Boat Building Academy - Lyme Regis

[Beachbum]

Although i joined the site some many months ago time flies when your building boats and i just haven't had time to get involved! With a couple of months left on the 37 week course at the BBA I thought a few pictures of the boats my comrades and I have been slaving away on might be of interest. I don't know where to start with telling you the hows, whys and whats so fire away if you have any questions on any of the builds.

310 Cedar strip canoe

311 Sapele cold molded, electric powered river launch

312 Traditional clinker Iroko on Oak Whitehall skiff

313 Chine rowing skiff

314 French designed day sailer Ebihem 18, Douglas fir strip planked on permanent bulkheads

315 Portsmouth Victory class for restoration. (now in many bits with the joint owners (including me) sucking teeth like mechanics!

316 Boats do fly, even Beer Luggers!

317 Best boat builder in the workshop! Chews a perfect rabbet!

Like i say i don't want to throw two many photo's or details out in one hit but if anything tickles your inquisitive minds just shout!

BB

[Mike]

Hi Neil

Is the Ebiham 18 'stripper' built using bead and cove or plain strips? I have considered both methods and can't make up my mind whether one is better than t'other. It seems to me that bead and cove may be better if aiming to have a clear finish. If not, the other is probably cheaper and faster.

You mention PU gluing. Was this Balcotan or some other product? If Balcotan, how did you find it on the stripping process? Did it tend to push the strips out of place?

That's all for now. Great photos, pal. Love 'em. Nice and big too so that we can get up close for a look. Thanks for sharing them with us. More please, when you have the time. We realise how busy you are. And the camaraderie must be first class when sharing a common interest like that at the BBA.

Best wishes :approval:

[Beachbum]

Bead and cove, even though its just a core and being painted. Cheaper? because you dont have the machining to do? The B&C routing took two of us just over a day to do so no big hardship, plain strips is not something we considered so i'm not really familiar with the pro/cons. I would imagine you would either have to bevel the planks which seems madness or use a large quantity of gap filling epoxy(cheap/quicker?) B&C will obviously give a larger glue area and locating the strips as we went made life easy. We had to scarph 90% of the planks which we did as we went,the next plank holding the scarph together, We found that locating the scarphs on bulkheads where we could made life easier as a screw with a washer on helped hold them in, which brings me onto the PU. We used a construction PU, 5 minute open joint 30 minute clamp time. This enabled us to quickly fire a line of glue into the cove, get a plank on with a loose scarph then glue and get the next plank on encasing the scarph before it cured, we would normally get 10ish planks on before having a break cutting a load more scarphs and swapping sides/direction while that went off, Go back pop the screws out, chisel the excess off and go for it again. No push out problems really as it was screwed to every bulkhead even though the Douglas fir at 15x25mm was pretty stiff around the twist. (another good reason for B&C. Planking the hull took us 10 days. Of course im not saying this was the perfect or only way to aproach the job but it worked in our situation as it was just a core, not a finish, The cedar strip canoe we are building being bright finished was Titebond III'd and we got all anal about plank selection and quality of fit. Horses for courses i guess! Love to hear about anyone elses stripping experiences as i may have a 35' to do soon.

Comaraderie?? None of the B******s have helped us fair it off!

Neil

[Mike]

Thanks for that comprehensive reply, Neil. Very helpful indeed. Of course, not everyone has the machinery needed to bead and cove the wood themselves. I guess the suppliers make a fair bit of money out of machining it for 'em.

I particularly enjoyed your comment about the canoe build. Know that feeling well.

It seems the BBA camaraderie is not quite what one might expect when it comes to the hard graft. Bet they helped you empty a few bottles, though. :D

Regards

[pjl83]

sounds like you've been busy. some lovely looking boats there.