Making a Shellback Dinghy

Beginning February 7, 2009

As I was anticipating retirement, (I anticipated retirement for at least the last 10 years of my career at Big Blue!!) I received many suggestions and ideas about what to do during this next phase of my life. These ideas came from many quarters, friends, loved ones, family, colleagues, my doctor, people on the street, enemies, ministers, Rabi's and the odd ayatollah. Suggestions included:

take a cruise
visit the National Parks
camp in the High Sierras
get another degree
take a long road trip
cut your lawn
cut your former colleagues' lawns
build a boat
take a class that teaches you how to build a boat
paint your house
vacuum your house
get cancer
sail around the world
spend a summer on your boat in the North Channel
lock through the St Marys river and summer on Isle Royale
etc
etc
etc

I intend to do all of these things, at least most of them while I'm still walking around loose imposing myself on the world.

The idea of building a boat really caught my attention. Catalogs were sent to me about serious boat building in schools, usually in New England, where you spend months learning every part of the craft. Those schools, probably being really good, seemed to require more commitment, at least money-wise than I was willing to put forth.

Ann discovered a class at a maritime museum in Door County, Wisconsin which was priced right and semi-convenient. I got in! The entrance exam turned out not to be too rigorous!

February 7, 2009, First Day of Boat Building School.

There are 5 of us in the class, all 60-somethings. There is also an instructor who is also old enough to be at least somewhat focused on the benefits of the federal Medicare program. He has actually built boats and seems to know quite a bit about it. The other 4 guys all seem to have some woodworking experience but not in building boats. My own woodworking experience is VERY extensive, having just build a two step ladder some 38 years ago as a freshman in high school. In truth, I do understand which end of the screw-driver turns the screw but had no idea that a block plain could be more useful than a power tool.

All in all it's a pretty good group of guys whose combined enthusiasm and skill seems to be moving things in the proper direction at about the right speed. It amazes me how much we all learned in just the first day.

















There is a book written called "How to Build the Shellback Dinghy" by Eric Dow which most of us purchased and we all read. It's a great reference on how to do this. 180+ steps, none of which seem that easy, but for me one of the most intriguing steps was the makes of (2) 12 by 4 foot 30 mil pieces of mahogany plywood from (3) 4 by 8 foot pieces. To the amazement of most of us we did it almost entirely with small block planes. The process is called scarffing, if you're interested!


Out of the photo above you don't see the rest us patting ourselves on the back as HE WHO WILL INSPECT identifies a job well done. Next the pieces are epoxied together and you have big lumber instead of pretty big lumber!!
















Jigs are used to make both the mid ship frame and the stem. These two pieces are laminated wood and thus the strongest parts of the boat. The wood is Douglas Fir and the glue is epoxy. It's amazing how much you can bend a thin strip of Douglas fir.