Choosing Rough Lumber for boat building. Interesting Video.

[richhiway]

Building ORCA - Episode 9: Back to the sawmill for the stern post, horn timber and framing stock - YouTube

[SawyerTed]

Wooden boat builders are very particular about the lumber that goes in every part of the boat.  At least for those who build boats to last.  As a result many are framed with white oak and planked with Atlantic White Cedar if traditionally built - not plywood and composite.  

I've been around the periphery of the boat building business for 40 years.  I got hooked in 1982 when I visited the Sea Ox and Grady White plants in Greenville, NC. Later that year, I spent some time at the Uniflite plant in Bellingham.  Uniflite built the PBRs, Patrol Boat River.  Think Apocalypse Now boat.  Of course those were composite/glass reinforced plastic/fiberglass boats.  

Later on I became aquatinted with some of the NC wooden boat builders at Harkers Island, Manns Harbor and Wanchese.  

Boats and wooden boats are among my greatest passions.  I have a Simmons Sea Skiff I built sitting in the shed.  I need to finish it.  It's among a handful of boats I have built.  

She's a boat designed by Tom Simmons around the 1940s.  He built many of these well boats primarily for fishing nets but many recreational boaters loved them.  



 

 

   

[Bruno of NH]

I watch this fella an U tube 
He's a great craftsman and not with all the fancy tools .
An old school guy like the uncle that I learned carpentry from.
The way they did in the old school

[Crossroads]

I went to a wooden boat show once and the hook was set. I had to build one. After quite a bit of research, I decided to build a cedar strip pram called the "Coot". I lofted the plans on my kitchen table then built the plywood frame to build it on. A friend of mine had an Lt40 and some western red cedar 1x6's. He chucked up 4 or five of them and started making 1/4"x1" strips. I ended up with way more than I needed. I got the hull completed and the outside fiberglassed. The inside is also glassed, I just need to do some touch up and build the seats and it's done. Sadly, it's been hanging in the rafters for over 10 years now, waiting for me 

[longtime lurker]

What's in a name right? Mayne Australia Speciality Timbers - MASTimbers.



 

Every customer might be important, but when you're doing a plank on frame trawler or a strip plank and epoxy row boat, or any dammed thing that floats,  you're my favourite customer and I will personally pull every board for you. And I GPS mark trees with curves and bends when we're logging so I can go back and cut things suitable for bents and knees and ribs for steam bending when required. And if you want a steam pot I'll help build you one at cost just to keep a dying art alive, or lend you caulking hammers, or scratch my head with you converting a table of lines and offsets to the lofting table trying to figure what some long dead naval architect thought would be fair.

Wooden boats are a disease.
Sawmills are a disease.
Damned straight I found a way to mix two of my greatest passions.

And there's a few boats big and small - and repair work on a lot more - I can walk past and tap them and say"I knew it when it was a tree" and know that my part of it was done right. And I like it, that feeling. And I get pictures back and hoard them like a 14 year old boy with a Playboy collection.

Freakin' boat pictures, Imma win this one when I get time to sit at the office PC

[longtime lurker]

 

 

 

 


Deck planking and contrasting trims for this guys project is actually on the floor here to leave this week. Queensland Maple strip plank on frame, about a year into the (part time) build process and I imagine the guys wife is starting to want her garage back

[moodnacreek]

Obviously they are not concerned about sap rot with all those white oak cants outside uncovered. That would all have to come off for marine use anyhow.   Anybody know who New England navel  timbers is?  The maintenance of wood boats is something i learned about a long time ago so I love wood boats, from a distance.

[SawyerTed]

Rose is a common name around Harkers Island and you can't talk about Harkers Island boat building without mentioning Leslie Rose - Rose Boat Works or the Rose Brothers Boat Works.  Two different sets of Rose descendants.  

Same is true for the Willis family, most recently Alex Willis and the Lewis family.  The Lewises are still building and repairing boats.  

So many Harkers Island boats were built without drawings or written plans.  Often the chine length, beam, depth of forefoot and stem height were all that was necessary to build the hull.  

They often used those measurements to stake out the dimensions in the yard.  The rest of the boat was built to the chine line laid out with stakes and battens.  The deck was laid out similarly.  

Leslie Rose built his personal boat, Leslie Ann, much that way.  

Here is a link to Mr. Rose's build 

https://www.rosesvacationrentals.com/making-of-the-leslie-ann

As you look through the photos, notice the  stakes and battens forming the shape at the chine (where the bottom meets the sides) and the stakes supporting the deck cross members.  

Others I've had the privilege to meet and visit include Omie Tillett, Buddy Davis and most recently Paul Mann.  I actually got to talk with Paul and his wife when they visited Portsmouth when I was volunteering there.  

Paul was very hesitant to tell me who was at first.  He had his neck gator pulled up on his face to protect himself from the sun.  Once we got to talking a bit about fishing he opened up.  We had a great talk about the pioneers in the NC Sportfishing boat building business.  I finally told him we had met not long after he built his first Sportfishing boat in the late 1980s.  He made a big impression on me then.  

This is the Miss Mimi one of Paul's personal restorations.  Miss Mimi was a boat his father fished on with a close family friend who built it.  Miss Mimi is his wife's boat, she wanted something she could handle and enjoy with their grandchildren.  

The boat looked like it just came out of the shop.  It was beautiful.



 

[richhiway]

Obviously they are not concerned about sap rot with all those white oak cants outside uncovered. That would all have to come off for marine use anyhow.   Anybody know who New England navel  timbers is?  The maintenance of wood boats is something i learned about a long time ago so I love wood boats, from a distance.

New England Naval Timbers

[Crossroads]

Interesting video! 

[moodnacreek]

Obviously they are not concerned about sap rot with all those white oak cants outside uncovered. That would all have to come off for marine use anyhow.   Anybody know who New England navel  timbers is?  The maintenance of wood boats is something i learned about a long time ago so I love wood boats, from a distance.

New England Naval Timbers

Thanks, Richhiway

[SawyerTed]

Boat builders often used species readily available and often sourced from sawmills specializing in timbers for boats, very much like the video.  Years ago, keels often were hewn or hand cut due to lengths needed.  

Traditional boat building methods have certain species and milling expectations which are more relaxed in more modern methods.  Modern adhesives and materials tend to make up for the shortcomings of wood in boats (and the sins of the builders).

In commercial boats lumber was mostly selected for economy, functionality and durability because they are mostly painted rather than varnished.  Commercial boats compared to pleasure boats is like comparing cattle barns to houses.  

Frames were often built from white oak, live oak or yellow pine.  Some builders of commercial boats even used treated lumber for framing later on.




This trawler may be the last wooden one built in NC.  It was built by the Chadwicks.  I may be mistaken but it appears to have been framed with treated pine.  

Framing obviously doesn't require the visual appeal that brightwork (the exposed varnished wood) like decks, rub rails, cabin soles (floors) and jointery in the cabin requires.  Look at the knots in those frame members.  

Four key characteristics of framing are strength, rot resistance, stability and fastener holding.   Of course quarter sawn is preferred for keels, stems, stern posts and anything else for stability.  

There have been many very functional and durable boats built from lumber yard lumber.  Douglas fir makes reasonable framing and yellow pine planking has been used a lot.  

From the 1940's plywood became a common material for frames, decks and planking.   

Cold molding versus steam bent timbers is a whole other set of lumber characteristics to be considered in traditional building,  

Modern keels and stems are more often laminated lumber or plywood and foam/fiberglass laminates are replacing plywood in decks and bulkheads.

[richhiway]

Enjoying all your comments. I am very interested in the all the knowledge of grain orientation that is used in boat building as it applies to all woodworking. Cutting gunstock blanks is also very interesting. 

Probably never have time to build a boat but I enjoy learning from these craftsmen.

[Sod saw]

.   


My profile picture shows a ketch that we rebuilt and use not often enough.  She is about 30 feet on deck with the overall length of just under 40 feet.  Sleeps only 3 unless you are on deck., with stand up head room only at the galley sink for those of us who are not overly tall.

While working, raising a daughter and taking care of a bunch of various parents, we took about three decades to rebuild her.  She moved with us a couple of times as the years went by.  We were lucky to have a lot of friends and family help along the way.

She has oak frames with what I believe to be long leaf pine planks.  The deck now is marine plywood as I chose to not have water drip thru laid deck planks.  The masts are both solid wood as well as both booms.  They are laminated from large pieces.  The bowsprit is solid one piece.  The keel dead wood is white oak from local logs and a local saw mill (many years ago).

SawyerTed will get a kick out of this next item:  I did use some pressure treated 2 x 6 material is one location where water might get it wet and I admit to be lazy with not wishing to need to replace those parts soon again.  These treated boards are old enough to be treated with the good stuff before the treatment chemicals changed to less useful chemistry.

She has some non local mahogany and teak, but not too much.  I have been unable to find local growing teak trees in NY State.  Maybe I should look harder.  I did use walnut from the back yard at the house where I grew up, for hand rails along the inside ceiling.  Some of the bronze hardware was made by me and some was custom made by others, and some was found, used, here and there.

She is rigged as a ketch with the ability for one person to single hand her with all sails up.  She has no engine as I am not a mechanic and chose to do without smelly fuel and oil leaks.

Thanks for the various links and videos.  They were most enjoyable.   I am always eager to listen to stories about messing around in boats.


.

 
                       1979 when I saw her first:





 

                                some years later:


Please take note that;   boats are never finished.



.

[richhiway]

.  


My profile picture shows a ketch that we rebuilt and use not often enough.  She is about 30 feet on deck with the overall length of just under 40 feet.  Sleeps only 3 unless you are on deck., with stand up head room only at the galley sink for those of us who are not overly tall.

While working, raising a daughter and taking care of a bunch of various parents, we took about three decades to rebuild her.  She moved with us a couple of times as the years went by.  We were lucky to have a lot of friends and family help along the way.

She has oak frames with what I believe to be long leaf pine planks.  The deck now is marine plywood as I chose to not have water drip thru laid deck planks.  The masts are both solid wood as well as both booms.  They are laminated from large pieces.  The bowsprit is solid one piece.  The keel dead wood is white oak from local logs and a local saw mill (many years ago).

SawyerTed will get a kick out of this next item:  I did use some pressure treated 2 x 6 material is one location where water might get it wet and I admit to be lazy with not wishing to need to replace those parts soon again.  These treated boards are old enough to be treated with the good stuff before the treatment chemicals changed to less useful chemistry.

She has some non local mahogany and teak, but not too much.  I have been unable to find local growing teak trees in NY State.  Maybe I should look harder.  I did use walnut from the back yard at the house where I grew up, for hand rails along the inside ceiling.  Some of the bronze hardware was made by me and some was custom made by others, and some was found, used, here and there.

She is rigged as a ketch with the ability for one person to single hand her with all sails up.  She has no engine as I am not a mechanic and chose to do without smelly fuel and oil leaks.

Thanks for the various links and videos.  They were most enjoyable.   I am always eager to listen to stories about messing around in boats.


.

 
                      1979 when I saw her first:





 

                               some years later:


Please take note that;   boats are never finished.



.

Now that is a long time project!