Mississippi River Skiff update: OarLocks

The pinion of the oarlocks are set 12.5 inches past the edge of the rowing stations.
This is the distance we find best for the stroke geometry in this hull.  If they are set farther abaft you get less reach forward with the oar.  Farther forward and it is too tight.
There is a lot of variation of opinion on the best distance, this is our opinion and our boat.

This weekend we will be sanding the interior to prep for varnish and working on the oars.

Here is a picture of the oar blanks (and a Greenland paddle).  The Ash and cherry look good together.

Mississippi River Skiff update: out of the shop

Yesterday we moved the skiff out of the shop onto a trailer with the help of the visiting students.  The trailer came with our 14 foot Rhodes Bantam.  The Bantam is on blocks so we could use the trailer.

The only problem is the length of the skiff.  At 18 feet 3 inches it extends way past the end of the trailer but more problematic is the wheels are too far forward.

Today we are going to set the skiff on the ground and reconfigure the trailer.
We can move the wheels back about 2 feet.  This should balance things out.

Today we are also going to instal the oarlocks.  We found a set of four at the Nautical Consignment shop in Oriental, NC.  They are old galvanized locks that are in great shape.  I was looking for bronze, but  of course this skiff historically was a working boat on inland rivers and would have been fitted out with the most practical cheapest hardware available, so galvanized it is!

Finishing out the interior, then hull priming and paint

Mississippi River Skiff update: lilly pads

Seats are edged with the black oak and installed.  We salvaged an old chair with nice turned legs.  Two of these are used as supports for the two rowing stations.

I like the Johnson Wax building by F.L. Wright, so we set the posts with the taper down like his lilly pads.

The Walnut base that was laminated to the sole of the boat is directly under the center of the seats.  We set a laser plumb on the base to find the spot to drill the seat.

This was marked, the seat was taken to the drill press and a forstner bit was used.  The depth was set at half way through the Walnut. 

Installed

Lilly pad

After both holes were drilled we measured for the turnings and cut them to fit.

Once everything fit tightly, an adhesive fiber epoxy putty was used.  Bronze fasteners will be added to the side blocks after everything hardens.

Mississippi River Skiff: Skeg

We have given the hull it's first course sanding (40 grit).  At this stage we are setting the skeg.

According to Howard Chapelle's lines, it should be 6.5 inches at the stern and taper to 0 before station number eight.

Instead of a single piece of wood for the skeg, we are building it up of poplar strips.  The first couple layers are 1 inch wide and then they drop down to 3/4 s of an inch.

The strips are set in colodial silica thickened epoxy.  Several layers of kevlar will end up on the skeg.

Mississippi River Skiff construction

Since the bottom of the Mississippi river skiff is "flat"  (it bends through only one plane,) is was super fast to finish.

Because of this we could use wide planks. The planks are 4.5 inch wide ship lapped cedar planks.
They are 5/8ths thick. We started with the bottom and are working down to the gunnels.

After the new poplar had thoroughly dried we planed the strips down to 3/8ths of an inch thick and started the hull's sides.  Working down on the form is different.  It is the opposite of our past projects but for this boat it is working well.

We are using edge clamps to press the strips together and additional clamps to keep the strips tight to the form.  The size of the boat meant it was going to require a trailer from the start.  This lessened the weight considerations and freed up up our choice of materials and thicknesses.  The transom is an attractive shape and we are going to cut it out of a cherry glue up.  It will be an inch thick.

The first hull we build will be set up as a row boat with two stations per the plans.  But the transom will be engineered to take the stress of an outboard.  This is always wanted around here. 

A sail version could be next.

A plumb bob is used to make sure the bow is not pushed out of alignment as the sides are built.

The bob is about 150 years old, and it still works!

Mississippi River Skiff

We are making great progress on the Mississippi River Skiff stations.  It will be our biggest boat to date at over 18 feet.
After our experience using steel stations for the Niangua canoe, we knew the advantages of the steel forms made it worth all the trouble to fabricate them.
For our next boat we were looking for something native to our waters and fell in love with Howard Chappelle's Mississippi River Skiff.   He took lines off a 1889 working wooden boat.  It is on page 97 of his excellent book  American Small Sailing Craft.
Here are the stations during fabrication:

Paper work: we are converting the offsets to inch measurements.  Also we are using some trigonometry to figure the length of the station from the chine to the shear. Click on the image for a closer look.

Here the stations have their centerline and are ready for a coat of acrylic spay to keep them from rusting.

The cherry chine forms are used to narrow the face of the station to accept the bending wood without deflecting it under clamp pressure.

The next posting will show the shape of the hull as the stations are spaced on the strong back.