Here are a few photos of the first steps in building a wooden 16 foot sharpie sailing boat. First the wood for the chines, inwales, and keel are jointed and planed to thickness. Here I’m checking them for square and straightness.

Then I have to mark out the frames on the sheets of half inch plywood. I nested the frames as best I could on the sheets to reduce wastage. This was fairly easy to do as as the sharpie hull shape is very economical with materials. One of the reasons that it has remained a very popular traditional hull form. Perhaps more boats should be flat bottomed wooden boats. Of course more boats should be wooden boats. Then the frames had to be cut out with a hand circular saw and a guide rail. I did use a jigsaw in some locations but the circular saw is much quicker and leaves a straighter cut.

Well that’s all you are getting to see so far. We actually seem to be having some Summer weather here in Ireland for the first time in years and it is getting very very hard to stay in the workshop and not just go sailing.

Roeboats, Ballydehob, Co. Cork, t:+353 (0)28 38973 m: +353 (0)86 158 69 37 e:roeboats@ymail.com

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