New boat build

[John Bourbon]

I'vw had a desire for some time now to build another boat. Part of that desire is I just really like the process and part of it is I had an idea banging around in my head that I wanted to explore. Basically I wanted to build a variation on the 6 hour canoe that I built for my son 9 or 10 years ago. I've always liked that boat, and it can be paddles very fast due to its length to width ratio. However, it does feel a little tender as the sailboat guys might say, so I don't feel its late season, cold weather worthy as a duck boat. What I want to do is decrease the length, decrease the spring to the shear, give it a transom bow and stern (to increase the internal volume for carrying floatation foam) and deck over the bow and stern.

Eventually I am going to build this boat in 3/16" Occoume, but to test the theory, this boat build is in 1/4" exterior. So, assuming I attach the pics correctly, you will see what I've been up to....

First off, Cheech Kehoe and I built a strongback out of various 2x6's and 2x4's, I needed a good working surface to do some scarf work on.

I started the scarfing with a Lie Neilson scrub plane and finished with a low angle block. I forgot how little I cared for hand planing scarfs. Next time I'll use butt blocks....

In this pic, I have drawn my grid lines on the completed panel. I also drew the lines for the original 6 hour canoe. Then I redrew the bow line 1 foot closer to where the cockpit is. I redrew the stern line a foot closer also, only I drew it with about a 10 degree angle instead of the original boats rakish transom. My plan is to have the transom capable of mounting an electric motor. Both bow and stern are approx 2 inches lower than the 6 hour canoe. When using the boat I built for my son many years ago, I found that wind pushes the bow around more than I care for. I'd like to avoid that on this boat.

Here, I've cut out the first panel. I've run out of time to do any more boat work today. If I'm lucky, I 'll get a chance to work on it this weekend.

John Bourbon

PS, after previewing the post, I see that one pic came out small and I have no idea why....

 

[Chuck J]

John

The second pic is obviously a resizing issue, and the third pic doesn't show at all for me. If you want to email the originals to me I can edit them in. I'm curious how this is to turn out as I love double enders.

Best
Chuck

 

[John Bourbon]

Chuck, thanks for the kind offer. I'll send them to you right off....

John

 

[Chuck J]

John

Wierd thing is, the third pic is now showing up. The second pic in the email is just as small. DId you resize it or change camera settings?

Chuck

 

[John Bourbon]

I didn't resize it or anything, however, its entirely possible I saved it to my computer wrong. And then when I tried to upload it, the size was a result of an improper saving. I did some more work on the boat today and took pics. I've been trying to upload the pics but am having no luck. Can I send them to you for posting with some verbage?

John

 

[Chuck J]

Send them over John, no problem

 

[Chuck J]

 

[John Bourbon]

Chuck thank you very much.

I didn't get much boat work done today. Some, not much. Since this boat is going together with only a few actual plans, I want to document the pieces as I cut them out. So, to that end, I used wrapping paper I got from Cheech Kehoe to use to creat patterns of each piece. Most of you guys may not know this, but Cheech owns and operates the best pizza joint in all of Vermont. I laid the port panel on the paper and traced it out. Now at least I know what I have should I ever decide to build another, but slightly different boat hunting kayak.

I then cut limber holes in the frame with a round sureform file. The pattern is rolled up and stored safely, and the frame is set aside for now. With any luck, I will get a chance to join it to the sides this weekend. Then it will start to look like something.

John Bourbon

 

[Jon Zuccolo]

Keep these pics coming, as I am trying to convince 2 guys I hunt with to build something like this in my shop, and store it at my house

 

[John Bourbon]

Hi Jon. I'd be happy to. I took pics of the tracing on the paper and the limber holes, but I haven't tried to post those yet. I will though in the next day or 2.

John

 

[John Bourbon]

Had a chance to do some morte work on the boat. Am having to work around the weather, or more precisely, the outside temperatures. Here we have both sides of the boat C-Clamped to the frame and placed in the driveway for a photo op. The 2 skinny pieces are the bow and stern transoms.

Here I am precisely placing the frame prior to drilling the hles for the deck screws which are used to hold the pieces together till the epoxy dries.

The screws will be pulled after the epoxy dries and the holes filled with thickened epoxy.

An ugly looking fillet. I started by wetting out all the contact surfaces. Then I took some sawdust from my bandsaw dust collector and thickened the remaining epoxy. I made a small fillet and laid some left over scraps of 6oz. cloth into the thickened epoxy and placed the cloth on it. Then I wetted out the cloth as needed. You can see the top of the frame is taller than the side of the boat. I left it long 'cause I still haven't decided what I'm going to do for a side deck (if anything). Leaving the frame ends wild like that preserves my options.

And there it sits, awaiting mother nature to give me a warm enough day to do glass work. In this pic, you can see the limber holes in the bottom of the frame.

 

[Jon Zuccolo]

Is this a pirogue? If so what plans did you end up using?

 

[John Bourbon]

Hi Jon. Its not officially a pirogue. Although I can see where a person might think it looks like one, what with the relatively flat sheer line. It started life as a 6 Hour canoe, a boat originally designed by Mike O'Brien. A friend and I built 4 of them about 10 years ago, one for my son, one for my nephew and 2 for his daughters. My boy has used his every summer since then. Its a fast boat, but with the high bow and stern, the wind blows it around more than I care for. The 6 hour canoe, as designed is 15.5 feet long and is a bear for one guy to load in the back of the truck by hisself.

So I decided when I built this boat, I was going to shorten it one foot on each end and make the stern much more vertical than the 6 hour canoe. I also wanted to put floatation foam in both ends, so to increase the volume of space for the foam, but hopefully not effect the paddling qualities of the boat too much, I decided that I would use a narrow, flat bow and stern rather than have the boat be a true double ender. I also lowered the sheer 2 inches at both the bow and stern, again, so that the wind won't blow it around so much. This boat will be decked over in the bow and stern. I figure I will consume half of each decked over area with floatation compartment, meaning the bow and stern will each have a compartment in the ends of the boat.

All of that is a long way around of saying, I don't have plans, I'm making them up as I go along. I am however going to make a paper template of each piece so that I can duplicate them in the future if I ever decide to. Or if this boat isin't all I hoped it would be, I will have a starting point for version 2.0

Oh yeah, the other big change is that the 6 hour canoe was deigned to have a chine log. My boat will be stitch and glue. Fitting the bow and stern posts and the chines on the 6 hour canoe was kind of a pain. I think this will be much simpler and more conducive to one guy working alone.

In one of your earlier posts, you said that you were trying talk some buddies into building something similiar? I would say go for it. So far I have $77 into the plywood and some 1x2's. The epoxy is left over G-Flex from one of my earlier projects. I've used 8 nails so far and 3 screws. I'l have to break down and buy some cloth for the bottom and fiberglass tape for the seams, and eventually the expanding foam. I don't want to venture a total dollar figure for the finished boat, but at this point, its not looking too expensive so far.

John

 

[Jon Zuccolo]

I really like your ideas for this boat. I won't be building one like this for now as I have officially reached my boat limit for the year (wifes concept not mine), but I was thinking that something along those lines would be perfect here in oklahoma, as we have lots of wind, relatively small waves or chop, and lots of swampy shallow areas to explore. So a low profile, flatbottom, wide, decked skiff/canoe/pirogue (could it be called a skangue ? ) would be perfect for getting into skinny water and hauling decoys and gear.

Can't wait to see the progress!

Jon

 

[John Bourbon]

The weather cooperated enough that I managed to get a little work done on the boat. Here I have managed to attached the other side to the frame:

After the frame epoxy kicked, I used my block plain to bevel all the edges of the sides and transom pieces. Then I brought the two sides together at the bow and stern and zip tied the bow piece in place and did the same to the stern.

Due to either the flimsy nature of 1/4" plywood or my minimalist building frame, the boat was a little twisted. So I used C clamps as attachment points and tensioned one back towards the other and tied it off. The duct tape on the out side seams is to keep any thickened epoxy from running through the seams and dripping on the floor.

On both the bow and stern I used straight epoxy to wet out the mating surfaces and then followed up with thickened epoxy for tabs to hold the bow pieces together after I cut the zip ties out. As you can see, I will need to sand down the tabs and put in some proper full length fillets.

Today was hardly good epoxy weather, so I kept the epoxy viscous with a heat lamp.

 

[Jon Zuccolo]

Looks good! Do you think it would have twisted if you built it with pointed bow and stern?

 

[John Bourbon]

Hi Jon. Would it have twisted with a pointed bow/stern? Maybe....From what I can tell, the twist was mostly from the limberness of the bow and stern. Getting both of them square to the centerline of the boat was difficult. If the boat had pointed ends and I didn't cut them exactly the same or mount them on the frame parralell, those things would have caused a pointy boat to be a little twisted also. I've done some more work the last 2 days, and as soon as I get a chance to post the pics, you will see that 90+ % of the twist is gone. You have to really strain to see what little twist is there. As far as I'm concerned, its close enough.....

John Bourbon

 

[John Bourbon]

Had a chance to work on the boat some the past couple of days.....Started off by sanding the fillets for the bow and stern.

With the bow and stern rigidly tabbed into place, it was time to cut out the bottom. I started by turning the boat over. Since I didn't have any plans on how to shape the bottom, I took the remaining piece of the scarfed up sheets of plywood and placed it on the updide down boat and took a sharpie marker and traced the outline of the sides onto the bottom. Then I took the boat out of the garage so that I could do the actual cutting on the strongback I had built, and cut the bottom board out.

I then traced the outline of the bottom board onto more paper, so that I have the outline should I ever want to build a copy of the boat. Obviously, this was done in the house when the wife wasn't around.....

Then I drilled corresponding holes in the sides and bottoms for the zip ties, and beveled the inside edge of both the bottom and the sides. My son is helping tighten the ties.

The boat is now right side up and the zip ties are all tight. As soon as my work schedule and good temps for epoxy work coincide, I will tab the bottom/side joint with thickened epoxy.

 

[joe miller]

nice boat
here is a picture of the canoe I built a few years back
if you need any help give me a shought

View attachment 3n33k43o85O15U45P0b99ecd7d6dc4fed1f57[1].jpg

 

[John Bourbon]

Hi Joe. The picture didn't come through.....

John