Boat Plans At Mystic Seaport | Mast glued up rudder and daggerboard glassing

Boat Plans At Mystic Seaport

Ok, another frustrating boatbuilding day here in New Hampshire.

The mast got glued up today in a long session.  It takes a deceptively large amount of glue.

First, I laid down the mast ladder frame, with the two sides to be glued next to it.  I primed the wood to be glue with unthickened epoxy, and then made up the thick stuff.  Application of the glue went along the base plug, narrow staves, and ladder framework.  Afterwards, I picked up the ladder section and placed it upside down on the wide stave.  The other side of the ladder was then glued up and the wide stave dropped onto that, making a sandwich.  Mr. Storer recommends a clamp every foot.  I only have 9 clamps that can be used on the mast.  Mr. Storer advises his customers to use packing tape... use a clamp, wrap the mast with packing tape to hold the pressure, move on.  This method has been used by other Goat Island Skiff builders, successfully.  It kind of worked for me, but not to the degree I would have liked, the clamps hold more pressure.  Regardless, better than nothing, and with some careful maneuvering I was able to make sure that all gaps were closed up.

It took longer than I thought, and a lot more glue than I thought.  There were a few areas where I really had to force the staves into position, and this was a pain.  For some reason I dont have any real overlap in the lower half part of the mast or I could have used nails to hold it in place.  I used my muscles instead, and clamped them down, and hoped for the best.  In  a few locations theres an overlap on one side and an underlap on another... not much, about 1mm, but I see it, and it pisses me off.  I should be building to tighter tolerances by now.  I dont know if its impatience to get this done with, or its a level of meticulousness that drives me batty.

Off to check the bottom runners, shall we?

Oh look, gaps!

 In my quest to use less glue (I keep throwing out tons of squeezed out glue) I went with what I thought was a moderate amount of glue... but it obviously wasnt enough.  These are, surprisingly, my worst scarfs on this boat yet.  This is not the end of the world, I can force some glue in there, they are not necessarily under pressure (that would compromise the scarf) and they will fully glued onto the hull.  So this is not the end of the world.

This is:

My daggerboard.  What a mess.  I was so concentrated and focused on making sure I got it smooth around the end of the board, I didnt really care what happened along the edges of the glass.  I figured I could sand it smooth later.  Now, Im realizing I really screwed myself up the wazoo.  This clean up job without going through the soft wood of the board is going to murder my day tomorrow.  UGH.

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Boat Plans For A Chesapeake Deadrise | A note on tools

Boat Plans For A Chesapeake Deadrise

A few things on tools that I have found out the past few days.

A japanese pull saw is awesome. I doubted it at first, hemming and hawing for months before getting a small one-sides saw. A FANTASTIC PURCHASE. Versatile, sharp, easy to use, and precise. Practice first, because youll saw through something important quickly and without realizing it (trust me).

My random orbital sander was a $9.95 DEATH DISASTER I purchased at cheap-tool-emporium Harbor Freight. Its so frustrating to use I want to throw it at the cement wall. I will have to go buy a better one that actually secures the sandpaper.

Most importantly, I was perusing my jigsaw blades and saw something called a "scrolling blade." It was small and skinny. "Hmmmm, I betcha this is for going around corners a little tighter than the normal blades!" Hmmmm, I reckon I was correct... and this was after I cut the hole through the transom, BH2 and BH3. Boo me, for not knowing my tools. Again, amateur style is my building style.

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Dinghy Boat Plans | Bottom surprise! and limber holes and gaps filled

Dinghy Boat Plans

Today I overturned my bottom after gluing it last night. I was all very nice and neat and did my best and I was welcomed to see the fair bottom of my speed-demon boat with THIS:


HELLO DRAG. A giant glue mess that I will have to sand smooth. Which, if I estimate correctly, will take forever and a half. I shoulda woulda coulda put packaging tape around the seam, but my side panel job came out so neat (probably because I didnt put glue between the panels) that I didnt think I would see this. Also, note the glaring holes from my finishing nails that I used to pin the buttstraps in place. SOB, I went right through the ply. This is very embarrasing, I havent gone through the ply anywhere where I didnt want to, this is the first time, and I have no idea how I did it. Again, I didnt do it on the side panels, so why now?

In other news, I planed down the new shims that will fill the gap between the bottom and the BHs, and cut/chiselled some limber holes. They look nice and neat from this angle because the ply is on the other side, which is all chipped up. I shoulda woulda coulda dammit scored the ply to get nice smooth cuts first, before going after it with my chisel.


Notice the stringy thing coming out of the limber hole... thats some fabric coming out from IN BETWEEN the layers of the ply! OOOooooooooh, mystery!

You may also notice the cloudy color, that because Ive sanded the layer of epoxy there in preparation for bottom being glued on. Ive decided to put in mini fillets along the BHs and the bottom for practice and to re-enforce the double seam, one between the bottom and the spacer, and the on between the spacer and the bottom of the BH frame.

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Wooden Boat Plans And Kits | A quick note on oars and boatbuilding

Wooden Boat Plans And Kits

Building this Goat Island Skiff has been quite the up and down. There have been days of boredom when I stared at her and couldnt get started, days of excitement when she came together, days of satisfaction when I see my cumulative efforts, and of course, those days of agony over how to fix something or worse, "did I do that right? Because now its too late..."

Oar building, however, has been phenomenally exciting, a shaft of light onto my project. To shape with my hands the object of manual propulsion for my beautiful boat brought a feeling of overwhelming satisfaction. Not only could I see immediate results, but I could easily see where I could make improvements on future oars. Nice. When I looked up from the first oar, and saw that, dammit, I just made an oar, and then saw my boat sitting on her buckets... well, it was definitely a "holy s**t!" moment, for sure.

I think during a build it gets easy to see the trees-- the small projects, the small problems, the next step. In that process the big picture of a boat sitting in the garage ready to go sailing gets overshadowed. The oars brought the forest back into focus. My boat is not a series of problems and tasks and items to be completed. My boat is a she, a vessel designed and built to carry me over the water and to those distant shores of my summer dreams. When I look down at the oar in my hand that just yesterday was a pine plank, and I look up and see the boat, my boat... well then the smile is very broad and I am happy.

So go build an oar. If youre on the fence on whether or not to build a boat or not, get some plans for an oar and build one.

Then build another.

Then build your boat.

Then go sailing. Go rowing. Smile!

Michalak (simple oar plans in this book)

Storer (free oar plans)

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