Canoe Building 101 - A journal

[Terry Beeson]

Wooden boat building journal:

Day 1 – Well, this is it. I decided to build a wooden boat. I got the plans in the mail today that I ordered from a website. The Finias Fisherman Five Thousand is just the boat for me! Exactly to my specifications. Big enough and roomy enough to carry me and all my stuff, but small enough to be agile and stealthy.

Tonight I’m just looking over the plans and getting my shopping list to go by the local Lowe’s to pick all the stuff up I need on my way home from work tomorrow. At first I thought this was going to be a lot more expensive than I had calculated when I bought the plans and more than what the designer had estimated the costs to be, but after a six-pack of Bud, the list looks much better and well within my new budget!

I can’t wait to get it on the water and try it out!!! Look out fish!!

Day 2 – Finally got home at 8:30pm after traveling to two Lowe’s, a Home Depot, three Meeks, and an independent lumber yard to find all the things I need to finish my boat. It was funny how the guy at the first Lowe’s said he had everything on my list, but come to find out he doesn’t know Walnut from White Pine.

I finally settled on some really nice genuine Norwegian Birch plywood that the guy at the independent lumber yard said he had ordered for a customer who didn’t pick it up. He let me have it at a real deal, too! I just can’t figure out why he had it stored behind the shed in the very back of the lot by some old paint cans and pallets. Funny too how genuine Norwegian Birch is dark gray in color. I’m not sure if those rust streaks from the rebar and reinforcement wire stacked on top of it will be easy to get off, but hey… $15 for three sheets of plywood is not a bad deal in my opinion.

I didn’t have time to do any actual work on the boat tonight. After all that shopping and those two six-packs of Bud, I was pretty tired.

But I can’t wait to get it on the water and try it out!!! Look out fish!!

Day 3 – Ready to go at it for real tonight! I got all my plywood laid out on the garage floor and put the plans down to draw the lines for sawing. It was only then, and after 4 beers, that I realized I will need more than a circular saw to do the job right. So it was back to Lowe’s again for more shopping. Better pack the other two beers and another six-pack for the trip just to be sure.

Well, Lowe’s didn’t have the jig saw I wanted. The guy in that department recommended I go to Sears and look at their jig saws. But I didn’t like any of them either. I finally went by Joe’s Tool Store and caught Joe just as he was about to close shop for the day. He agreed to open long enough to buy a saw. I settled on the one he recommended – the DeWalt Super Duty 2000. It was hard to justify $1,200 for a jig saw, but Joe’s explanation of all the things I could do with it after finishing the boat along with the extra 7 Buds (I gave Joe one for staying open for me) convinced me I could never do without such a fine piece of equipment.

I’ll get to the actual work on the boat tomorrow night for sure. I can’t wait to get it on the water and try it out!!! Look out fish!!

Day 4 – Well, the wife says if I don’t hurry up and get the boat built or at least get the garage where she can park her car in it again, I’m going to need to build a dog house out of the scraps to live in. So I spent most of the night rearranging the garage, tools, and equipment where she could get the car inside. The fact that she has to get out on the passenger side did not seem to make her happy, but hey… The car is in the garage.

I had to go back to Lowe’s again tonight. I found that it would be much faster to sand the boat with a power sander rather than trying to do it all by hand. And does that genuine Norwegian Birch tend to splinter! This time Lowe’s had just what I needed. Mission accomplished!

Oh… By the way. While I was there, I found this wonderful beer keg cooler and tap that will fit nicely in the corner of the garage. I figure I will save enough money buying beer by the keg instead of in cans to pay for the Kegmeister Kool 1000. And besides, the taste of that cold beer fresh from the tap really hits the spot!

I finally got the top edge of one side of my new boat cut out! I’m a bit disappointed in the DeWalt Super Duty 2000 jig saw. After cutting that line, I noticed the saw had traveled back and forth across my line. I know it was the saw, because I only had one cup of beer. I would only refill it after it got down to one-third full and that was just to cool it back down. I really like my beer cold.

Good thing I got that power sander. At least I can sand down the edges to the line I drew and then glue the sawdust from that back to the edge where the board was cut on the other side of the line.

GLUE! Dang it! Lowe’s closes in fifteen minutes. If I hurry, I can get the other side cut as well.

This is going to be SOME BOAT! I can’t wait to get it on the water and try it out!!! Look out fish!!

Day 5 – After looking things over, I decided that before I do anything else to the boat itself, I need to build a couple of sawhorses to set the boat on while I work on it. All this bending over and holding this plywood up to saw and sand is making the blood rush to my head. After a few cups of beer this can be very distracting and I can’t seem to concentrate on working on the boat after that. Sawhorses will be just the thing.

Since there are no 2x4s in my garage and my wife nixed any attempt to remove drywall and use some of the studs in the wall of any part of the house, I have to return to Lowe’s for a few more pieces of lumber to make the sawhorses. I better take a couple of cups of beer for the trip. Those 64 ounce Big Gulp cups make fine beer mugs!

While in the 2x4 section of Lowe’s, one of the fine young men who works there inquired as to what my project was. When I told him about my wooden boat dreams, he seemed really impressed. I mean, after all, he did stand their and listen to me tell him all about it for 45 minutes. Then he asked about the 2x4s and recommended that instead of that, I should look at the sawhorses that were already made and ready to use. This would certainly make sense in that taking time to build my own would take time from building the boat itself! And we all know that time IS money.

So now I have four brand new Stanley Super Duper Duty 200 sawhorses. But then I stopped at Sears on the way home and found the neatest thing to go along with the sawhorses. So I also have a Craftsman Double Jointed Clamping Adjustable Folding Work Table to accent the sawhorses. That will help keep the wood pieces I’m sanding from flying off and hitting things in the garage like my wife’s car.

Now that boat is REALLY going to be built right! I can’t wait to get it on the water and try it out!!! Look out fish!!

Day 6 – I intended to work most of the day (Saturday) on the boat, but the wife insisted that before I could work on it, I had to mow and trim the yard, vacuum the house, and fold and put up all my clothes she was washing. That put off any work on the boat until the afternoon. Good thing she didn’t see that dent in the side of her car from the flying piece of wood I was sanding last night before I went to Lowe’s. I wouldn’t get ANY work done on the boat today.

But before I could even start the motor, I checked the beer supply and found the keg was all but empty. I don’t understand how that happened unless Earl, my next door neighbor, discovered the keg while I was at Lowe’s. I’ll ask him about that when I get back from the beer store. Unhooking the keg, making the beer run, and hooking up the new keg is going to postpone my project even longer.

As I pulled in the driveway back from the beer run, Earl was walking across to see what project I was up to. He seemed surprised at my new beer tap, but I wonder if that was just to camouflage the fact that he had drank almost a full keg of my beer in the past couple of days. He did help me unload and hook up the new fresh keg and even helped me sample a cup before getting to work on the yard.

And after I got my chores done, Earl helped me get the two sides cut out for the boat. He works hard when there is beer involved. And the more beer, the more he seems to work. Of course, it seems we would have gotten a lot more work done with all the beer we drank. But then there was all that sanding and gluing to repair the edge of the cuts where the saw is still moving back and forth. That genuine Norwegian Birch seems to take a lot of glue, too. We ran out just as we got the second side finished. Earl volunteered to take me by Lowe’s on our way back from fishing. All that work has got us needing a break. Of course loading the beer tap in the back of Earl’s pickup and hooking it up to an AC/DC converter took a lot of time as well.

But the sides of the boat are done! I can’t wait to get it on the water and try it out!!! Look out fish!!

Day 7 – The wife insists no work on the boat today. It’s Sunday and she wants to relax and take an afternoon nap and does not want any of the usual noise coming from the garage to disrupt that sleep. After she drifted off, I managed to sneak out to get a beer from the tap. Those sides just begged for more gluing and sanding, so I decided to glue some more gaps and a little light hand sanding. No noise, you know.

During this, I realized that sawdust from genuine Norwegian Birch mixed with Gorilla Glue looks a lot like that Bondo stuff they use to fix dents in auto bodies. So, I thought I’d give it a try on the dent in my wife’s car and save some time and money. Well, it works pretty good. Now all I have to do is wait for it to dry, sand it with my new power sander, and then put a couple coats of Krylon on it and she’ll never know! I’ll have to wait until her nap is over so I can run the sander. She’ll think I’m just working on the boat.

By the way, the boat is coming along nicely! I can’t wait to get it on the water and try it out!!! Look out fish!!

Day 8 – My new Craftsman Double Jointed Clamping Adjustable Folding Work Table came in really handy today. You see, I draped a tarp over it and placed it up close to my wife’s car right next to the dent I’m fixing. She never noticed it as she got in the passenger side door to go to work this morning! I’ve never spent a better $379 in my life! That work table is GREAT!

Of course, when I got home from work, I didn’t get to spend a lot of time on the boat since I was sanding and painting my wife’s car door. It turned out pretty good! As long as she doesn’t wash it, I don’t think she’ll notice the little specks of sawdust and bubbles from the glue foam showing through the paint or the difference in colors. It could be all that beer he drank talking, but Earl thinks my wife’s car is more of an egg shell white rather than glossy white. Maybe I should run to Lowe’s and pick up some more Krylon and paint the whole door just in case.

We did get the bottom for the boat marked out by the plan before I had to leave for Lowe’s. We’ll cut it out tomorrow night.

I did discover something tonight. Fifteen cups of Bud plus 8 cans of Krylon egg shell white paint will make you really drowsy and sleepy. No more work on the boat tonight. I’m going to bed and dream of my new wooden boat! ! I can’t wait to get it on the water and try it out!!! Look out fish!!

Day 9 – I thought that was my wife’s car on the back of that tow truck I met down the street. I pulled in my driveway with two cop cars parked in front of my house and my wife talking to one of the officers as another searched around the garage. Seems she discovered that apparently vandals had trashed the passenger rear door of her car while it was in the garage! She discovered the vandalism when she moved the Craftsman work bench when she wanted to use it to pot some flowers. darn teenage kids! I bet it was those two kids down the street that are always riding skate boards and looking really suspicious. And after all that work I did on that door to get it looking so good!

Well, with all the commotion and giving statements to the police, I didn’t get to work much on my boat. Only got to do a bit of sanding and got the bottom cut out. Did run into a slight problem. The bottom is not matching up to the sides! That darn saw. I’m thinking about taking it back. I may just do that on my way to the beer store. The keg is empty again! That darn Earl!

Not to worry, though. A bit of sanding and some glue and I’ll get those sides to fit just fine! I just hope 2 gallons of Gorilla Glue will be enough. But the main thing is to get this beauty built and ready to fish! ! I can’t wait to get it on the water and try it out!!! Look out fish!!

Day 10 – Well, I was about to start cutting the braces for the boat when Earl pulled up in the driveway. Behind his pickup was none other than a trailer with wooden boat on it! It was just like the one I was building. Over several cups of cold Bud, Earl told me he had told a coworker about my project at lunch. Seems this fellow had built this boat in his garage and finished it only a couple of months ago. He took the boat out a couple of times but had decided to build a different one and sell this one.

He invited Earl to come and take a look after work and Earl made him an offer for the fine piece of craftsmanship. As we drank a few more beers, I carefully looked over the craft taking mental notes to help me in my endeavor to make one of my own. It was perfect! I wanted my boat to be exactly like this one!

So now I have my boat! A perfect Finias Fisherman Five Thousand!! Big, roomy, agile, and stealthy. And it only cost me a DeWalt Super Duty 2000 jig saw, a Kegmeister Kool 1000 with an empty keg, four Stanley Super Duper Duty 200 sawhorses, a Craftsman Double Jointed Clamping Adjustable Folding Work Table, half a can of Krylon egg shell white paint, and two gallons of Gorilla Glue! I even threw in a pile of genuine Norwegian Birch plywood scraps!

I can’t wait to get it on the water and try it out!!! Look out fish!!

At least now I can steal Earl’s beer.

[gonefishin]

I had to go get a beer before I finished reading that. I figured if I read to fast you wouldn't be done typing before I got it read. I gotta kno tho have you been peeking in my garage???? :D

[Danoinark]

What do they say...the best times are the day you get the boat, and the day you get rid of it?

[Flysmallie]

Beeson I think you are picking on me!! You have too much time on your hands. And by the way you have screwed up my progress for tonight.

If you get bored come on by, I'll let you use the jig saw and there is plenty of beer.

[Terry Beeson]

Ronnie... How much Gorilla Glue have you got on hand? If I come help, you may have to stock up...