Shaldon rowing boat gunwale replacement

A local artist approached me with a view to renovating a 14' rowing boat that he had just bought. The wood work was in a sorry state and one gunwale was broken in two.

Once the old varnish was removed and the surface sanded, it was clear that the Iroko that I had in stock wasn't going to match. So I got a plank of Sapele and machined it up to make the inner and outer sections. The inner has a lip on it that hooks over the edge of the GRP and the outer is screwed and glued to the hull and the inner section. The old one was held on with lots of clenched copper nails and was hard to get off. I had to cut it into about thirty pieces to break it free from the hull. 

The knees were plywood and were in surprisingly good condition but the boat would look so much better with solid wood knees. Something for the future perhaps.

 

The new timber wouldn't bend to the bow section of the boat so it was steamed for an hour and then pulled into shape and clamped up for a day in the sun. Once bonded and screwed, it was then sanded smooth and all the wood work was coated up with a product called Rapidcoat. It leaves a "hint of teak" semi-gloss finish but best of all requires no sanding between coats and you can put 2 or 3 coats on each day in warm weather. 

Shaldon Regatta Dinghy Project

The past 4 weeks have involved working with small groups of children from Shaldon Primary School to build 2 Shaldon Regatta Dinghies to sell in the village. This fits in with the ethos of giving the kids real life learning experiences. Each morning 2 groups of Yr6 kids would come to the old ferryboat workshop in Shaldon to help fit out the bare GRP hulls that were sold to the school by River Teign Rowing Boats in Teignmouth. We were provided with the sapele hardwood, keel bands and fittings needed to fit out both boats. It was quite a challenge for all of us, the main stumbling block being that the tools required a little more strength than many of the kids could muster. After trying various hand saws we ended up using fine toothed Japanese saws that cut on the pull stroke.

The bare hulls as the project began

 I was really impressed with how motivated they all were and some of the templates they made for knees and breasthooks were very accurate. Many of them had never used any tools (although they were reluctant to admit it in front of their peers!) but soon picked it up with excellent results.

Taking shape

 After many hours of cutting, planing ,drilling, glueing and sanding the boats were finished and one was put on display outside the school. Both boats were sold by the end of the day and the project was declared a success! Well done to all of Yr6, Ben Miles ( the school governor who got the whole thing organised) and also Jack Haywood who brought his wealth of knowledge and skills to help us for free.

Rudder build

This month one of the more interesting projects has been building a new rudder for an old wooden sailing boat. The original rudder had started to rot where the rudder cheeks meet the stock and the pintle was badly worn. The new one was made by joining three planks of iroko together using stainless rods and epoxy to make the capital D shape. The cheeks were then routered out to accept the tiller and bonded on with epoxy. Stainless bolts also helped clamp all this together and were later covered with grain plugs.

The original metal straps were removed, ground up and then several coats of epoxy primer were applied. They were probably unnecessary due to the internal reinforcement but they keep the traditional style of the original.

A nice looking little boat that attracted lots of attention
 from people waiting to board the steam train opposite the quayside

Straps hide a crack in the main spine of the original rudder

Almost all of the original strap bolts sheared off or had wasted away

No wonder the rudder felt a little strange

14' Strip plank canoe final update

At last the canoe is finished and ready for someone to enjoy. Although I must admit I really like it and it just fits inside my garage if I were to keep it! I took some pics and video clips to promote it and the YouTube video is below. If you're interested in owning this one check out the Boats For Sale page on the website

I went for a less fussy design on the decks
 as they are shorter than previous canoes

Ready for her maiden voyage

14' Strip plank canoe update 2

With the Solo dinghy restoration complete and other off-site jobs done I've added some decks, bulkheads and seats to the canoe. The seats have laminated ash supports and are scalloped in the middle for comfort.

 The bulkheads are 5mm elite ply with cedar strip on one face. They have one skin of cloth and epoxy over them and are bonded in with an epoxy fillet.

 The decks are ash and cedar. The combings on the decks are laminated 4mm strips of ash bonded in with thickened epoxy and shaped up with a curved sole spoke shave.

Next up is a lot of sanding and finishing. To get the best results I obviously need a dust free environment which may prove to be most easily obtained by moving the canoe somewhere else for varnishing.

Ash strips clamped up on formers to make the seat frames

Solo dinghy restoration final update

The GRP solo dinghy refurb' is finally finished!

1980's solo dinghy after having all the visible woodwork replaced.

The hull was sanded through the grades and polished up nicely.

So that's what the back looks like!

The owner of the Solo dinghy I have been working on collected his boat today. It was a great feeling to finally get the dinghy out in the daylight and see it properly. In the end I re-bonded all the deck beams, renewed the deck ply, replaced the gunwales, re-made the centreboard case capping, the thwart had a new layer of ply, the bead around the inside of the cockpit and the trim across the transom, inside and out. The workspace available meant I spent a lot of time squeezing past uncured epoxy and fresh varnish for hours on end. I had to work on the transom using a head torch as there was only 150mm between it and the back wall of the workshop!

 The Elite okume ply turned a golden colour once epoxied and varnished and we were both very pleased with the end result. I used West resin with the 207 special coatings hardener. It is clearer and less orange/yellow than the regular stuff. It's also less susceptable to going cloudy if the conditions aren't ideal. It's been a fun project but it took me far longer than I had predicted so now it's time to finish off the canoe as soon as possible.

It's a nice feeling to give something a new lease of life

Teak pads and lifeboat holder

A local rigging company contacted me about making some teak bits and bobs for a yacht on the marina. They needed 3 winch base pads and 2 blocks to strap the lifeboat down onto the deck with. 2 of the winch pads were over 300mm diameter and 45mm thick on one side and 15mm on the opposite side. The winches are mounted on the cockpit moulding and bolted through alloy plates in the moulding. They had to be tilted to get the best angle of pull. The cost of teak in thick planks like this is huge and making all these parts used quite a length of a thick and wide board.

The lifeboat holders were needed to hold a new 8 man lifeboat on the foredeck. They were made by using a thin MDF template and I used a router with a bearing cutter on it to follow the edge. They required some fettling on the marina which meant having to remove 10mm from the middle of a 52mm wide piece of teak to fit the deck curvature without making a mess on the pontoon. Next time I will template the deck and do it all off site!