intheboatshed.net

Dutch dinghy and steel-built Forest & Stream skiff

Over in Holland, Hans-Christian has taken these photos of a traditional steel-built Dutch dinghy of a type often used as tenders to steel-built barges and other craft. They’re strikingly curvaceous little boats, given that they’re made from plates of sheet steel, particularly when compared with the steel-built Forest & Stream skiff seen in the background.

The F&S skiff is being smoothed with filler prior to being painted and having its woodwork fitted. I will be fascinated to hear how this boat works – and I trust it does work well in steel, as it will presumably have a theoretical life time of 80 years or more. I’m pretty sure it will be fine, by the way – it’s clearly greatly scaled up from the 12ft ply dink I drew some ten years ago no, and that will no doubt compensate for the extra weight of the hull. I’d like to take a trip to see it once she’s in the water if that’s ok please Hans-Christian!

Hans-Christian’s workshop trains youngsters in the metalworking skills, and the steel dinghy belongs to the Graf Ship Association - it is destined to be cleaned and refinished.

Here are some earlier images of the F&S skiff, and of a ship, the Jantje ready to be transported to Nordhorn after being sandblasted and sprayed.

10ft folding dinghy plans at the Svenson free boat plans site

Attention boating enthusiasts – is this folding boat the half-forgotten answer to the eternal tender problem?

Tenders tend to be be a nuisance as we all know – the nasty rubber things cost a fortune, take ages to inflate, take up a lot of space on board and row like psychopathic milk jugs, and of course a solid tender is a can be a pain to tow.

So some people might like to consider this folding alternative, which I’ve just spotted. Plans can be downloaded at the Svenson website.

Follow this link for more free boat plans.