Willet Concept drawings

Promised myself I'd do at least one post with honest progress towards my next project. So I'm starting with some basic concept drawings of how I see Willet, my next adventure craft. Originally I'd thought a set of berths would work, but I've noticed that most boats around 16 feet suffer from excessive windage and I assume pointing ability. With that in mind, I've gone with a 4' x 7' flat, set about waterline and drawn the cabin height just enough to sit comfortably inside. For this first drawing, I've added leeboards to clear the cabin space. The cockpit is small, just comfortable for two people, but self-draining with a space for a potta potti under the stern deck and out of the way.

Next I'll work up some primarily cad work see if it's possible to get the stability I need to sail comfortably yet narrow enough to recover from a capsize with my 200 pounds if worse comes to worse. This will help define the cross sections.  

Rainbows

Today was the sort of days I had in mind for a light rowing boat. After three days of rain and being stuck inside, the rains stopped and the sun started peaking out by early afternoon. I had a few hours to kill, tossed Sundew on my 8 foot utility trailer, tied it down with two lines and drove the 2 miles to the closest water.

I rowed across the small chop to the windward more sheltered side of the pond and started trolling a fly along the South shore. But I'd been a bit too eager, a strong rain shower passed overhead. Luckily I'd tossed a water resistant shell into my day pack but it didn't' help my legs--I'd worn shorts! LOL. If not for the rowing I would have been cold. No sign of trout feeding either.

The shower passed, the wind dropped to a gentle breeze, and a burst of sunshine crossed over me and created a nice rainbow. I made my way back to the ramp, ending the day with another rainbow display. A bit wet and cold I'm still aglow from a good day in the Pacific Northwest.

Coastal and estuary micro-cruiser

Winter unofficial started here last week. The summer abruptly ended with the first rain in more than three months and hasn't stopped yet. I don't expect to see clear blue for more than a day until April. 

(taken besides Sundew after an tiring 5 mile row against a stiff breeze and harbor chop)

But I imagine a couple years from now, it's late summer, the days made of sparkling clear skies after burning off each morning's fog after a chilly night. 

I crawl out half out of my sleeping bag, situp and look out the port window. Through the dense fog I can make out a heron wading the mud flat where the Preachers slough meets the Chehalis river. The boat's turned towards the river with the incoming tide. Yesterday I slowly worked ten miles down the river tacking under light winds with the ebbing tide. It reminded me of learning to sail rivers in a nine foot Turnabout my grandfather had given me more than 40 years ago.

After a coffee egg breakfast, I tuck the galley box back into the cabin. It takes me only a minute to set sail by unhooking a couple bungees, pulling two halyards and loosely setting the sheets. There's just a ghost of wind. I preposition the oars, work forward to lift anchor, quickly start to row to the river. It's slow going but with little effort the boat is moving a couple knots against the current. The exercise and breakfast help break my chill. The blue heron cries in protest, unfolds it wings and lifts off the water in a few powerful strokes; he's heading downriver, I wonder if I'll see him again in a few minutes.

Today I'll reach Grays harbor, a wide shallow bay, take some pictures and prepare to dash the 40 miles up the exposed coast the next day, or stop in one of the coves along the way. I've been wanting to see Falls Creek from the water, but entering Goodman creek through the rock pile at the mouth would need perfect conditions. If the weather doesn’t' look promising, I'll explore the lower reaches of the Humptulips river and perhaps try to catch a sea run cutthroat for supper. If the weather still doesn't look good the next day, I'll sail to the south end of the bay and explore the Johns River. I'm in no hurry.

What I envision 15 to 16 feet.

A foot or less draft and sit nearly flat when dried out.

Honest 2 person bed flat for V-berths with a place to set my wet feet and shoes out of the rain.

Can make 6 knots in 15 knots winds without white knuckles.

Progress to windward against four foot seas and 20 knot winds under reefed sails.

My 220 pounds can right the boat after a capsize-a rare freaky wind or moment of stupid.

Cockpit for 2 people and a tackle box, self draining.

No board that splits the cabin—twin boards, one off center or a leeboards.

Enclosure or cut out for a 2 to 4 four-stroke outboard plus fuel can so it's out of the way.

Space for a couple deep charge batteries and a 5 amp solar panels.

Can rig from trailer to sail away in 15 minutes by myself.

A porti potti space in the cockpit.

Tabernacle mast(s) I can lift with one arm to pass under bridges.

Best matched designs:

John Welseford's Pilgrim—tough and nearly has me smitten, won't sit flat.

John Harris/CLC Pocketship—cute, won't sit flat.

Welseford's Tread lightly—Close. Perhaps stretched 10%? Raised flat cabin floor? Leeboards?

Selway Fisher's Goshawk & Heron 15-- heavy but purposeful

John Pruitt's No Frills 15---worth mentioning; clever cabin but a bit homely looking; doubt it's weatherly.

Sam Devlin's Nancy's China—cute, not crazy about dagger board that split the cabin.
Jim Michalak's Oliveoyl--functional but not crazy about slab sided look. 


Her her name will be Willet or Selkie.

Testing to destruction

One of my first post I mentioned some of the other boats I've built. (I'm a serial boat builder). One that sat in the harsh WA weather for nearly 3 years had rotted so badly I decided to cut it up and haul it to the dump. It was a good chance to look at where the wood failed as well as the construction durability.

The extent of the delamination. Even marine plywood has limits--this boat was outside, uncovered for 3 years with "protected with two coats of latex exterior house paint (I won't do that again).

The Seat fillets were still strong.

Doublers and siliconed plastic hatches stayed dry and strong.

 A good look at the tape and seam cross section--no rot.

 The top of the dagger board and seat did not have doublers and were only varnished to protect the end grains. Even though the boat was upside down--it obviously wasn't enough. Epoxy seal your end grains!

Enjoyment

This is mostly about using the dory to explore South Puget sound near Nisqually reach. It was a warm, clear blue day with a 14 foot tide and gentle winds except for kicking up to about 12 knots or so for an hour or so. I rowed down a small river, across the reach and back, a total of about 8 miles in mostly near calm water except for some strong currents and just enough wind to kick up some 1 foot waves. Hardly a good test or her full capabilities, but an excellent way to get used to the boat and take some nature pictures--what I built the boat for.
I did get around to weighing the boat and was delighted to find it was only 69 pounds.

Some pictures of my day.

Chaffing Keel Protection

After scuffing up the bottom from my first two trips, I decided to add the 3/8" half round brass protection. I rounded off the bow a bit but it went on pretty easy. I fastened the brass with copper nails. To help drill holes into a half round I filed thin slot with a diamond file, and drilled a 1/8" hole about every six inches with an addition nail hole to support the bend points. I bedded the half round in silicon, but it probably wasn't necessary. I gently tapped the flat nail heads onto the brass, and filed the front edges to minimize them getting caught and torn off if I drag the boat up on a beach.

Final touches

Nearly complete. Close enough to Launch! 

Couple coats of varnish, two coats of paint inside and out and hatches finally on. Couldn't resist the urge to launch it for the first time and take my wife for a leisurely row down a slow river.

I'll add at least one more coat of paint to the inside, and another two coats of varnish on the decks as well as build a respectable cover so she last a lifetime. 

--

I finally uncovered the art work on the deck supports/backrest. The bow has the boat name "Sundew," while the stern backrest has a water lily and a dragonfly. I drew them with colored pencil. 

I'll right about its performance in more detail once I use it move. But for now I'll say I'm happy. With my wife rear seat and me rowing from the bow seat, she's well balanced. Stability was also good with just a tad dory- like instability within about 5 degree but firms up solid past that point--the wife found it comfortable after the first minute or so; I also felt comfortable with my expensive camera--there's no surprises in her gentle Swampscott dory shape. She rowed as well with the 7 foot oars as any boat its size, a couple sweeps getting her up to 4 knots or so.

Front deck

Placing the front deck turned out to be more adventurous than I thought it would be. On a prior boat, I'd mounted a small deck with only one supporting beam at the end. That was pretty easy the plywood bending it's own radius down to the gunwale and remaining relatively straight. This deck didn't go so easy--it's longer and the shear line has a good bend. 

When I dry fit the front deck, rather than stay straight up the center line, it bent down taking a stressed compound and unflattering curve from the stem to the arched support deck. I had two choices. One is I could add a few support beams, but I wanted to use that only as a last resort because I wanted to keep the weight down. My other preferred option was to screw a temporary center line straight beam, clamp down the plywood to the sheer line, wet the plywood until it took on the right compound shape and then let it dry to keep that shape. I used 18 clamps and wet hot towels for a few hours that letting it dry overnight.   

You can see the results below. You'll probably not I've started painting. Boat is coming along nicely. 

 

Wooden cleats

To take a short break from the boat building, I decided to make wooden cleats for this dory. 

I learned with a prior boat that top mounted cleats are a pain to car top because they get caught up in the carrier crossbars so I decided to mount them sideways under the inwales and abutting the frames for strength. I won't use any larger than 3/8" rope so the cleats could be small--no longer than 3" long with a 1" base. Some scrap white oak would work fine. I made simple template of 1/4" ply, traced them on the oak and measured each frame to the correct angle so the cleats would be parallel with the inwale. The pictures show the blank with initial cuts and holes from 3/8 inch drill for rounding sides and base. .

The next picture shows the 4 blanks just about to be separated--I did it this way so it would be easier to to handle while I used the band saw for the straight cuts and jig saw for the curves. 

I mounted the tall base in a vice and did the final shaping with a rasp tapering them down to 3/8" in each end, the refining the shape with file and finally course grit sandpaper. 

The last picture shows the mounted cleat.  

Gluing the seats

Turned the hull over. During the last boat I built, I forgot to paint under the seats before they were epoxied down; what a pain (I did it with a my arm covered in a elbow high glove and several cans of spray paint. I didn't repeat that mistake.

I marked up where supports landed under the seat and painted between them as well as the compartment. The picture also shows the hatch plate support and the doubler that fits under curved extension beyond the bulkhead support.

To fit the seat, I covered the bare wood underneath with thickened epoxy, used a few clamps where they could reach and used drilled through round scraps down the center line into the support splines to hold everything down. On prior boats, 

On prior boats, I've added support cleats and used fiberglass to tape the seat to the sides. On this boat, I decided to forgo the cleats and and add thickened epoxy faired to the sides. The first batch of epoxy was too thin and some ran into the hatch--wasting an ounce or so, but it's all hidden and was easy to fix.  

 

More bottom work

After a day of letting the dry fiberglass settle it was time for the epoxy. Started on a cool morning so I'd get plenty of time to work each batch and spread it slowly using a 3" plastic spreader. I started from the top centerline, giving it time to saturate the two layers of 4 ounce cloth and working it down the sides. I finished with the transom and was glad I'd rounded over the planks.

About eight hours later, I decided to apply the box rubbing strake and skeg I'd already fitted out. Any longer and I'd loose the chemical bond between the fillet supporting the skeg and fiberglass. You'll note in the picture I used a chalk line down the center line to help.

I also cut along the blue painters tape with a sharp razor and pulling the still flexible fiberglass. It's a trick I'd seen Warren Messer of redbarnboats use on one of his YouTube videos that worked really well. 

The rest didn't go so well. I mixed in a too much filleting blend into the epoxy to fill the weave. It made the 2nd layer a lot harder to apply and added more work to get a smooth finish. I finished the skeg fillets at this point with a thicker bonding filler. After a light sanding it's ready for paint. 

 

Fiberglass the bottom

I decided to use 4 ounce fiberglass on the outside, but doubled in two layers over the bottom and lower chine. I needed two 50" wide overlapping strips. I applied 1" blue painters tape close to the gunwale. Next I laid out the first piece to completely cover the bottom plank dry carefully then running my hands stretching it down each plank and tacking it down with small dabs from a glue gun on top of the painters tape. I trimmed it so it overlapped the chine by about 2". I did the second piece the same way setting it up to overlap the opposite lower chine and stretching it over and down along each plank till it was flat down to the gunwales. The result will be 8 ounce coverage of the bottom and 4 ounce fiberglass on the sides and transom. I let the both pieces set overnight. (see picture below).

Fitting the seats

This went easier than I'd planned. For the sides, I measured the width from the spline center line at the end and at each the frame and support beams. I fit a 1/4" batten to scribe the line. To improve the looks, I extended each seat  beyond the bulkheads for the end seats, and supports for the mid seat into a nice curve using a 48" radius and a french curve. The overlap is between 1 1/2" and 4";  not shown in the picture is a doubler under this extended set for strength and so I can make a nice rounded end. It looks a lot better than straight ended seats. 

I put a 6" hatch in the bow seat and a 4 1/2" in the aft seat. I'd put the hatches at the end of the bulkheads in my other boats, mostly to hide them. But I've found they are difficult to use, usually an exercise and kneeling and groping around for keys, wallet or what ever else got tucked inside. With top mounted hatches will be more handy.

I have an old 10W Minn Kota trolling motor I hung off the standard side (see picture) as a mock up. Though smaller than most available today, it should push this tiny boat fine up the slow rivers and quiet ponds I intend to use it on. I'll pair it up with a U1 deep cycle battery that should give a at least a few hours of power. I'll have to built some sort of tiller extender. I see myself barely moving as I carefully stand up and scout for surfacing trout or crouched down camera and telephoto lens at the ready while I approach some wild life.  

 

Seat Supports

To build the seat supports, I first needs to check my CAD dimensions and copy them to the splines. Below shows how I did that with a straight edge, a clamp to hold it against the frame, and combination square. My square has a level which allowed me to confirm I had a slight pitch from the ends; I designed the ends a half inch higher so water would drain towards the center.  

 Here I show the dry fit of the spline, with the cleats clamped on,  and 1 x 3/4" crosspieces. The holes were to save a bit of weight and improve access from the round top hatch you see just to the right--beside they give it that cool airplane look :-). I spaced the crosspieces 8 inches apart and used a level and strait edge to confirm everything was right before marking and epoxy gluing every in. The stern seat was done the same way. Each spline has a limber hole on its low end that you can't see in the picture.

 I used solid clear yellow pine for the aft of the mid seat support. The arching curve are mostly cosmetic and should be as strong as the traditional 1x2" straight hardwood pieces set on edge cleats.

I'll be fitting the seats next time.

Quick update.
Created short epoxy fillets between the wire ties and starting to fit the frames. The first picture is a dry fit of the middle frame to double check everything, the 2nd is of the final front frame cut. After this, I'll pull the wire, finish the fillets and epoxy the 2" tape.

planking

I aligned the bottom and used two screws to attach it to the cradle; this will make working and truing everything much simpler as I go. I'm using 20 gauge copper grounding wire for the stitching. It's a good compromise between flexibility and strength. Most of the copper ties were pushed through from the inside because it will be easier to apply the epoxy fillets to the inside. I used a stitch about every foot or so, just making it tight enough to bring the planks together. There's quite a bit of tension at the transom so I've used two stitches per plank.  

   I've epoxied the planks to the stem rabbet. The narrow piece of wood to the right of the stem is to help align perpendicular to the bottom; it would be very easy to mess this part up. The stern will also be done this way.

So far so good. It's nice to see the boat finally taking shape. Next will be epoxy "welding" the planks and framing.  

Cutting wood

This is going too slow. Last week I started to mark the plywood and yesterday, after double, triple and quadruple checking (hehe), started to cut out the bottom and lower planks. Quite a few people recommended a circular saw with a plywood blade set shallow just deep enough to make a clean cut. I tried it but didn't like the results, more dangerous, even the subtle curve bogged the saw enough to make me nervous. To be fair I was using a cordless 5 1/2 saw which I've successfully used to cut up to 1 inch stock with no problem; it just didn't work well for plywood. So I went back to my variable jig saw with a fine blade and small rotation, for a slower but very precise cut. 

I've also built a rolling cradle for the boat, mostly to move outside for sanding and to make room in my garage. Below are pictures of the cradle with the bottom piece, initial stitching just enough to see some shape; and of the dry fit stem. So far so good.

A few notes about the design changes. The four pieces of plywood "just" fit. So close that I didn't know if I had enough room to create the transom doublers and other odds and ends pieces--not to mention any room for even the smallest mistake.  My other concern is I wanted to slightly increase the displacement. I ended up increasing the depth to 5" and shorted the length by 10% so it's now 12'6"

Other progress. I had many stem options including just stitch and glue, an inner stem, two part stem or a rabbited stem which is what I'm going to try.

Below shows the stem pattern.

On each side of the stem, I routed a 1/4 deep rabbet and then chiseled a bevel angled for each plank.

I made a few minor changes to the design...but I'll show that next time along with the plywood layout.

I ordered four sheets of 6mm Okoume from Edensaw woods http://www.edensaw.com/ which was about the same cost as other sources but I could pick it up in Tacoma without paying $40 a sheet just for transportation.

I ordered a gallon of Raka resin and its 350 hardener. It gets good reviews and easy to mix 2:1 ratio.To start off, I scarfed the plywood together into 2 4'x8'x16' sheets using 10:1 slope. I used a plane to remove most of the wood and finished with a belt sander and flat vibration sheet sander. As you can see the layers make a nice guideline. 
















I mixed up a couple ounces of epoxy, applied it to the feathered ends, let it soak in a few minutes. Next I mixed in some wood flour until it was like thin peanut butter and used a wooden fork put a thin layer on the plywood before joining the scarfs together. I held down each pair with a line of filled water jugs for two days.

What's it going to weigh?

Freeships will get me part of the way. It allows for input of material density and thickness which it combines with developed surface areas to obtain a total weight as in the table below.

 The rest I'll have to do by hand, or using excel, in this case. The cleats will do on top of the bulkheads to strengthen the plywood edge and give a good gluing surface. The support beams will be spruce or pine crosspieces to support the thin seat plywood--I'm going with a beam every 6 inches which is close to Skene's scantlings. Next is I'm going to cover the plywood with thin fiberglass weave two coats of epoxy and another layer just on the bottom with one coat for traction and to strengthen to bottom. According to my original Gougeon brothers Boat Construction a pound of epoxy covers about 35 sq feet, I've got 52 sq feet in the planking. Add long strips of wood for the inner and outer gunwales. I added a pound for the 4 bronze oarlocks I'm going to canalize off one of my rotted hulls.

Add it all up and wow! I'm at 71 pounds. Of course I haven't added the fiberglass tape on the seams, nor breast hooks and paint of course but 75 to 80 pounds looks realistic. Nice. 

Next time I'm going to show the plywood layout. 

Bulkheads

Added bulkhead, which also serve as the three primary frames. While stitch and glue construction can be done without a frame, it's difficult to control the thin plywood; adding a frame helps. The aft and bow frame will serve as bulkheads for the water tight compartments as well as support the seat. The midship frame will support the mid seat and will be hollowed out to save weight. In Freeship there are several ways to do this. I added transverse planes, copies the intersections with the planks, removed the planes, than built the frames point by point. It's a bit tedious but gives good result. It also gives me good outline from which I can subtract the planking thickness later to get exact frame dimensions.

Freeship allows each layer, which in this case is each part of the boat, to have a set thickness and pounds per cubic foot. I plan to use occume mahogany, with an average density of 27 pounds per cubic foot. I set it as 30 pounds in Freeship with mostly 1/4 inch plywood. That gives me a total on only 49 pounds so far; I'm not done yet, but that's encouraging. This little car-topper looks realistic!

Next I'll add the supporting frames for the seats and start on the developed parts layout on sheet plywood. I hope to order the wood by next week.

Completing the Seat Tops

Decided to double check the hull before trimming the seats because after the seat sides are created, it's very difficult to make any further changes. I tweaked a few things using the scale tool applied to difference layers. I built each layer as a boat part (e.g. shear plant, chine plank etc). Still trying to keep hull weight and the boats purpose for rowing, fishing and photograph in mind, I reduced the bow height to 21", which will be fine for the protected waters where I plan to use this boat. I raised the minimum shear height to 14 inches for good rowing oarlock positions; this required I do some proportional scaling (manually) from the bow to middle of the boat for the sheer and mid planks. Lastly at 4 inches draft the displacement was 260 pounds which was a bit low. Against for rowing without an outrigger, I scaled the overall beam to 41" wide and increased the bottom beam by almost two inches to raise displacement to 300 pounds--a knowing compromise to get better initial stability while probably reducing speed.

I shifted the mid seat aft by a few inches so it was over the center of buoyancy (`6.4' from stern). From prior boats, I know water tends to pool in the end seats so raised the ends by a half inch so they had a gentle slope. Using the point>intersect-layers command identified where each seat intersected the middle plank. Then it was a simple matter of collapsing the points outside the hull so their outside edges fell on the mid plank points.

The results are below:

Next time I'll add bulkheads and the hull weight estimate.