My first home-made boat

Background

Fishing and camping has always been something that my family has done at least a few times a year. In previous years, we have gone in 2-man (they say 3, but they lie) blow-up boats. After any bit of use at all, they start to leak both air and water (so you end up sitting in a puddle). At a cost of $40+ (I don't remember exactly how much they were), it's not something that I would want to replace every time we go camping.

This year, my Dad and I decided that we would like to be a little more comfortable, with more space to sit/move, and drier clothes. After looking around at prices for used boats, where a cheap one runs about $300, we decided that we could make our own. How hard could that be?

As we are both internet junkies, we set out in search of references and plans for building boats. After a bit of research into stich-and-glue building, I decided to look at some older plans (1890-1950). I thought that they may be a little easier, and a whole lot less expensive, as there should be no need to coat the entire boat in epoxy or tape up and fill in the gaps/joints with fiberglass and more epoxy.

My searching led me to an odd little beauty of a boat which the author named "Wheelie Willie." Basically, it was a floating box with a wheel added so that it could be carted around like a wheelbarrow. It was very simple, and fairly small (8'x3'x12"). As such, it could be made for very little cost, and fit into the back of a truck. After showing this one to my Dad, we decided that this could make a good beginner boat.

Here's the original pages that I found, and I even created some thumbnail images for your viewing pleasure. I have not modified the full-sized images in any way. They are the same quality as I found them (the text on page 3 is a little ugly, but still readable). I have no clue what the original publication was that these came from, but if anyone has an idea, I'd like to know (for interest, and proper credit), so you can email me (see bottom of this page).

Design

Primary design decisions came from a few factors:

• Cost -- It had to be made mostly from materials that we already had available. The original plans asked for 3/4" solid wood for almost everything except the seats and the chines (the bottom was planked), and we figured that was a little heavy, and thinner plywood would do a similar job.
• Stability -- The original plans were a little narrow, and it looks a little bit tippy (if you lean to a side). We wanted it to be a little more stable than that, so it had to be wider.
• Comfort -- After fishing with my brother in his 8 foot boat, I thought it would be nice if the seats were higher (less pain in the knees), and the sides were higher (less likely to have water spill over the side, and leaning over a little won't swamp it).

Supplies:

• Wood
  After digging through most of our supply of plywood, I found a few sheets of 1/4", a near-full sheet of 1/2", a near-full sheet of 3/8", and some useable scraps of 3/8", 1/2", and 3/4". I figured that between that and about five or six 2x4s, we should have enough wood to make a decent variant of "Willie".
• Paint
  As luck would have it, we happened to have a gallon of exterior, oil-based, porch and deck enamel paint (slightly off-white). Sounded good enough to us to seal the joints and seal the wood.
• Nails (screws)
  The original plans called for 2 pounds of galvanized nails, which would be bent on the inside of the boat to pull the joints tight. We decided that screws would hold it tighter, and leave the boat much cleaner (no sharp objects inside the boat). Not knowing how many we would need (I was guessing about 300), I bought a 5 pound box of screws (which should have been about 750 screws), costing around $12.50.
• Handles
  Searching for some form of decent handle at the local hardware store turned up a big blank. They had no screen-door handles (as asked for in the original plans), and the cuppboard handles that were the closest match were $4.50 each (we'd need 4 of them). As that seemed a little pricy, we decided that a couple of eye-bolts with rope between them would do just as good a job, and with nuts and washers, they only cost about $1 a piece ($4 for the set).
• Wheel
  The author made his own wheel, but we'd prefer something a little less wobbily, so we'd need to get a small tire or lawnmower wheel to do the job. We haven't got one yet (we can always attach it later), but I have priced it at about $6 for the wheel, and probably $2 or $3 for the needed hardware to attach it (a rod, to which we can add threads, and a couple nuts/washers).

Real design work
The width of the boat was pretty much fixed by the 1/2" plywood we used as a base (it was cut to about 42 inches). The length, we had a little more flexibility with (we were planning 8 feet, but shortened it just about 7'6", to trim off some bad portions of wood). The height of the boat was determined by comfort (sitting at 14-17 inches is fairly easy on the knees), and waterline. As our estimate of total weight for three passengers, gear, and the boat was about 800 pounds, our waterline was calculated (by the "Chine Hull Designer" program) to be about 5 inches. As we needed some room above the seats (so we wouldn't feel like we were falling out), and we assumed that we needed at least 13 inches from the top of the boat to the waterline, we decided to make the boat 20 inches high.

Construction
Construction of the boat happened over about a 3 day operiod (a total of about 6 to 8 hours of actual construction time). Most of this time was spent measuring, remeasuring, ripping 2x4s down to about 1.5 inches, and gluing any joints of wood-on-wood with some paint before we screwed them together. I guess there isn't much more to be said about that, except for the fact that I didn't get any pictures of this process. There was a bunch more time spent on painting (mostly the outside), but I have no clue how much time was actually spent. For fun, I weighed the boat, and it measured about 122 pounds (with seats).

Testing

After allowing the boat to dry for about a week (the oil-based paint stayed sticky for quite a while), we decided to test it, even though we hadn't completed painting it (the inside only had 1 coat, and was partially grey, because we ran out of the white). Since we spent quite a while trying to convince people that the boat would actually work, we had a few spectators for our first test (and cameras).

Placing the boat in the water, we found that it -- TADA -- really floated. Hehe. It seems I wasn't over confident at all. We did, however, notice a slow leak in the front of the boat (which we later pointed out to be a crack caused by either our dropping it to put it in the water, or cramming it into the truck).

All that's left, is to show some pictures to document the test:

Our boat, and my brother's boat, loaded in his truck. A cat happened to sneak into this picture.	Arriving at the pond we were using to test the boat.	The boat, after we placed it in the water.
My Dad, checking a slow leak.	My brother, as he didn't believe that the boat would work, had to go in his own.	My brother in his boat, with my Mom and sister (neither of whom believed that it would work) in/by the blue car. We don't know the kid playing in the water.
After proving that the boat worked, we tried a little fishing, with no luck.	The sun, as it was starting to set on our test.	Still falling in the sky.
It's gone now.	Packing the boat back in the truck.	The reason we had a slow leak (the crack). It wasn't leaking very fast for how large the crack was (must be a fairly decent seal inside). Notice that we picked up a few dings and scratches too.
A top view of the boat.	A top view of the boat.	A bottom view of the boat.
A bottom view of the boat.

Todo

• Finish painting the boat, and seal up the crack with a good amount of paint. We'll have to wait a few days to do this, as it has to dry out really good.
• Add a wheel. We will probably just screw it into the keel (the board on the bottom), so that we don't have to seal around more screws through the bottom.
• License the boat, so that we can put a motor on it. I'll either buy a small trolling motor, or borrow my brothers 5hp motor that he uses on his.
• Build another boat. The next one I build will cost quite a bit more than this, as it'll be stitched and glued (fiberglass tape, epoxy, and all). It should be a bit easier to paddle through the water than this box (a more conventional design), but this box was a lot easier to paddle than I expected.

Contact

If for some reason you need to contact me, you can reach me at kpReMOvEthISharris@users.sourceforge.net, remembering to remove the 'removethis' portion.

Go back to Kevin's Project Page.

Revision History:
07May2002 Created this page, wrote some verbage, added the pictures of the test, and the original 'willie' pictures.