Strip planking, was Re: Meadowlark

I must misunderstand; are you talking about edge-planked boats and
usual gaps for oakum/cotton? It wasn't until epoxy (dry)
encapsulation that you could plank edge to edge.

Anyway, the Meadowlark seems certainly a more complex boat than I
knew; certainly explaining to me why a glass copy might be made of
such a simple-seaming single-chine hull.

Gregg Carlson

--- In bolger@y..., pvanderw@o... wrote:
>But it does bring up something that I saw at a boatyard a few weeks
> ago. There was an aux sloop on a truck about to be taken away. From
> the design, I would guess it was from the 1960's. You couldn't tell
> at a glance at the topsides or cabin that it was not fg, but
clearly
> there were cracks in the deadwood. From the waterline down, the
> finish had been removed from the planking, revealing strip planks
> about 1.5" wide. I was surprised to see gaps of about 1/16" or 1/8"
> between the strips. The surface of the strips was bright fresh wood
> color, indicating that some wood surface had been removed along
> the finish. Can anyone infer anything from this? It seemed odd to
> to have such gaps.

On Tue, 24 Apr 2001pvanderw@...wrote:

> All that said, a veneer over strip is probably the most popular wooden
> construction nowadays.

This depends upon how you count, of course. There are probably more
traditional plywood boats built than all the others put together.

But, if you mean professionally, I suspect you're right.

> BTW, Paul Gartside, often featured in WoodenBoat and BDQ, does not

encourage strip building in the larger sizes. He feels that even
with glass and epoxy, the planking will be visible in a year or three
because the strains in larger pieces of wood overcome the epoxy.

I wouldn't want to argue with Mr. Gartside, except to point out that
there are plenty of designs by good designers for larger strip-
planked boats.

But it does bring up something that I saw at a boatyard a few weeks
ago. There was an aux sloop on a truck about to be taken away. From
the design, I would guess it was from the 1960's. You couldn't tell
at a glance at the topsides or cabin that it was not fg, but clearly
there were cracks in the deadwood. From the waterline down, the
finish had been removed from the planking, revealing strip planks
about 1.5" wide. I was surprised to see gaps of about 1/16" or 1/8"
between the strips. The surface of the strips was a bright fresh wood
color, indicating that some wood surface had been removed along with
the finish. Can anyone infer anything from this? It seemed odd to me
to have such gaps.

All that said, a veneer over strip is probably the most popular
wooden construction nowadays.

Peter

Thought I'd drop in my two bits here. On a smaller scale, building canoes,
I found that the fairing almost took care of itself when the strips were
machined with matching bead and cove -- I imagine that this would hold true
in the larger sizes too.

BTW, Paul Gartside, often featured in WoodenBoat and BDQ, does not encourage
strip building in the larger sizes. He feels that even with glass and
epoxy, the planking will be visible in a year or three because the strains
in larger pieces of wood overcome the epoxy. He has a good letter in the
current Watercraft magazine about this. He designs lots of boats for strip
planking, but specifies 2 or 3 layers of cold molded veneer over these, not
glass.

Jamie Orr

-----Original Message-----
From:pvanderw@...[mailto:pvanderw@...]
Sent: Tuesday, April 24, 2001 10:39 AM
To:bolger@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [bolger] Re: Meadowlark



Those with experience say that strip planking is not so difficult,
just hard work fairing the hull.

Peter