Tag: pacific northwest

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Week 16: Tourists in Our School

Imagine, instead of boarding a plane, ship or train, one could discover new worlds immediately outside the doorstep of your house. Yes, yes, I know the folks who specialize in infectious diseases understood this for a long time—every sneeze is a new adventure in their world. But, what about boat school? Hey, aren’t we all just working on things that are intended to float? Yes, then again, wander through your nearest harbor. All that stuff afloat sure does not look the same, nor is it made of the same materials.

Turns a similar story is unfolding here at the Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding as we all discovered last Friday when we were given an opportunity to wander through the shops our other colleagues call home. (A shop does become home—I spend more time in the Hammond Building than in my house…perhaps that reveals mixed-up priorities…or a slow learning curve on my behalf…regardless, it’s a great place to reside. Particularly, if you like boats, learning, and sawdust.)

Oh, thinking of learning, Jedi master Jody Boyle caught me with a new challenge this week.

“Leather the oars.”
“What?” (A common term in a boat student’s lexicon. Often followed up with “How?”)

Turns out that oars you want to keep—like the ones your classmates sweated to craft—should have leather “sleeves” so as to avoid unnecessary wear and tear when being used for propulsion. People who like to row already knew this. Those of us prone to using Mother Nature for propulsion—also known as sailors—didn’t contemplate this complication. I know sails require sewing, but that’s why there are sail lofts and people who know how to cut and stich canvas or Dacron.

That level of specialized labor does not apply to wooden boat school. Not only do we get to construct the craft, we have to figure out how to finesse bronze, leather, stainless steel and the weather. Alas, the weather is another challenge we confront (wood has to dry before construction or one’s craft will shrink in a manner prone to letting in water). Bad karma. Drying occurs when humidity is less than the wood content—here in the great “Northwet” come January and February that’s no small challenge.

I digress. Back to leathering oars.

Jedi master Jody has made it clear the skiff we have been laboring to launch so as to open shop floor space must have leathered oars before we splash. To prove his point, he arrived at the shop with what appears half a cow hide, waxed twine and needles…the kind you mother used to sew on buttons, just heavy duty. Hmmmm…this was not in my vision of boat school, but no time to learn like the present.

Good thing the gentleman working with me knows leather skills and how to stitch. Now I am no longer in fear of shedding blood via chisels and saws, those damn needles are sharp! At least they won’t remove a digit, just perforate the surface…multiple times if you are me when it comes to stitching.

What does this mean? Well, with any luck we will put skiff four in the water during week 17! I look forward to a row and then back to building Felicity Ann.

Jedi Master Leigh O’Connor

So, back to my point about playing tourist. Jedi master Sean Kooman insisted on Friday we all walk through the shops. Great idea! Down in the Rubb Shelter, Jedi master Leigh O’Connor is leading charge on the Whitehalls and a pram. These small craft guys are sticklers—meaning the strongbacks and molds they build would meet a dentist’s idea of precise. In the Westrem, Jedi master Olivier Huin has four projects going at once…and is looking forward to launching at least one sailing skiff. His powerboat project, on the other hand, will put the kids at Chris Craft to shame. (If you ever get a chance to wander the lakes of our mid-west states—well, Chris Craft are the Cadillacs we wooden boat builders would like to claim our own.) Oh, and you should see the lofting and laminating work required to build this beauty. Meanwhile, Jedi master Bruce Blatchley has this submarine thing down…never thought of a wooden sub, but would keep that magnetic mine problem at bay. In addition, he is leading on a pram and the Handy Billy is starting to look like the best crab boat I could ever afford—too bad she is headed for somewhere other than the Port Townsend watershed.

 

All of which brings us back to the Hammond Building. Jedi Master Ben Kuhn continues to push forward on the Sea Beast…looking up through scaffold and planking I now see decking and a cabin. On the other side, we find Felicity Ann and the Folkboat in full pursuit. Now, if I can just get the oars leathered and that skiff launched.

No more time for tourism, back to learning. Where is that needle?

eri profile

 

Eric Anderson is a retired Air Force officer who can be found puttering
in his shop when not scribbling on the keyboard.  A new resident of
Port Townsend, he is an avid sailor, struggling carpenter, and would-be writer.

 

 

 

 

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Week 15: Pancakes

 

Pancakes.

Somewhere along the line an editor has politely told me no introductory clause has a single word and certainly should not be a breakfast meal. What a shame, all that lecturing gone to waste and I insist on opening with pancakes.

IMG_4307Mind you, that is not all we did during week 15, but the blueberry pancakes for lunch on Thursday will take a while to fade from memory. Many thanks to staff members Tulip Morrow (Student Services Cooridnator), Heidi Groh (Admissions Coordinator) and Christina Cogan (Communications & Development Coordinator). Add to that one of our classmates and Jedi master Sean Koomen (Chief Instructor), who makes a mean blueberry buckwheat pancake. Why all this breakfast nonsense? Thursday was national blueberry pancake day—at least according to Congress. And you thought they did nothing useful in Washington DC? Ok, enough pancakes and syrup, at least for the moment.

So, where do we stand here at week 15?

Jedi master Jody Boyle patiently watched for two days as a pair of us large craft knuckle-draggers tried to figure out how in-walls are installed on a skiff. (Yes, there are at least two more skiffs waiting to float out of the Class of 2016’s  growing fleet.) We finally figured out the game, and then he divulged a secret. ‘PATTERN BEFORE TRYING TO BEND TIMBERS.’ We had the second in-wall done in less than 60 minutes. When it comes to wooden boatbuilding, experience and lessons learned sure beats labor and silent cursing. Thinking of labor…

Remember Oliver? I introduced Oliver last week. Our ceaseless taskmaster of a planer who will take all manner of abuse regardless of timber or weather. We knew Oliver could care less about wood types and what we discovered this week is that he cares less about rain. Good thing. It’s been wet up here in the Northwest—still beats snow. My apologies to counterparts in Maine.

So we start feeding Oliver in the pouring rain. No worries. He’s up to the task.

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S/V FELICITY ANN

 
The result? A “Great Wall of Wood” in the Hammond Shop. We are drying planking for the Felicity Ann, Folkboat, and Whitehalls, all at one time. Makes for a lot of scrambling around timbers and the “stickers” necessary to provide breathing space necessary to take this lumber from building material to ship stock.
 

No one said wooden boatbuilding was easy on the imagination or spine.

 
 
 
Time to stop grumbling. Another skiff has met the sea. On Wednesday, Master Jedi Bruce Blatchley splashed “Thin Lizzy.” Rain or no rain, this stretched version of the standard skiff (we added two feet), went into the Pacific and out for a row. Proving he was up to the task, Bruce took the lead in rowing Thin Lizzy around the bay. A skiff that will serve family and friends for a generation to come.

So where do we stand?

Up at the large craft shop the Sea Beast has found decking and a cockpit. The Felicity Ann has most of her planking, and the Folkboat won an admirable white oak transom. And then we spent time steaming and bending timbers. Who said we sleep up here in the sawdust kingdom?

In the Rubb Shelter the Whitehall teams are proving the craftsperson skills we learned in that first quarter and are about to meet Oliver. (He’s cranky…just my head’s up.) Down in contemporary, half the submarine looks like epoxy wizards are ready to roll. (I still have to figure out the pram they are working on…more to follow.)   And in the Westrem…? Well, a lot of lofting and crafting of all the bits and pieces that make up anything that floats.

And so goes another week here at the Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding. If you thought this was all work and no fun, keep in mind a colleague, his wife and I had the chance to sail last Sunday and are looking forward to much more time afloat. Imagine the scenery when the clouds blow out and the strait opens to fair winds and following seas. Kind of like thinking of pancakes when you make same with an intention to make people happy—always fun when the work is done.
 
 

eri profile

 
 

Eric Anderson is a retired Air Force officer who can be found puttering
in his shop when not scribbling on the keyboard.  A new resident of
Port Townsend, he is an avid sailor, struggling carpenter, and would-be writer.

 

 

 

 

 

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Week 14: One Step at a Time

Maybe it was in second grade (I don’t remember kindergarten or first grade; a real shame), as at least one author has made a fortune by claiming to have learned everything necessary for life during that first year of exposure to a public education. (Think I’m kidding? Ask the local librarian for a copy of Everything I Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten first published in 1986.) Anyway, back in second grade I was told everything had to be done one step at a time. We’re  certainly at that stage here in week 14 of the Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding.

 

One of the things that becomes apparent as the Class of 2016 moves along is the Jedi masters—aka instructors—provide much more space for completion of our own mistakes. In other words, that measurement you missed, the bevel not quite right, or lofting that made no sense, well, now you get to try it out and then spend time fixing an original error. Hence the temptation to make every cut more than a little wide of that precious pencil mark. It’s a lot easier to sand or work with a plane than trying to figure out how you will add wood back onto a beam that just does not make the mark. This is where some of us get to be jealous of the contemporary students. They really do know how to adhere materials back onto a miss-cut plank. (Epoxy, the magic elixir for boatbuilders). Alas, I am a knuckle-dragger (a large craft student) where we don’t get access to epoxy, just the band saw or a planer. Not that this is a bad thing. Thanks to Mr. Edison’s contribution of electricity, we are now attacking 30 foot planks. For those tasks we have a stable of band saws and “Oliver.”

Have I introduced “Oliver?

IMG_1167

 

Welcome to an industrial planer. Oliver likely came to life sometime in the early 1950s. Located on the leeward side of the Rubb Shelter, Oliver lives in a lean-to shed that keeps him dry while allowing for extrusion of endless sawdust and shavings. I know this because large craft students don’t get dainty planks and indoor work spaces. We are condemned to a life of timber loads delivered aboard semi-trucks and only transported about the work space with a lot of manual labor. As a result, we spent all Friday afternoon keeping Oliver busy by taking $8,700 of Douglas Fir from 1 ¼ inch to 5/8 inch. This is no minor undertaking, particularly when many of the planks are over 30 feet long and 14 inches wide and need to go through Oliver five times. My gym trip is rendered moot with my workout coming from chasing a lot of timber through Oliver and then cleaning up the subsequent mess. Fifteen industrial-sized garbage bags filled with shavings to be exact. I, and my fellow culprits, will smell like Douglas Fir for more than a few days.

Why all this labor? Because we’re planking a Folkboat!

 

 Meanwhile, elsewhere in our Boat School world, the contemporary team has put its first round of epoxy into the Handy Billy and are starting to put planks on the submarine mold. Oh, and Jedi master Bruce Blatchley has a skiff that looks ready to launch, but more on that in a moment.

IMG_4210[1]Up in the Rubb Shelter, Jedi master Leigh O’Connor is leading a charge on the pair of Whitehalls and has a sailing skiff thinking about splashing into the Pacific. The cold and rain have not slowed his team. They persevere and are crafting elements of their boats at an amazing pace. Apparently working in unheated spaces really does cause an increase in productivity.

Thinking of heated spaces, the small-craft crew is “building in heated luxury” (just kidding, it gets damn cold in there too) in the Westrem building working hard on lofting an 18′ runabout. Only the contemporary students live in warmth, something about the epoxy needing to set that swirls into more science than I am going to understand. It’s going to be interesting to see what rolls out of that shop come Spring.

And with that we come to the end of week 14—one step at a time. You must have the right lofting to build, the right timber milled to appropriate dimensions to plank, and the right surface and temperature to epoxy. But! You also need to know when it’s time to sit back and appreciate a finished product. And so we did, on Friday when Jedi master Ben Kahn splashed his team’s drift boat into the Pacific. Looks nothing like the other skiffs but serves the same purpose: Water stays out and occupants get to wander the other 70% of our planet’s surface.

One step, one step at a time.

My second grade teacher was right but it only took me 48 years to realize the wisdom of her lesson.
 

 
 

eri profile
 
 
Eric Anderson is a retired Air Force officer who can be found puttering
in his shop when not scribbling on the keyboard.  A new resident of
Port Townsend, he is an avid sailor, struggling carpenter, and would-be writer.

 
 
 
 

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Marking 35 Years of Teaching

 

January 2016 marks the 35th year of the Boat School!

To commemorate this milestone we journey back to November 1982 when the Boat School campus was located at the Port Townsend Boat Haven and the first student built boat was launched.

The Charity Ann was a 28-foot working tug built on commission and was a replica of one used for many years by the owner’s family. It took a year and a half to complete and was built of fir, iron bark, red cedar, and redwood.