Grab some thwart!

Ok, not much of a post today. I did manage to finish up the gunnels and carved out a thwart for the unfinished canoe. I ran into a source of 7/8" thick maple and used it to make a substantial, beautiful thwart. Of course it needs to be sanded.... everything needs to be sanded... sheesh!

The final punch list is still a mile long, but progress is being made....

Inwales

I was really worried that the hull of this canoe wasn't going to straighten out when I installed the inwales. When I started this project the hull came to me without the forms so the sides were pretty floppy. In fact it had some interesting waves along the side.

I used a 7/8 x 3/4 inch inwale to give a lot of rigidity to the hull and everything smoothed out nicely. Scuppers were cut at 4" wide by a 1/4" deep, about 8 to a side. Should have plenty of wood to hang the seats from.

Shop Improvement

I picked up this vintage radial arm saw, and let me tell you these babies take up quite a bit of room! But it provides reach and angles and accuracy not possible with my old chop saw. Next project with this saw it to cut scuppers on the in-wales for the unfinished canoe. I installed the old trusty dado blade set up at an inch and will nibble out 4" scuppers on a 12" centers the length of the in-wales with the exception of 32" on either end for tapers. Problem to be fixed was in-feed and out-feed tables at the height of the saw platform... sheesh nothing is ever easy! But I got it done and am ready to start cutting....

Smooooth

Its so smooth you can see it.....