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“My keel has fallen off” – Ray’s voice on the phone. So he dropped his sails and motored home. He asked me to design a new keel that he could build himself. This article goes through the process of turning a deep keeled boat into a competitive shoal shallow draft boat in a way one builder working by themselves can do.
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The “Orange Boat” was unbelievably heavy and just about fell over if anyone stepped aboard and it is a keeboat! The vendor couldn’t sell it. So Ted bought it cheap and asked me what he could do. So we simplified and modded everything to state of the art but constrained to using “normal” materials to keep the cost down. Would it be competitive with quick trailer sailors, sports boats and the classic Restricted 22 class with their big sails. Seems small, light and simple can be very fast.
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How useful are Solar and Electric boats anyhow? The large Solar Electric Mundoo 3 was one of the more interesting projects I’ve been involved in. It was the brainchild of Robert Ayliffe, then at Duck Flat Wooden Boats and Ted Dexter. This liveaboard boat was featured on the cover of WoodenBoat magazine at the time and was a tremendous success for the owners who found it fitted their needs perfectly.
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Pierangelo contacted me earlier this year (2008). He liked the strong aesthetics of my dayboat design but wanted more space. The result was this 27 foot riverboat. As Pierangelo will use it in Venice for travelling in the lagoon and along the canals the name became Venezia. I’ve just added many more photos to the article.
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The Dayboat/Launch is 23ft long and intended as a Dayboat or Camp Aboard boat for a small family. It has space for an enclosed toilet. The design is complete drawings for hull but final decisions are left to the builder. It is not step by step instructions like my smaller boats. It cruises at near 8 knots with a 10hp high thrust Yamaha outboard.
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A Fenwick Williams catboat carefully reinterpreted in Cedar Strip. Includes cleaner structure, optimised foils and a tabernacle rig that allows raising of the mast by one person. Built by David Wilson at Duck Flat Wooden Boats in Adelaide.
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There are two versions of the OzRacer and one Kit for family sailing, learning to sail or club racing. The Kit by J.O. Woodworks fits the PDRacer rules but carries just about all the OzRacer advantages of Performance, Lightness, Ease of building and that you can build the boat very cheaply and still get first class performance. The plans even show you how to make a proper sail from polytarp at home. All for $20!
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The MSD Rowboat is very pretty, reasonably light and easy to build. The specifications are here but the article also runs through the design process from client consultation including some of the designers missteps before a very nice boat is finalised.
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The finally famous Goat Island Skiff is the lightest and simplest 16ft sailing boat I could come up with. Simple to Build with Modern Performance. She will sail well and handle impeccably at all times with 4 adults and is fastest with one or two aboard. Plans are extremely detailed and there is an active community of builders on Facebook.
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How introductory boats that were intended to be cheap have become crazy expensive. And forced sailing to contract. Hundreds of sailing clubs have disappeared in Australia alone. Sailing is now semi professional and elitist again.
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If you want to go sailing what is the best way to get a sailing dinghy? Maybe build but most will buy a sail boat secondhand. How do you pick a good used sailing boat? We show you how.
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How sailing and paddling canoe shapes differ.
How traditional canoe designs work really well and a lot of modern ones don’t.
Building a canoe – is ply or cedar strip better?
How to build a lightweight canoe – selection of materials – ply vs strip plank and timber species
Books for canoebuilding.
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If you understand the plans business as a consumer then you can make best use of the system. A good plans agent will have experience with the types of boat and a large background in helping to solve problems. They may also be able to either supply materials or head you to the best places to get them.
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Building boats from older plans often adds a lot of labour and materials cost. Some old plans are great. But many are utter rubbish. Having a living designer or other people building the same boat is really useful for most builders.
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We first started to see Paulownia becoming available from Plantations in Australia around 2004. Well before the current boom in its use for framing and hulls of dinghies, yachts and other boats. Paulownia is a very lightweight timber from China that provides one way of building lightweight boards and boats. How to overcome its weaknesses and make use of its strengths.
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Never join boat decks the way you join up panels in a house. Cracks and big failures will result.
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Ultralight strip planked boats using Paulownia, Balsa and Western Red Cedar. Superlight Eureka Canoe and Goat Island Skiff and the amazing 12lb balsa canoe
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The dominant source of timber sizings or scantlings for traditionally built workboats in Australia is the USL Code. It would probably be OK for traditionally built workboats in other parts of the world. It has information for both traditionally planked or semi traditional plywood boats of larger sizes
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pointless, timewasting activities in boat repair and maintenance
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Oil or diesel fuel have soaked into some of the areas you want to work on. There are no easy solutions. But this one might work.