Duckworks Magazine - One-Sheet Baby Canoe Part 3

One-Sheet Baby Canoe Part 3

By Gaetan Jette - Sherbrooke, Canada

Construction Continues

Last time, the hull took shape and work on the paddles progressed. But the boat building still has a long way to go.

Time to complete the inside fillets where the frame once was. A second layer of tape is then applied on each side of the keel, overlapping the first layer.

That new tape along the keel and the chine fillets are then faired with thickened epoxy.

There were a few air bubbles in the stem inside fillets. I drilled a small hole at the top and bottom of each bubble. I then poured clear epoxy with a dropper through the top hole, till the cavity was filled. Not as strong as thickened epoxy, but better than a void.

I cut a 2x6 into half-inch thick slices for use as gunwales. The process left me with thinner slices, some a quarter-inch thick, some less. I used the 1/4-inch thick slices to laminate the curved seat braces.

Time to let go of that "Viking" look: a ruler is used to mark where the stems will be cut. (Nothing wrong with Viking ships: it's just not what I am building this time.)

With masking tape protecting the top plank, a hand saw is used to cut the stem.

A man never has too many clamps: I had to install the inwale spacers in several stages. Spring clamps are not the ideal choice for this. My epoxy batch was perhaps a little too thick for gluing: the wood blocks had a tendency to slip under the limited pressure of those clamps. I had to use two clamps on each piece. Even then the pressure was not perfectly even from block to block. This caused uneven thickness once the epoxy cured.


The top of the stem has to be trimmed, except for the tip. The breasthook will rest on the trimmed, inside portion of the stem. A cleat, extending beyond the stem, allows to do most of the trimming with a router. The cut is finished off with a chisel.

All regular inwale spacers are now in place.

The end of summer is here and everybody is asking when the boat is going to be finished.

The seat frame is assembled by using dowel pins. It is best to use a Forstner drill bit for the dowel holes: a regular twist drill bit will chip the perimeter of the hole a lot. I learned that the hard way.

The gunwale is installed in place, starting from the middle. That's what worked best on an earlier model of the boat. A dry fit is done first: spring clamps hold the gunwale while the screws are driven in place. This leaves you with screw holes that make for a speedier assembly the second time, once the epoxy has been spread. Screws are coated with beeswax so they can be removed once the epoxy has cured.

Screws could only be used where there were inwale spacers (they were driven right in the middle of those spacers). Clamps had to be used in the breasthook area.

To avoid a hull bent to one side, both gunwales have to be installed at the same time, before epoxy has set. In order to fit the second gunwale, the first gunwale has to be cut: anywhere in between the 2 lines shown here will do. The left line is the path that the second gunwale will follow. The right line, perpendicular to the boat length, is the shortest the gunwale can be cut.

A screw in the second gunwale helps to retain a cleat in place, giving the spring clamp something to hold on.

With no screws in the breasthook area, there is a risk that the gunwales will slip while the glue cures. It did so on the bow. If I were to do it again, I would add one more screw, with a temporary wood block on the inside.

An improvised jig is used to trim the tip of the gunwales with a router.


The tip of the gunwales is trimmed flush with the stem.


A round pattern is traced on top of the gunwale tips (a bottle cap of suitable size). The tip is then rounded freehand with a sanding block.

Weather was now too cold for epoxy work in my brother's shed. Time to move back at my workplace. Do I have an accommodating boss or what?


The breasthook is dry fitted and the cleats underneath are scribed for their final cut.

The final inwale spacers, cut at the proper angle, are glued in place. The angle in question is a vertical cut: a short flat spot on the bow stem allowed me to level the boat. Then I could mark those cuts using a small square with a built-in level.

The inwale spacers are one-half inch thick. The seat brackets are one-quarter inch thick, so a shim is needed where the seat brackets will be bolted. I glued quarter-inch thick blocks for that purpose. This proved tricky to work around when finishing . A quarter-inch thick rubber washer would have worked just as well without getting in the way while applying finish and sanding.

The center of the boat has to be braced to its final beam when dry fitting the breasthook.

The previous bracing would have got in the way when fitting the inwales, so a different approach is used next.

The temporary outwales used when doing the epoxy fillets are recycled and used as inwales. As a bonus, they are almost bent in shape.

The inwales are dry fitted and marked for the final cut.

Epoxy is applied and the inwales are screwed in place.

A notch is cut for the center cross brace. This brace is placed just behind the seat. The inwale spacer behind it is 3 inches long. All the other inwale spacers are 2 inches long.

The center cross brace is made up of several laminations, 1-1/2 inch wide, then rounded with a router using a half-inch rounding bit. This produces a very comfortable grip. The longer bottom section will sit against the bottom of the inwale. A loose-tongue joint is used for assembly. Two layers of plywood, taken from the plywood sheet waste area, form the tongue. The groove in the cross brace is routed with a quarter-inch bit. Since the tongue and groove don't go all the way to the top, they won't be visible (unless you are very curious!).

The seat brackets that will support the seat frame are made from one-inch wide, one quarter-inch thick aluminum bar. They are bent using a home-brew bending jig. The bar is bent around the 2-inch pipe, which is held in place with a few screws. Two flat bars act as levers, rotating a bed wheel that pushes against the aluminum bar. This worked... barely. The 2x4 supporting the bed wheel was twisting under tension, due to some play in the screw holes. L-shaped bars would have worked better.

It is hard to achieve a perfect 90-degree bend with the bending jig. It is possible to do small adjustments in a vise.

All the cross braces are now in place.

The breasthook cross braces are notched, so that the breasthook plate is supported all around. The width of that notch is chosen so that the visible portion of the cross brace is one-half inch thick, just like the gunwales, for a more harmonious look.

The breasthook plate is glued in place, using spring clamps.

This is how the completed bow (and stern) look.

Dry fitting the seat frame and brackets proved a little bit tricky. I first tried to prop everything in place by using shimming blocks under the seat frame.


I then built a jig, for easier testing and adjustment.

Once the gunwales were glued, the screws used during assembly were removed. Now, the screw holes are enlarged with a 3/8-inch Forstner bit. Dowel rod will then be set in those holes, for a more decorative look. Achieving perfect center alignment on both sides of the gunwales would be too difficult, if drilled through completely. Instead, I drilled through the outwale till I reached the plywood, then I drilled through the inwale, again stopping at the plywood. So two sections of dowel rod are needed to plug each pair of holes, but the result will look as if there is only one rod going right through.

The dowel rods have been cut a bit long and glued. The empty holes are for the seat bracket bolts.


A hand saw and some masking tape allow to trim the dowel ends as flush as possible, without damaging the gunwales.

Around this point, I was so fed up with sanding, I took a long break. It was also obvious that the boat would never be finished for Christmas. For most of December and January, I did practically no work on the boat.

The bow and stern area (inside) proved the most difficult part to sand smooth. I should either have used something wider when spreading the epoxy for these fillets, or made the stems narrower. This would have avoided that narrow groove that took forever to finish sanding. The inside of the breasthook was no picnic either. I was perhaps too perfectionist: I certainly cannot blame people who settle for a workboat finish.

It took much longer than expected, but now the hull is now ready for paint and varnish.

This is the type of bolts used for the seat brackets: they are called connector bolts, normally used for furniture. Because the gunwale is curved, the holes for these have to be recessed a bit for their large head to rest flat. The two bolts shown here have been gouged to become an exact fit cutting tool.

Varnishing the gunwales. I used a roll of wax paper to cover the sides.

After the paddle blades have been faired a first time, fiberglas cloth is wrapped around the edge of the blade to improve resistance to damage. Masking tape is used to ensure the cloth stays flat against the blade.

The fiberglas cloth has been covered with clear epoxy. A few wrinkles are unavoidable.

Areas of the cloth previously covered with masking tape did not absorb epoxy much. These have been cut off and a rough sanding removed any excessive bump.