Flawless workmanship and artwork by eye

[Oyster]

This is a traditional built hull that has been built by one of the last folks on Harkers Island that can walk into a shop with some string and wood and create a masterpiece after a few minutes of talking to you to get some guidance on the size and intended use.

Sometimes if you have never experienced obstacles of compound curves you may dismiss the accomplishment of these shots. This boat is strip planked out of Juniper, or Atlantic White Cedar as its known in some circles.

This will give you an overall perspective of the interior of the boat. For every station, there are angle changes and requires a lot of forethought in the initial fairing or the frames and ribs. The ribs are actually shaped with a spokeshave with a quarter inch batten, both fore and aft and vertical too.

There is little to no fill to make up for any improper fitting against the planks or between the strips, all cut out of solid planks and installed.

Even in the areas of extreme curves and hidden lockers, the same standard applies.

The boat is a tunnel hulled inboard design and the bottom is also all strip planked, all fitting the curves properly.

The builder even knows exactly where to cut the shaft and created a mark or centerline for which to drill the finished shaft log setting the face angle accordingly. If you look closely, you will see that the nail marks the spot. .

The foredeck is also curve and is solid planked to the same standards with curved coamings.

[capt jake]

Pretty durned nice!   You just wanted to show off the sunshine!   That is extremely nice workmanship.  Is that one of Graham's designs?

[Charlie Jones]

;D

Jake- you must have missed Mike's first sentence

;D

[Craig]

Now that is fine work!  This ain't his first rodeo.....  8)

[Oyster]

Charlie, the sun was in his eyes. He should know by now to wear sunglasses when opening my threads. ;D  Craig, this guy is one incredible builder, building 70 foot hulls with a not much more than a chainsaw, drill, and a good table saw, and of course some mighty fine finish grinders, the tool of choice for finish work, only on the outside. This hull was built parttime consuming about seven weeks while building another 42 footer . To Jamie its like most of us taping a six hour canoe together.

[capt jake]

;D

Jake- you must have missed Mike's first sentence

;D

Still could be his design, I know he is not building it due to the description.

[Tom Lathrop]

Captain, it's nobody's design.  It's a Harker's Island skiff.  At least that is as good a name as any.  These boats are not built from plans.  Such boats have evolved over many years in the backyards and boatyards  along the middle part of the NC coast.  You can find "plans" for many of the old working boats from the NC Museum in Beaufort but these are just made from lines taken off existing craft.  Mike can probably make some addition to this but it's probably close to the truth.  The flair in the topsides forward is probably the beginning of the extreme flair seen on the NC offshore fishermen that work this area.

One thing has always puzzled me about the construction of these boats.  That is the joint in the frames at the chine.  A plain lap joint with a single through bolt.  It must work or they would have changed it but it does seem weak to me.

Charlie, you must be kidding.  The Capt. lives on Puget Sound and it's January.  He has had no sight of the sun for weeks.  When he is outside, he has seen nothing but mud puddles and his shoes.

[capt jake]

My shoes IN the mud puddles!   It was actually sunny today. I had a dickens finding my sunglasses.  Not to worry, it's supposed to start raining again tomorrow......

[Pipefitter]

Wow, Mike. Great pics of a sweet looking job. Do you know what it gets for decking?

[Oyster]

The only plans that I know that exists are sketched up on a piece of wood as you stand along side talking to the guys and telling them the few guildlines when doing most of these hulls. Its a natural with these folks. They transfer a thought with a pencil without batting an eye and most all do it with no erasers. In most cases it comes out just right.

Here is a great example. While speaking on a small break, he grabbed a pencil and drew a duck, all with its proper proportions and beauty. But they use the same idea of a couple of stations and true the boat and intermediate stations or frames with a batten and level it with their eye, water level or with the assistance of a level from side to side. The fore and aft can be viewed with a string in the setup if the boat is setup upright.

To address the single bolt issue, I can only give you my thoughts on the reason or lack of for doubling up. I think the natural shape gives credence that compression or any working in that area is minimum to none, since the hull sides and rails rake out and around. The engineering part or physics if that applies, seem to lend itself to the idea that you cannot compress that shape inward at all. The cap keeps any raking to a minimum too. This is just my uneducated opinion from my navel  engineering degree. If you also look, there is no chines, just a wider plank at the chines.

[BobSmalser]

Great post, Mike. 

[Noklin]

Beautiful work.

I hope that he has a large group of younger workers working with him so that his knowledge can be passed on to the next generation of builders.

It would be a shame to lose that kind of knowledge/skill.

[PAR]

Thanks Mike. Brought back days of my youth, as I wandered around different shops and yards watching masters at work.

[Tom Lathrop]

I remember about 20 years ago visiting one of the few remaining builders of skiffs on Harkers Island.  He was recognized as one of the masters and hobbled by arthritic knees so bad that he moved about with two canes.  He was still building a skiff in the back yard and needed the canes to move around while he worked.  The workmanship was just as Mike shows and the techniques was the same.  If you asked one of these builders to see the plans, he might point to a worn drawing on a small piece of wood nailed to the wall or even a serpentine curve carved into the wood floor that represented the midships rib of a boat.  From this groove he might have built boats of many different sizes over the years.  Everything done by eye and experience.

Our local maritime museums have documented and  preserved much of this work.  What they cannot preserve is the independent will and spirit of these builders.  There is perhaps even more wooden boatbuilding here than in the past but it is not the same.