Boatbuilding Part 4

 Now She has a name. Despite all the exposed copper wire ends poking holes in my hands and arms, she will not be Porcupine. I wanted to name the sharpie skiff after my girl, but she declined. I must have caught her at a weak moment, because she agreed that the new boat will be... Sandy.

I've been lazy with the blog about boatbuilding, mostly because it has not had many challenges. Anyway, here's a summary of the project to date:

10-22 Received the kit from Chesapeake Light Craft.

10-27 (interim was site prep and erecting the "little white house" shelter) glued up the four scarfed rub rail 8' sections into two 16-footers. They will go onto the boat later in two layers on each side.

10-28 Started gluing the plank halves into twelve 16' planks.

10-29 Did another few planks. Not enough room on the shop table to do all them at once.

10-31 Ditto

11-1 Sanded the planks. Stitched the two garboard planks together with copper wire every 5". Assembled and glued the four frames and bulkheads.

11-2 Stitched the rest of the starboard side planks, sanded the frames, ordered more copper wire.

11-3 Stitched port planks, drew bow planks together and stitched them to form a stem.

11-4 Stitched the port side of the transom, rounded the edges of the two foot braces with the router.

11-5 Stitched the rest of the transom, rounded rowing seat pieces, rounded frames and bulkheads, rounded breast hook and quarter knees.

11-6 Fitted and glued the breast hook and quarter knees.

11-7 Removed screws from above- that's all I did.

11-8 Stitched the frames and bulkheads in place.

11-9 Turned the boat over, tightened the stitches along the keel and the next two planks on each side.

11-10 Tightened the wires on all the rest of the plank seams, frames, bulkheads, and stem. There are over 400 stitched wire connections, and a somewhat smaller number of holes in my fingers, hands and arms.

11-11 Day off.

11-12 There is no provision in the plans for a bow fitting. I really need to have a sturdy fitting midway up the stem to which I can secure the winch cable and use my rollers to get the boat up from the beach to a cradle ashore. And there is no solid stem to fix hardware to. The solution I devised is to cut a slot in the planks at the stem, insert a stainless steel tang, 1/8" x 1", the inside end of which I twisted 90 degrees to lie flat and be bolted to the forward seat. The seat will be fiberglassed in permanently, so it will be a secure anchor for the bow tang. Today I fashioned the tang and cut the slot.

11-13 Turned the boat bottom up on two carefully levelled and parallel saw horses to keep it in the right shape to glue the seams together. Glued the keel seam and one plank on each side.

11-14 Glued the rest of the planks together, being carefull to do a neater job than yesterday, when I left myself with a lot of sanding to do.