature of boat building. The
"lines," as they are called, of many of the boats in
this book are given in the illustrations, and you can
build the boat from them. Enlarge to the size you have
selected. This is best done with an architect's rule
giving you choice of scales from 3/32 inch = 1 foot up
to 3 inches = 1 foot. Lay off the lines on coarse
building paper, full size, both body plan and sheer
plan. The reason for this is that your lines as
enlarged from the body plan will never agree with the
lines as enlarged from the sheer plan, but will be out
from 1/4 to 1/2 inch, due to errors in enlargement,
and you must correct these errors until both sets of
lines agree, and yet sweep fair curves with no
wriggles or dog's-tails in them. Then, when you make
molds from your enlarged and corrected full-size body
plans, they will be true and the planks when put on
them will run in fair sweeps, with no flats and
hollows.
For boys around eighteen to twenty years old it is
not hard to lay out a knockabout from our plans and
build her complete. None of the timbers are very
large, and the construction is, in general, simple. A
centerboard modification of the accepted deep-keel
type is more agreeable to the youth's pocketbook, for
a lead or even an iron keel is not to be thought of
for persons of ordinary means. But sand or gravel
ballast is cheap, and simply requires the manufacture
of a dozen 10-ounce duck canvas bags, about 80 inches
long by 18 inches wide, which will each hold a hundred
pounds of beach stones, to be picked up for nothing on
any beach along our shores. These are stowed in the
bilges, and you then have a ballast that will insure
stability. The rest is a matter of a few hundred
dollars for lumber and hardware, and you have a racing
boat which would cost some $2,000 at the
shipyards.
And, in all boat construction, do not overlook the
knockdown frame idea. It saves a mountain of hard
labor and insures a hull that will be true to design.
Buy the frame, knocked down but fitted, and buy the
plank patterns. Lay out the latter on your plank stock
and have your planking sawed at a band saw, and the
whole job will cost but a couple of dollars, whereas
if you rip them yourself, not only is it a
back-breaking job, but you are sure to spoil more than
two dollars' worth of planks in mistakes and
slips.
Caulking, paying and puttying seams, fitting the
planks, nailing them fast and countersinking and
upsetting rivets planing the skin of your ship to a
fine smooth surface that will take paint without
showing tool marks, sandpapering the whole thing to a
fine polish,-- all these are long-winded jobs, and
quite enough for a gang of youths to undertake with a
large boat.
With a small one all these are but details and the
main building operations are not overlong in time.
Even a couple of twelve-year-olds can make a good job
of a batteau; and older boys around fifteen years of
age can make a sharpie which is a batteau some twenty
feet in length with flat or else skipjack deadrise
bottom; or they can tackle a 17-foot sail dory. Around
seventeen years a boy has proficiency and honesty
enough to try a lapstrake skiff or catboat. By honesty
I mean intolerance of any faulty work, and nerve
enough to scrap spoiled work instead of trying to make
it go in the boat, where it will worry you from that
time on. A boy that is honest enough with himself to
take the consequences of his mistakes in measurements
and carpentry and not try to foist them off on his
boat, has learned one of the great lessons of life.
He'll do to trust with a man's job, as soon as he
knows enough!
 More
...
..
© 2002 Craig
O'Donnell, editor &
general factotum.
May not be reproduced without my permission. Go scan
your own damn stuff.
|
