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Thanks everyone for the suggestions. Capsize testing is coming up tomorrow or Monday hopefully.

And there is a long bow painter. I'll try out using it to flip the boat back over. Thanks for that...

I went for what seemed the quickest and easiest approach. I bought a 4x8 sheet of 2" blue extruded foam and built two "blocks", one for under the mast thwart and the other for just in front of the...

Foam it will be, thanks for the advice everyone. 4'x8'x2" from the local lumberyard at $56 for 8 cubic feet = 480lbs buoyancy if I can get all of it fit into the boat.

Under the mast step is my...

My Featherwind (16'x4.5', 105lbs) is completely bare inside the hull. It has lots of space for people, but no reserve buoyancy. That feels fine on a 30 acre reservoir (see below) but completely...

I finally got time to lay out the bottom shape from the offsets on the laminated plank. It's a double ender with 3 stations and the midline, so it didn't take too long, but I had to wiggle back and...

Yes, well-spotted. It's my adaptation of Chris Scwarz's Anarchist's Workbench to the existing bench that a friend handed down to me. It is a tremendous benefit to my woodworking, so glad that I put...

Glue-up continues for the dory bottom. After scarf joints for two boards, I lightly jointed the edges wwith the block plane and test clamped the two boards. I marked the gaps and took a few more...

A little Saturday work on the stock for the bottom. I've got these salvaged 1x6s up in the garage and I pulled them down to see what I've got. The finished bottom is 10' 9.5" x 15.75" so I'm hoping...

Spent most of my hobby brainpower today ordering LED shop lights for the basement woodshop. Ended up with 6x2500 lumens at 5000K color temperature for about $40 (what is the world coming to, that's a...

This will be the twelve foot version. There's a bit too much of me for the carrying capacity of the original ten footer. At least if I want to bring along more than a ham sandwich.

Then make a second one! Easier than the first because you can just trace around the first one for a pattern.

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Then I screwed and glued up the frame and its added temporary brace.

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Got out the two stems and screwed and glued the mid-frame.

First, mark the 5/8" thickness of the stem.

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I like to plane one side to the line and then flatten everything else to match....

The stem has enough sweep that I didn't have a wide-enough scrap on hand.

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I convinced myself that an edge-glued joint down low on the inside of the stem was safe enough so I cut a longer...

I bet you're the one who gave me his name on the other thread where I was looking for cedar planking stock. ;)

Josh Swan from JW Swan and Sons Boatworks jwswanandsons.com was the source of the NWC. The website says he doesn't have any, but when I emailed him he said "oh yeah, I should change that, I have a...

The plans call for #6x3/4" bronze screws between the two sides of the frame (with glue of course). I bought the recommended supply of screws (and I have no idea how to rivet, what's it like?)

My...

The plans book has four things that need building individually before the strong back and the setup: the midship frame, the two watertight bulkheads, the stems, and the bottom. The midship bulkhead...

My first boat I built was a cheap-and-cheerful plywood flatiron skiff. I enjoyed the build immensely and the sailing and rowing it with my family even more. For a second boat, I wanted to do a boat...

Hasler and McLeod's Practical Junk Rig has many years of empirical testing behind it. They have the most thorough explanations of unstayed mast design that I have seen, including a section on mast...

Hard to say how old Harry Bryan’s design is. This little 10.5-footer https://www.harrybryan.com/products/fiddlehead-106 is the original one, with two larger siblings coming later, probably upon...

I am building a Harry Bryan 12’ Fiddlehead, a solid wood lapstrake canoe. The plans just say “3M 5200” for sealing planks to the dory-style bottom and the hood ends and gains of the planks. The plank...

The pictures say it all. Featherwind was a wonderful boat to build and wonderful fun to sail this last summer, speaking as someone who had never sailed a small boat before. I had sailed a Catalina 25...

I think I remember a couple of duck works magazine stories on a multi lake mess about up there? I wonder if Google can find them?

We've got threads when videos come out on other YouTube channels, but I'm not sure if I've seen one for Sailing Magic Carpet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tr1IGQQNt_k

I enjoy watching Maya and...

The spars are almost 14 feet long with a ten-foot mast. They are shorter than the boat, but not by very much. That means they need to be run almost all the way up into the bow before they clear the...

I have rowed a fair bit with the mast up when I did get out this year. Since I am no good at rowing and have never rowed anything other than this boat before, I don’t think I noticed the drag of the...

Maybe? The sunfish gooseneck is bolted on and I haven’t been excited about pulling the mast on the water, usually because the boat is so crowded because of how much my kids and their friends love it....

I finished building my first boat this past summer and sailed it a few days before winter set in. It’s a 16’ plywood flatiron skiff, very cheaply built, and I love it, but I don’t love the lateen rig...

Joining the chorus, I have much gratitude this year for your generosity in sharing the stories and pictures of your travels here on WBF. We know there’s no monetization like on a YouTube video, so...

So beautiful Tom and a great reminder of the sublime small-ball experiences available for Midwestern small boat sailors. So much of the sailing writing that I see is racing or crossing oceans and...

Grolsch and other swing-top glass bottles are re-sealable and quite airtight, but I doubt they have positive buoyancy given the weight of the glass.

Not to hijack Mike’s thread displaying the results of such craftsmanship, but I want to say thank you to Alan for those words summarizing what I strive for and occasionally experience in a building...

Why the second leeboard? Mine works equally well on both tacks despite being on one side of the boat. There are lots of successful designs using off-centerboards with no practical problems with the...

Jim Michalaks Toto is in the same ballpark as Long Weekend, 13’ long, 45 pounds. https://duckworks.com/toto-plans/

Texas, plywood, shallow, sub-14’, how about the Welsford Saturday Night Special which was literally designed for tat scenario:...

Putting a different sail rig on an existing design is not trivial. The geometry of the sail determines the location of its “center of effort” which needs to have a specific relationship with the hull...

As the aspect ratio of the cross-section goes up (it gets thinner relative to its chord) then the lift and drag benefits of a better profile go down. https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1312/8/9/677 is a nice...

I was just looking at these for making a breakdown double paddle. In case you are thinking of looking around for a better deal, don’t bother. Everything similar that I saw was double the price. $30...

Can you say more about “expensive and difficult to work”?

Every wood working tool I own has cut plywood as effectively as it has cut timber. What is it about plywood that is difficult to work?
...

Great article. For general purpose writing about sailing, the reporter did a very nice job.

When I get my boat Bristol fashion, it’s usually in that sense of the word.

Just a status update, my local hardwood place only has SYP for pine, got a number to call for the right person at Endeavor Hardwoods. And heavens to Betsy I’ve got two, not one, count ‘em two leads...

My friends and I have dealt with lots of Amish sawmills for various projects, but the issue is that none of them saw for grade, and usually they are selling wood green right out of the woods, through...

For my second boat, I am excited to try something more traditional than a plywood flatiron skiff. I bought the plans for Harry Bryan’s 12 foot Fiddlehead and I have been enjoying reading the...

So happy to see this boat in the water before the end of the year. For three sheets of plywood, it’s a pretty fabulous creation. Lots of fun in a tiny bit of materials and simple construction...

Same here. We sailed on the Castle Rock flowage at Buckhorn State Park this weekend following Tom’s suggestion and it was exceptional. That part of the Wisconsin down to the Dells would be a fun...

I use the same sort of thing in a 15’ skiff that has no internal furniture, so everyone has to sit on the floor. If you need a plan, Jim Michalak has suggestions...

One of the post-launch tweaks still left is to paint the gunwales their accent color. My daughter the 6th grade artist picked the color scheme and it sure looks dramatic. Nobody Is going to mistake...

Thats very interesting, I remember reading a boat designer (can’t remember who right now) who used weight to estimate build time. I think his theory was that you could put 2 or 3 pounds of wood on in...

My recollection from the motor episode is that he has the main engine coupled to a motor-generator for hybrid propulsion, and also charging. I don’t think that we’ve seen any of those parts yet?