Making gunwhales

[Greg Luckett]

Each boat I build has been a struggle to make and install gunwhales.  The last two I soaked fir in water for several days, then bent each stave to shape.  This time I want to use white oak for its durability but the 3/4x1-1/2 staves do not bend easily at all.  I have seen in the books on steam bending that white oak should be done while green, which is a problem for me as I do not have any nor a source for any.  Can white oak be steamed and bent successfully?

In the meantime, I resawed the staves to 1/4x1-1/5 and they will make the bends.  My thinking is to construct laminated gunwhales, but I really wanted solid ones which could be finished bright if desired.

I am hoping for some recommendations and advise.  Thanks in advance.

Greg

[ulpilotrmh]

Greg:

Seems to me that if you were able to get good tight glue joints with the 1/4 x 1 1/2 staves, that you colud finish them "Bright," and it would not be readily apparent that they were laminated.

Russ

[Oyster]

Greg sometimes what we are so picky about and worry about detail, to others means nothing.

I present to you what I get away with and have yet to be scorned by anyone. This laminate has had numerous people say that they rarely see anything like it on a boat anymore. You make the call. What you see takes less than one hour tops to saw and glue and finish sand.

[PAR]

White oak steam bends especially well. You'll probably only be able to find kiln dried, which should be soaked, though tossing it straight in the steam box works too, but he percentage of breakage will be higher. Rail caps usually don't have particularly severe radiuses to conform to, but usually have compound curves. 3/4" x 1 1/2" white oak stock is quite stiff (one of the nice things about this oak) as you've found, but once steamed will be barely able to support it's own weight coming out of the steam box. Set everything up before hand, clamps, jigs, tools, wedges, everything, because once you pull the stock from the box, you'll have 3 good minutes to get it dogged into the jig and a few more minutes before it's too cool to force in any more bending.

If bending in place on the boat, insure the clamping method(s) will be forceful and capable of the strain, as the oak will resist. I've popped plenty of clamps off jigs bending oak, sometimes it just doesn't like to cooperate and you have to "talk" to it with lots of force, which the portion of the boat it being attached to must tolerate, until the oak dries. Over bend slightly on the ends, to counter act "spring back". Once the oak dries, it will surrender calmly and live in the new shape.

[Steve Day]

Greg,

I sent you an e-mail off line to describe what I did on the Spindrift (and the Garvey). The laminated method, in my mind, is just as good, easier to do, and looks quite nice.

Oyster and I are of like mind on this.

BTW, Mike, did you make it home yet, or are you still in Texas?

Steve

[Greg Luckett]

Greg sometimes what we are so picky about and worry about detail, to others means nothing.

I present to you what I get away with and have yet to be scorned by anyone. This laminate has had numerous people say that they rarely see anything like it on a boat anymore. You make the call. What you see takes less than one hour tops to saw and glue and finish sand.

Thanks, Oyster.  What woods are used in this picture?  It looks nice and I like the contrast.

[jan nicolaisen]

Greg, I suggest tapering the gunwales in both planes. Example: midships the full gunwale might measure 5/8" x 1" for a few feet, then slowly and gradually taper to, say 3/8 x 5/8 at the ends.

This will accomplish two things. First it will bend easier around the typically more pronounced curves toward the ends. Second, and possibly more important, the appearance is wonderfully balanced. The funny thing about an untapered gunwale is the risk of having them appear to GAIN in scantlings as they approach the ends of the boat. The trained eye will immediately spot this on certain hulls, just like an uneven lapstrake job, and it is not attractive, to say at least.

It is not overly difficult to shave the stock down, whether the tool is a jack plane or electric power planer, just a bit time consuming laying out the lines considering both rails have 4 tapers.

I wouldn't risk building a boat without doing this!

Jan

[Greg Luckett]

Jan,

Thank you for your advice.  I am interested in looking at some pictures of this method; can you point me to some?

Greg.

[Tom Lathrop]

There is one important thing to remember when bending any wood to a curved and/or compound shape.

Always start with that part of the piece that will be the most curved part.  This is usually the bow part which typically has some compounding also. 

[Greg Luckett]

There is one important thing to remember when bending any wood to a curved and/or compound shape.

Always start with that part of the piece that will be the most curved part.  This is usually the bow part which typically has some compounding also. 

Thanks Tom.  I did not know that and had always started at the transom on the previous boats.  I will try this today, but am curious why start at the most curved section?

[Howard]

Greg:

I'm guessing you are talking about doing these for a Spindrift?

If someone asked me, I'd suggest that doing these out of one piece of white oak involves a number of "issues".

First, doing these out of a "one piece" of anything has the potential to force the hull out of true. The laminations are done from front to back, side to side, so that the hull doesn't get out of true. Steam bending them, followed by dry fitting might help with that, but is something to be on the lookout for.

Not sure white oak or any oak is the best for this. There is "durability" by which I suppose you mean it can hit stuff without denting? It's not the most rot resistant, and in a glue up test I tried using white oak, the epoxy stuck fine....the wood separated (split off) and it didn't take that much pressure to do it. Added to that is the supposed compatibility issue with epoxy and white oak that it doesn't stick due to the acids or tannins in the wood. So I'd be concerned they wouldn't stick and might pop off at some point. White oak is also dense, meaning heavy.

I've had some rot tests going for about 8 months now and while white oak is doing better than red oak, it's not doing as well as some others. Ash is the worst. Black locust, bald cypress, the new pressure treated yellow pine and western red cedar are doing the best. Of these, the cypress and western red cedar glue the best. Black locust is hands down the best in terms of durability and rot resistance, but is not easy to find clear in any decent length and it's heavy. But it's holding up pretty well to a glue joint test.

But I'd stick to laminations. Mine are bald cypress, and in my opinion, they don't look too bad finished:

Up  close, there are flaws, but that was me, not the wood. Fastner holes never go away.

If I was doing it again, I'd stick with the cypress or western red cedar.

As for doing the laminations, dry fitting them was easy. Wet was a different story. There is a wicked compound curve through the bow. and buttered up, those lamination strips want to slide everywhere but where you put them. Doing it again, I would dry fit them in place, then clamp a series of small blocks just below the laminations in the bow section, to about amidships. When you start fitting the laminations in place wet, you clamp sideways to the bow and down to the blocks. Front to back, side to side.

Next problem. To get these lamination strips to fit to the curve requires a lot of clamping pressure. Enough so, you risk forcing the epoxy out, leaving a glue starved joint, which again, will pop apart. On "stressed" laminations, I started using finely ground (30:100) walnut shell or System 3 plastic non-skid granules in the slightly thickened epoxy, to act as spacers and as grit to lock the strips into place. Either of these two can be "machined" (planed or sanded), whereas sand cannot be. With this stuff in the mix, you can clamp as hard as you want and it' won't starve the joint.

[Tom Lathrop]

There is one important thing to remember when bending any wood to a curved and/or compound shape.

Always start with that part of the piece that will be the most curved part.  This is usually the bow part which typically has some compounding also. 

Thanks Tom.  I did not know that and had always started at the transom on the previous boats.  I will try this today, but am curious why start at the most curved section?

The main reason is that you can put in the first clamp or two in the most curved part with no sweat.  That anchors the part and you can then use the rest of the part as a long lever to fit and clamp the rest.  When you get to the other less curved end, there is no great wood stress to deal with and there is no long lever to help fit it. 

Done the wrong way round, you end up with the most curved part under a lot of stress to deal with.  If you have steamed the part, it will be most dry just when you need it to be most limber.

[Greg Luckett]

Tom,

Both points make good sense to me.  I was just out dry fitting and tried your suggestion, and of course, you were right.  Thanks.

I built a roll around stand to sit the boat on and set up its shape.  I have set the shape 3 times now, but every time I needed to move the boat to get to something in my shop, it got moved.  Now I can roll it with ease and set forms under it to maintain the shape until I can get some of the interior in place to hold it.  This will be a good stand for building a CS20 later this year...or maybe an EC22. 

Oh, while building the stand yesterday, I managed to smack myself in the forehead with the drill motor and put a 1 inch gash and a painfull goose egg bump.  Stupid accident that could easily have been avoided.  The boys were not there to see me do it but Sam freaked out when I came into the house, called his mom at work and told her, "Dad has a 1-1/2 inch cut and won't go to the doctor!"  Must have been all the blood.  Head wounds seem to bleed a lot.  Anyway, I did not go to the dr. for stiches as I only do that if the blood won't stop.  Edith keeps watching me with a worried smile now, but I told her scars are ok for a guy, especially as old as I am.  LOL now! 

[Greg Luckett]

Howard, where did you find the Western Red Cedar?  Is that the Cedar being sold at the big box stores?

I am thinking that putting the laminated strips on one layer at a glue up might be easier, but more time consuming.  I am unsure how to clamp the blocks while dry fitting that would not then have those clamps in the way while gluing up the laminated strips.

Thanks for your excellent advice and sharing.  It was interesting what you have learned about the different woods.  I thought white oak was better than you are finding.  Cypress sounds good for the keel and the gunwhales, that is what you mean?  I wonder where I can find Cypress around my area?

Thanks again,

Greg.

[ulpilotrmh]

Cypress sounds good for the keel and the gunwhales, that is what you mean?  I wonder where I can find Cypress around my area?

Thanks again,

Greg.

Greg:

Try a local woodcraft store, that's where I found some.

Russ

[Oyster]

Sorry it took so long to get back to you. I have been sailing all day.    The rails are honduras mahogany sandwiching white cedar. I rabbited the outside mahogany and capped the plywood hull sides and let it dry. I let me rabbit be fat to compensate for the glue. I then sanded the inside edge and glued the other two pieces t it. I have a foward deck which butted up to the outside piece, fastening to another small inwale foward glued to the hull inside.

[Howard]

Greg: On fitting the strips to a fixed block......the strips are threaded through it, or you mark the line you want to clamp to and add the block and clamps after the strips are in place. When all set up and finished, the block part would look like this:

Busy looking photos with a lot crammed in to explain things. You would only need 2 or 3 of these for the entire bow section on each side. Maybe one more aft. The blocks form a base to even the bottoms and tops are evened up when you clamp down to the base. It only takes a couple to get control of things. Not shown in the above photo of scraps is something like plastic, duct tape, wax paper, etc. to keep the strips from sticking to your clamps and blocks.

Many clamps along the sides. At least every foot...maybe more. High pressure clamps forward to force the curve and twist. Those cheap PVC clamps aft.

Leave the tops of the strips a bit proud and plane them smooth and flush to the top of your plywood sides when you take the clamps off.

I used slow epoxy to give myself time. But if you do that, leave it under clamps for several days. Maybe a week, depending on your temperature. Take em off too soon and if the epoxy isn't pretty well cured, the tension they are under will pop them off. Same problem as that butterfly joint. Give that taped joint some time to really setup or it will separate when you unfold the "book" and start stitching the sides together.

On the cypress, I was lucky enough to find some boards in my dads barn....scraps leftover from a fencing job years ago. They got it at the local lumber yard. Western red cedar.....skip the box stores and buy that at a local lumber yard too. Better prices and better selection. For a 12 footer, look at 2x stock in 14' or 16' boards. You might find a flat sawn board or one good clear side you can rip all 6 strips from.  Use the rest for your cleats.

For the keel, I used pressure treated yellow pine, as it's glued and screwed. Try Tom Lathrop's epoxied rope trick as an abrasive edge on the bottom of the keel.

[davidpm]

I used mahogany from the local lumberyard that is 1 /4 for decking. It is not honduras, probably african but I've used it before and it looks nice and rich when finished.

I'm thinking of two modifications.

1. Just oil the trim wood. I have used http://www.penofin.com and really like it. I prefer the look of a soft oiled finish to a epoxy varnish finish. Any thoughts as to the sucess of this,

2. What about putting another 1/4" strip on the inside. I'm thinking it would finish it off a little better.

What about that idea?

[Greg Luckett]

I like oiling better than varnish too.  Boiled linseed oil and turpentine mixed are my favorite.  I use a 50/50 mix on new wood, then add more oil as the wood soaks it up, letting it sit for a few minutes before wiping.  Several applications make for some very nice looking wood.

On my Spindrift, I may not mess with doing much of it bright.  I really like low maintenance, especially in a small boat.  Good two part paints are hard and wear well.  I have not yet decided what I will do, and I do like the looks of oiled woods.

[Hirilonde]

I used mahogany from the local lumberyard that is 1 /4 for decking. It is not honduras, probably african but I've used it before and it looks nice and rich when finished.

It is probably cambura (sp) or meranti.  They come from Polynesia and South America.  Good stuff for decking, fine for your gunwhales, but no substitute for African for planking.