new dory build to 1870's design

[Daniel Noyes]

John Gardner recorded the lines of Centenial a banks dory wich was built at Gloucester in 1876 and sailed across the Atlantic by Alfred Johnson.
I'm building the dory for rec. rowing and will be building it smaller than the original 20' boat and without the ocean crossing deck and sailing adaptations.

18' should be plenty of lenght for rowing and I anticipate the pronounced rocker of Centenials bottom will make her a particularly sweet banks dory for rowing.

I am very excited about the small amount of round to her sides wich is similar to the famous St. Piere dorys and should give this boat a nice look!

[sailboy3]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

No, yer thinking of Howard Blackburn. He also attempted and succeeded in some small boat trips across the pond.

[James McMullen]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

Cool! Are you going 19th century style building techniques too? Or are you incorporating plywood and epoxy and such?

[kenjamin]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

John Gardner recorded the lines of Centenial a banks dory wich was built at Gloucester in 1876 and sailed across the Atlantic by Alfred Johnson.
I'm building the dory for rec. rowing and will be building it smaller than the original 20' boat and without the ocean crossing deck and sailing adaptations.

18' should be plenty of lenght for rowing and I anticipate the pronounced rocker of Centenials bottom will make her a particularly sweet banks dory for rowing.

I am very excited about the small amount of round to her sides wich is similar to the famous St. Piere dorys and should give this boat a nice look!

That's all well and good but where are you going to find the 200 lbs. of cod to stabilize her?

What are you building her of??? Sounds like a fun project. Good luck with the build!

[johngsandusky]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

The original boat still exists. I think it's at the Cape Ann Historical Society.

[pcford]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

Cool! Are you going 19th century style building techniques too? Or are you incorporating plywood and epoxy and such?

I, for one, hope that he does not use the nasty stuff.

[Daniel Noyes]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

Plan is to do pine on oak with copper rivets and ring nails, The Garboard planks will be marine ply, the boat will live on a trailer and the bottom will be glassed with a softer/flexible cureing epoxy up to the top of the garboards, I am considering if it is better to give the inside of the bottom a light coat of epoxy as well or simply oil and paint it?

we will do solid rail with rail caps but as this boat should have a relatively easy existance compared with a working banks dory the rail parts and pices will be done in pine to save weight as opposed to the traditional oak, and I will likely incorporate some glue in the rails to ensure everything stays tight as pine is'nt as good at holding nails as the oak would be.

[James McMullen]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

Oarlocks or thole pins?

[Daniel Noyes]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

Both! oarlocks at the middle, #2 seat and tholes for 1 and 3

In scaling down the hull from 20-18' the hull will loose 6" of beam but her timbers/freeboard will remain the same, this is how most dory models were built by simply using the same stem, stern and frames on different lenght bottoms and adjusting frame spacing accordingly.

Also I think the slight round to the sides is of great interest in this old example as later banks dories show straight frames but earlier bateaux and the relatively isolated modern St. Piere dorys had similarly rounded sides.

[Clinton B Chase]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

This is great. I "discovered" the Centennial Dory a couple years ago and devoured some reading material about the boat. Look forward to seeing more.

Clint

[Daniel Noyes]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

Hi guys, the small (18') Centennial build is under way, I've got transom cut and glued up bottom planks jointed and cut to shape, frame arms, stem rough cut.

In cutting the pattern for the stem I found it to be the same curve to within 1/8th inch as the curve that gardner records for the frames, this tells me that the frames and stem were likely cut to the same curve, and so I have done on my build.
Ill start a build thread when I get some photos on line.

[Clinton B Chase]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

Interesting about stems and frame. I did not know that was done.

I read in the latest Small Boats about the current Lowell method of using Meranti ply for bottom and garboard and then cedar for rest of topsides. This is enticing...not so traditional but probably the way dory builders would do it of they were still building commercially in wood.

Dan, I am thinking of another hybrid method like Lowell's: an edge glued cedar bottom (essentially strip built) and glassed inside before set up, then glassed outside after planking. In this approach we could use ply for garboard and glass over the bottom and garboard. The "strips" for the cedar bottom might be 3/4" x 3" which would mean 7 strips for my dory. It would make a very stiff bottom, even if it were only 3/4". The advantage would be in getting a stiff bottom, using up some cedar stock I have, and if the bottom were oiled, would look salty!

[TerryLL]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

When I built the John Dory I glassed the bottom and the GBD and hid the glass edge under the first lap. I did the other planks in ply but they could have easily been done as solid strakes, as the LWL was entirely on the GBD. I think the big problem with a hybrid build is having a ply-to-solid transition below the waterline.

[Daniel Noyes]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

Last I heard Lowells was using pine for planking, I actually dont know what there doing at Lowells today, havent been by since I worked there.

When I was there I was under the direction of a builder who had worked there since the 1970's and had been taught by a builder who had started building at another shop on the banks of the Merrimac around 1940+-... but he's not working their anymore either.
My boss had us building with a plank bottom, marine fir garboard and cedar plank sides, with the bottom glassed to the top of the garboard plank, we were using system 3 for the glassing as it seemed to have a softer cure than the West System and was able to move with the planking to a degree.

I am using a similar method on this build with marine fir and traditional pine planking.

[JimConlin]

Re: new dory build to 1870's design

Haven't we learned anything about hull design in 140 years?