Steve Petty wanted to build a boat. He had done it before, twice: he had built an 8′ Frugal Skiff, WE DO, as a wedding present for his son and daughter-in-law; and he’d built a 12′ Frugal Skiff with a 5-hp outboard so he could “putter around West Falmouth Harbor in Massachusetts.” But he had sold the 12-footer when he moved inland to Sherborn where there was no coast but there were many lakes and ponds. He might have built anything on a whim, but he remembered that some years earlier his daughter had said she’d like to have a good rowing boat to keep at the family camp on North Channel in Ontario. That passing comment clinched it. Steve would build a rowboat. With so many molds set up on the strong back it’s easy to see the shape of the hull with the full ’midships sections running into a deep V both fore and aft—a combination that provides the boat with stability and good tracking.
Steve Petty
Read this article now for Free!
Ready for a second free article? Create a free account by entering your email address and a password below.
— OR —
Subscribe now for $29.99 a year and have immediate access to all of our content, including hundreds of small-boat profiles, gear reviews and techniques, adventure stories, and more! You can also browse our entire archive of back issues starting from September 2014, as well as post unlimited classified ads. This is an extraordinary value!
Sorry to sound like a broken record here, but again I urge the use of DRY heat for bending. A heat gun is a good tool for this. By pre-bending the slats for the stem, the problem of breakage in the laminations would be obviated. No need to bend them to an exact curvature. Bending them one at a time, the whole stack could be made ready for gluing in half an hour or so. Heating without moisture means no need to wait for them to dry out before gluing. Of course you would use your bending mould for clamping in the final layup.
For severe bends, a bending strap (the steel strapping from a lumber stack at the lumber yard works very well) helps a lot. I use a vise at one end, and a clamp at the other in order to control and manipulate the strips of wood. Securely clamping the bending strap helps force the bend into the inner wood fibers, rather than trying to stretch the outer fibers (which is sure to lead to breakage).
Grandpa Steve should wear his lifejacket, if only to set a good example.
Well said Malcolm!