Above is a photo of the mock up we did for the cabin. It’s a quick and immediate way of developing the look and sizes for the boat layout. The client was able to view the proposed cabin from all angles. The piece of wood sticking up in front of the cabin is a crude stand in for the mast. The cabin is deliberately quite small as the boat will be mostly used for day sailing.

Once the the deck had been covered in plywood it received a layer of fiberglass cloth and epoxy. This will help to keep the plywood dry and add abrasion resistance to the deck. I used peel ply over the glass so that I could get all of the epoxy on in one go (instead of three seperate coats) and it would protect the epoxy while it cured.

Here’s the cabin sides and coach roof framing going into the boat. The openings will have beveled glazing and fielded mahogany panels in the forward part. You can see the peel ply along the deck edge.

Here’s the bulkhead going in. Like the cabin sides and coaming it’s mahogany and the panels are plywood and will be a nice contrast once they’re varnished and have mellowed in the sun.

If you would like to have your own boat restored, repaired or built don’t hesitate to contact me, Tiernan Roe, you can call me at +353 86 1586937 or by email or use  the contact page.

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

Here’s some photos of the deck construction of Lady Min. The beams were dovetailed to the sheer clamp and the side decks were also dovetailed to the carlin.

The dovetails were cut before shaping the beams to their final curve of the deck. This allowed me to use a trammel to describe the required curve of each beam. To make the deck fair each curve is slightly different and using the trammel ensures the amount of work needed to fair the deck is reduced. The trammel is two long planks fixed at a predetermined angle which rests on the sheer as a pencil is held at the intersection of the planks. As this is drawn across the boat the pencil describes a portion of an ellipse which creates the deck crown.

Above the carlin is being fastened in place. The beams are spruce with oak beams in way of the mast and aft end of the cockpit.

Once th edeck beams and hanging knees were made and fitted, the plywood for the deck sheathing was coated with three coats of epoxy, primed and painted, where needed, before being fastened down to the deck beams.

The plywood was scarfed together to ensure that the deck would act as a monocoque structure and stiffen the entire boat. You can see the scrafed edge of the ply in the photo above. The penny washers and screws were replaced with stainless screws once the epoxy joins had set.

If you would like to have your own boat restored, repaired or built don’t hesitate to contact me, Tiernan Roe, you can call me at +353 86 1586937 or by email or use  the contact page.

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

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Link here if player doesn’t work

For those of you who may have missed it Lady Min and Roeboats were featured on RTE radio’s maritime programmed Seascapes on the 1st of November. The section on Lady Min starts around 9:30 and my interview starts around 18.18.

If you would like to have your own boat restored, repaired or built don’t hesitate to contact me, Tiernan Roe, you can call me at +353 86 1586937 or by email or use  the contact page.

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

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Is the planking finished? Well all the planks are now on, so I suppose you could say yes. Just the small matter of fairing and caulking to be done. As expected the shutter planks were slow to fit as they had to be tight which meant getting them in and out for final fitting was a bit of a palaver as there’s no real way to clamp them. I had to resort to a few judiciously placed bolts to get them to pull into shape.

Once all the planks were on I was dying to get the inside primed and undercoated to see how she looked. After many hours of tedious preparation sanding and cleaning I was able to finally paint the inside. This made the whole boat look much better.

Mind you if I thought the sanding of the inside was tedious it was child’s play compared to fairing the planking. To be fair the planking was fairly fair all over, it did of course require shaping at each of the seams where the sharp edges of the new planking met the older already rounded older planking and at the turn of the bilge where the planking was extra thick to allow for shaping of the tighter radius here. I’m not finished the fairing yet. It’s pretty hard work working a hand plane on your knees as all the power has to come from your shoulders as opposed to your whole body when using a plane standing up. I must be getting old. I’ve also given the stem it’s final profile so it doesn’t look like a battering ram on an ancient galley.

That’s all for now, if you would like to have your own boat restored, repaired or built don’t hesitate to contact me, Tiernan Roe, you can call me at +353 86 1586937 or by email or use  the contact page.

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

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Here’s more photos of the West Cork daysailor that I’ve been working off and on over the last couple of months.  The decks are now off and work is beginning on removing the old floors and frames.

The new frames are now being steamed into place and will be held to the planking with temporary fastenings.

This is the start of making the new floors. I’ve increased the molding on these a little to increase their stiffness. The ones I removed had been curved on the top, I presume to increase headroom in the cabin, it made them rather flexible and created a weakness in the ends.

That’s all for now if you’d like to see more photos I’ll be updating the blog over the coming months. Or if you’re in the West Cork region this weekend (21-22) the Glandore Classic boat summer school is on and I’ll be giving a talk about progress so far. Hope to see you there.

If you’d like to have your own boat restored, repaired or custom built for you don’t hesitate to contact me, Tiernan Roe, +353 861586937 or use the contact page.

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

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Here’s a look at the latest project here at Roeboats. She is a 30′ long, on deck,  Gaff Cutter designed and built in Schull in 1902 by the present owners Great Grandfather. Unusually for this area, and the time she was built, she has a fin keel. Over her first hundred years she had quite a reputation as a fast boat, winning many races against better known boats such as the William Fife designed Cork Harbour One Designs.

The first order of business was to get the keel off her and move her to a more accessible position. The second goal was to get the ill fitting and ugly coach roof off her. Luckily most of her Hickory backbone timber and Canadian Red Pine planking is in reusable condition. She had been originally framed with sawn Hickory frames but was later reframed with steam bent oak. Both the frames and floors are not original and will be replaced with new.

As you can see from the bent bolts of the whisker stay plate this boat was raced hard. I found bent and strained fittings throughout and the oakum caulking that was used on her was up to 1/2″ wide on the inside of the planking. One would hope when building a boat that the planks would be touching on the inside. This gives a very good idea of how she was slowly torn apart over the years. She was still winning races. It’s pretty hard to beat a flat sterned boat with a massive mainsail downwind. The new owner is hoping to show his fellow competitors  how it’s done.

This is a long term project so expect to see updates sporadically in the future. If you would like your family heirloom built, repaired or restored don’t hesitate to contact me, Tiernan Roe, +353 86 158 6937 or you can use the contact form or email.

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

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Well here’s how the micro-cruiser looked just before she was finished. Unfortunately for some reason I don’t have any photos of the boat when she was completed. Unfortunately the client passed away soon after he took delivery and I don’t think he ever got to sail her. You can read his obituary here, he was a very interesting guy and a great client. The raised deck really increased the livability of the interior. I was also very impressed with the cleverness of the Junk rig. We set it up, to position blocks etc., in the yard before delivery.

So what else was I up to over the last while. Well quite a lot actually. Above is an 1930s Swedish launch that I look after and last spring we took the windscreen off and refinished the deck, It had been covered in a textured palstic coveing sometime in the distant past and this was now lifting and shabby looking. When I peeled it off it revealed a deck made of three massive planks of mahogany. It had looked like plywood from underneath as the seams were covered. After a few repairs to a couple of spots of rot she was received 8 coats of varnish all over.

I’ll have more about what’s going on here at Roeboats in coming posts so that’s all for now. If you’d like to discuss having your own boat built, repaired or restored don’t hesitate to contact me, Tiernan Roe, +353 86 1586937.

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

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Here’s more progress with the exterior panels now cut and shaped they were dry fitted for client approval and in preparation for glueing.

All of the parts were epoxy coated and painted on the inside before assembly. They’ll get a final coat once the interior is finished. It’s hell of a lot easier to do the painting now as opposed to inside the boat.

If you would like to have your own beautiful wooden boat built, repaired or restored please don’t hesitate to contact me on +353 86 1586937 or you can email or to ensure I receive your enquiry use the contact form.

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

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Out came the skil saw and off came the cabin sides and top. We’re keeping the sliding hatch and grab handles which will save a good bit of work. The cabin will also be shortened by about 18″ or so.

Here’s a quick mock up of how the new sheer will look when the remodelling is finished. The forward raised section will be a well for an anchor and give good footing for working on the foredeck.

Above the new framing is being dry fitted before it gets epoxy coated and glued into position. The old side deck will now become and internal shelf and the overall feel inside the cabin will be much less constrained.

If you would like to have your own boat remodelled, restored or perhaps a new one custom built for you don’t hesitate to contact me, Tiernan Roe, at +353 86 1586937. You can also email me or use the contact page form to ensure that your message isn’t lost in cyberspace.

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

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