Finishing the Gunwales and Breasthooks

If you are at a point where the breasthook looks like this, it needs to be sanded to look like the one below.

To be most efficient, this is the time to fill the space between the gunwale and inwale in those four places where the thwarts will be attached. The rear thwart is 13 inces behind the center of the boat, and the front one is 39 inches in front of the rear thwart. Find the space that best meets these criteria. This gets filled with a short piece of ash, glued and clamped. When the glue is dry, the entire gunwale and the bresthooks can be sanded smoth and flat. DO NOT round off the outer spruce edges of the gunwale (the rubrail will attached here, you don't want to create a gap), though you could do this to the inside edges for handling comfort.

All the rib ends which are sticking up will sand very easily and quickly. The ash gunwale will take a bit more work, but be careful as you are smoothing the gunwale to keep the lines as fair as possible.

Attaching the Thwarts

Now that the gunwales are cleaned up, you have to drill some holes in them!  Only four. Remember, the rear thwart is 13 inces behind the center of the boat, and the front one is 39 inches in front of the rear thwart.  The ash filler pieces are installed. 

Now you need to fit and cut the thwarts to their finished length.  They should fall a bit short of the gunwale on either end; the canvas should not touch them when it is on the boat. In the photo below, you are looking at the outside of the boat. That end should be cut at a compound angle: parallel to the outer gunwale.  You can see the pencil line in the picture - the one one top is easy, just trace the gunwale.  The vertical line on the thwart runs along a line from the guwale to the first stringer.  This means it will slant in a bit at its bottom edge.  The drawing below may show this better (angled face 2). After you draw the lines, you want to cut a bit (1/8") inside of the lines, so the canvas of the boat will not touch the end of the wood.

















You can also see, in the drawing, the upper angled surface.  This is created so that the thwart will fit more solidly to the undrside of the gunwale, which is slightly flared outward.  This is about an inch long and takes off about 1/8" at the end.  It can be done with a sander,or a sharp plane.

You need to drill a hole through each filler piece, where the thwart will be bolted to the gunwale.  Drill parallel to the gunwale side (imagine poking the drill through that space if the filler wasn't there).

The finished attachment looks like this (below).  The clamps marks, by the way, will be covered by the canvas and rubrails.

Skining the Frame

coming soon.....

Coating the Frames

Oil or varnish?

I have made these boats using only water-based polyurethane to seal them. This has the advantage of slightly lower cost, water clean-up and lower V.O.C.s. Dries quick, too. My first boat was done with this, and its has stood up very well.

More recently, we have been using Waterlox, a commercially available, tung-oil and resin wood finish. I like to use two coats of the 'origianal' type, followed by a top coat of the marine version of the same product, which, rather than soaking in and filling the grain, leaves a more varnish-like gloss coating on the surface. It takes a while to thoroughly dry, particularly if there are thick spots or drips around the lashing, etc. Brush it out as thin as you can, and give it several days to dry, preferably in the sun.

The most efficient way to do this is to have the boat frame, the two rub-rails (for the gunwales) and the assembled floor boards all done, so you can finish them all at the same time.  With a few home-made 'pin boards', it is possible to coat both sides at the same time.