Category: Techniques

Video: hot-nailing a traditional crab and lobster boat’s timbers into place

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Over at the Boat Building Academy at Lyme, Ian Baird has been making progress on his replica of the Dorset crab and lobster boat Witch of Worbarrow. The timbers of the new boat named Witch of Weymouth have gone in, the gunwales are now in place and the spars almost completely made.

He also gave me the link to this splendid Youtube film clip of the process of hot-nailing her steamed timbers into place. It looks wonderfully frantic to me!

On the boat herself, what’s left to complete are the knees, thwarts and finishing, which must all be in place by the time of the grand student launch on the morning of the 9th December. If you’re in the area and are interested in boats and craftsmanship, do get along!

For more posts in this interesting boat and its origins, click here. Also, look out for a series of three articles describing the build, the first of which is scheduled to appear in the magazine Water Craft in January.

Alan Stancombe builds his second Cinderella – and does a super job

Alan Stancombe's Cinderella canoe

Alan Stancombe's Cinderella canoe Alan Stancombe's Cinderella canoe Alan Stancombe's Cinderella canoe

Alan Stancombe's Cinderella canoe

As usual, click on the thumbnails for much bigger images that in this case reveal just how smooth and sweet Alan’s seams really are!

Most first-time boatbuilders find themselves saying how much better the boat would be if they could do it all again, both because of the different choices they would make but also because of the techniques they have learned and improved. Many then go on to build different boats, but Alan Stancombe has built a second Cinderella to the free plans I drew up – and a great job he has done.

The difference lies in his use of tongue depressers as spacers between the strakes, which he says enabled him to produce smooth taped seams on the inside of the boat.

However he did it, I’m thinking he could give lessons in building Cinderellas!

For free plans for this easy to build 12ft stitch and glue open canoe made from plywood and epoxy, click here: Cinderella download

For more examples of the Cinderella, see the free plans page link at the top of this page.

PS I was also chuffed today to hear from Dave Stone, who sent me a Sketchup model of the sailing version of the Ella skiff that he’s been working on. Well done Dave! Plans for the Ella skiff are available from the Free plans page – see the link at the top of this page.

Ella skiff sketchup model

 

Tait’s Seamanship, 1913, part I, or how to sail a ship

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Tait's Seamanship 1913 Cover

Tait's Seamanship 1913 Cover adverts 1 Tait's Seamanship 1913 adverts 2 Tait's Seamanship 1913 Compass and frontispiece

Tait's Seamanship 1913 preface Tait's Seamanship 1913 Introductory note and contents Tait's Seamanship 1913 contents

I’ve often wondered what ‘seamanship’ really is and who, if anyone, has the definitive article in their posession.

It’s not that I don’t understand or approve of the aims of seamanship – it’s about keep lives safe and protecting boats from harm while successfully travelling on the water. But, like the proverbial skinners of cats,  boat users all have their own methods, and there seems to be at least as many forms of correct seamanship as there are sailors.

Whatever sea-related activity you care to name, someone somewhere does it differently and will tell you all about it in a very firm and authoritative way – in the club bar, online or, sometimes, even on our own boats.

So I thought it might be fun and informative (and hopefully uncontroversial) to consider what seamanship was thought to be a century or so ago. So here are the cover and first few pages of Tait’s Seamanship, a splendid little document produced by a Glasgow maritime educational establishment whose principals had the good sense to provide courses for masters discreetly in a separate room.

I hope you enjoy the scans – as usual, click on the images for much larger, easily readable images.