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Boat building schools

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Todd Frye
Navigator

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USA
222 Posts

Initially Posted - 10/10/2004 : 19:23:06

I am interested in traditional ( plank on frame, pour the ballast keel, bronze fasteneing, spar making, etc) wooden boat building schools/courses. Wish I could take two or more years off work to do that, but probably not very realistic. Has any one found any of these hands on courses beneficial? If anyone has gone this route, could you share your opinions and experiences?
Thank you,

Todd Frye

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Frank Hopper
Past Commodore

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Pitcairn Island
6776 Posts

Response Posted - 10/10/2004 : 20:03:40

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Todd Frye
 I am interested in traditional ( plank on frame, pour the ballast keel, bronze fasteneing, spar making, etc) wooden boat building schools/courses. Wish I could take two or more years off work to do that, but probably not very realistic. Has any one found any of these hands on courses beneficial? If anyone has gone this route, could you share your opinions and experiences?
Thank you,

Todd Frye
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

I'd buy one to repair first.

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Leon Sisson
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
1893 Posts

Response Posted - 10/10/2004 : 22:03:44

Todd,

I second 'fhopper's suggestion, "I'd buy one to repair first". I'm not trying to discourage you from pursuing formal training in traditional wooden boat building. But there's a whole lot you can teach yourself with a few good books, a subscription to Wooden Boat magazine (which I suspect is how the seed for this madness got planted in your head in the first place

), some basic woodworking tools, a firstaid kit, and a small wooden project boat.

I started off with a 1959 Lightning woody (19' open wooden daysailor). I taught myself quite a bit about wooden boat building, repair, and maintenance. One of the most enduring lessons was that traditional wooden boats require a lot of work to prevent serious deterioration. A more specific personal lesson was that after about 10 years I grew unwilling to continue to invest the time and effort required to preserve even that small and simple a traditional wooden boat. And the moral to that story is, be careful not to bite off more wood than you can chew.

Another approach I've tried, and recommend, is building a small plywood boat using modern materials and techniques. You can still learn a great deal about basic woodworking, and if you choose your plans carefully, you're likely to end up with a handy little vessel to show for your efforts. (I built an 8' johnboat as a kid, and more recently an 8' pram for a dinghy.)

If you do decide to make the investment in formal wooden boat training, having tinkered with one on your own first will pay big dividends. You will have a solid hands on foundation of skills (and some handtools) to build from. This will allow you to learn more for your time and money.

Good luck!

-- Leon Sisson

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Bill Holcomb
Admiral

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USA
769 Posts

Response Posted - 10/11/2004 : 10:45:30

Hi Todd,

I have been happy with the Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding in Port Hadlock, Washington state. http://www.nwboatschool.org/ They provide a summer seminar series that is great as well as one and two day programs. The last class that I enrolled in was "Decking". We learned several methods for constructing decks - including traditional planking and calking; canvas decks; and plastic/epoxy methods. This was a neat class as I was about to help my brother put a new deck on his 1940 Dunnigan 30 sloop.

Bill Holcomb - C25 Snickerdoodle #4839

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John Mason
Admiral

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USA
687 Posts

Response Posted - 10/11/2004 : 13:53:13

Here's another one that has a good reputation - The Center for Wooden Boats - Seattle. Go to the "What's Happening" page and look at the calendars and workshop info.

http://www.cwb.org/index.htm

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MattL
Admiral

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USA
990 Posts

Response Posted - 10/11/2004 : 15:06:03

Try Wooden Boat Magazine. Also if you are far from the wooden boat centers try Reuel Parkers site http://www.parker-marine.com/. I got his book on sharpies, it is very good and makes you want to go out to the garage and start building a boat. He is know for cheep easy designs that sail well. Also a good one to look up is Sam Devlin http://www.devlinboat.com/
good luck and let us know what you do.

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