Q. for whisp builders

[davebrown]

i've managed to negotiate two hours of rush hour traffic and now i'm back from work with five sheets of okume and marine fir on my jeep. as an aside i am going to plank in okume and bottom with fir, with glass over bottom and garboard.

on the plans for whisp, i did not catch whether it suggests scarfing or butt blocks for the planking. the boat loa appears to be 15'9". if i scarf at 3", will i have enough from two sheets of 4x8 to line off my planks? or should i butt block to preserve the full length of each 4x8?

my guess is that such an elegant hull would demand scarfing.

did other buildres scarf?

[Woxbox]

scarf

[James McMullen]

Scarph them for sure! Butt blocks and lapstrake planking are not the happiest marriage.

[ishmael]

The reason for the length of the boat, numb nut(meant with affection) is to figure in a scarf. IIRC there's just enough to screw up once and have to cut it back. Don't count on that, that's just a memory. The boat is drawn pretty tight to the material length.

Hey! Ya got the wood and are going to start in! That's great. It's fun in the building. But a scarf, not butts for this boat.

P.S. Follow Redmond's plan pretty much to the letter. He'd thought this out very well. For example, I thought I'd get fancy and cut the frames jogged so as to provide limbers at the laps. It worked out OK, but it was completely unnecessary: The limber was already there in the lap with a straight frame.

Have you heard back from either Steve or Tom Hill?

[davebrown]

redmond did not reply. i didn't write hill, but i do like his skiffs an awful lot as well.
i concur regarding the thought and care on this boat. it seems to be at the pinnacle for skiff design. the only one i like better is culler's otter, which is a double-ender and some would argue is not really a skiff. but that academic question doesn't concern us here.

i asked my question about scarfing because the plans mention METRIC panels for getting out the bottom, which are slightly longer. specifically, the plan mentions that with care, one could get the bottom out of one metric panel. i am using two panels of doug fir, as mentioned, for the bottom, and okume for the planks. depending on how clumsy i am with goop, i might finish bright from WL up..or perhaps bright on sheerstrake. not sure yet. my ladderframe is now finished and i am scarfing this morning.

[davebrown]

one other question,ishmael, jogged frames not to your liking? i was thinking of doing the same thing...

[StevenBauer]

Was the Occume metric? All that I have bought is. The sheets were almost 8'3". They must have been 250cm.




Steven

[davebrown]

yes--the okume was metric. my scarfs are structurally good but visually clumsy. i decided to try roessel's stepped cuttiing method, with power plane. i don't use it enough to be very accurate with it, and they always cut in two places: where you're looking and where you're not.

[ishmael]

"one other question,ishmael, jogged frames not to your liking? i was thinking of doing the same thing..."

There's no need. When the straight frame falls across the laps it automatically makes a limber. I thought I was hot ****, just out of boatbuilding school etc, and so I fitted the frames. A waste of time. It works just fine with a straight frame. Redmond had it right.