Installing the Oarlocks

This afternoon we carried the pram back to the cellar so we could put the truck back in it's side of the garage. I have put three coats of paint on the inside and outside of the hull. We can work on finishing it up in the cellar. Since it was raining, John decided to install the oarlocks this afternoon. He ran into a little problem while drilling the very last hole in the last holder. He ran into one of the screws we used to fasten the gunwale rail onto the side of the boat. He managed to work out of the problem without need for any touch up work at all. Below, you see the two rowing stations and the seats lying in their places. They will not be fastened down until the keel has been installed on the bottom.

Last weekend, John cut out the keel piece and the rudder. I have been sanding and shaping the keel this week. I will put several coats of varnish on it before we install it on the bottom of the boat. We want to install the gunwale guard before we fasten on the keel because the boat will lie flat on the ladder frame now and it won't after the keel is installed.

First Outside Coat

This afternoon, I put the first coat of cream paint on the outside bottom. We decided we could mark a new center line on the bottom for the installation of the keel after the paint had dried. I was free to paint my three coats of cream. This is what the first one looked like.

Laying out the Keel

It being Labor Day, we decided to do some labor. We have been planning out how we would shape the keel for several weeks. We didn't want to experiment with the piece of mahogany we had for the finished keel, so we took a piece of left over 1/4" plywood for the shaping job.

We laid it along the bottom center line of the pram and using a block of wood with a felt tipped pen taped to it, we drew the curved bottom line on the piece of plywood.

Then we cut that line out with our saber saw.

We shaped the resulting curved cut so it fit along the bottom of the boat nicely. Next we clamped the pattern onto the piece of mahogany and made sure we had enough board to make the necessary depth for the keel. We drew our curved line on the mahogany and marked the points at which it had to be certain depths.

After removing our pattern, we used a compass to draw the curved aft end of the keel and then used one of our battens to draw the fared shape of the keel.

Now the keel is ready to cut out on a friend's band saw. Since we will have the use of the band saw, we decided to mark the shape of the rudder and cut that out also.

This may seem like an overly detailed explanation of the process, but if you (like us) are not an experienced boat builder it takes a little doing to figure out a way to accomplish the job. We also have not been able to find any guidance on the web or in the book. So, here is how we did it.

Some Progress

Just because there have been no recent posts doesn't mean there has been no progress on the pram. The three seats have received three coats of varnish and are ready to install. See below.

The inside has received three coats of cream colored paint. The knees have been varnished, but still need one more coat before they can be called "done". The going has been slow because painting has been a challenge this summer. Not only is time a problem, but the weather has been wet and the air has been damp. Not good drying conditions.

Last night I did the first coat of red on the shear strakes. I can't paint the whole bottom because we need the center line on the bottom to score the curved bottom line onto the piece of mahogany we have for the keel. Once we have that done, I can finish up the painting. Launching this year is beginning to look doubtful.

Painting the Inside

Yesterday, the pram came out of the cellar and into the garage where she will be painted. I fine sanded her all over and cleaned up all the dust until I could run my hand over the planks and only feel wood, no grit or dust. Tonight, I taped the knees which will be varnished and rolled on the first coat of cream colored paint. This is the first time I have ever rolled paint on a boat. It does a nice job. I tipped out the streaks made by the roller with a brush. I also used the brush to get the places the roller didn't.


The end product looks nice. I used Epifanes marine enamel. I will do three coats in the end. I plan to sand the first coat with 220 grit sandpaper and then not sand between the second and third coats.

Fitting The Seats

Yesterday wasn't a boating day, at least on the water boating. Since it was raining, again, we took the time to work on fitting the seats into the pram. John had brought some pieces of mahogany up from the mill to use for seats. We trimmed the edges first. Next we calculated the angle that each end would have to be cut to. Then the bow to stern angle. The picture below shows one end of the stern seat already cut and John marking the other end.

Here is the stern seat after cutting and placing.

We went on and used the same process for all three seats. The middle seat had to be fitted around the midships frame. The plans call for the middle seat to be removable to give the sailor more room to work while under sail. We will eventually take our middle seat out, plug the screw holes and make it removable. One thing I should add is that in the plans, it calls for the seat supports to be 1" on the support surface. In the hand drawn sheet which shows how to make the removable middle seat, it calls for two inch support surfaces. We found the size screws called for in the plans to fasten the seats would be way too big to fasten to the 1" supports. However, they probably would work with 2" supports.

Now we will sand out the seat surfaces and round over the edges before putting three coats of varnish on. After one more coat of epoxy and a lot of 220 grit sandpaper, we will finally be ready to paint the inside of the pram. Then we will fasten the seats into the boat.

Seat Supports

The next project on the pram was to create the seat supports. These are nothing more than blocks of wood about 8" long, fastened to the sides of the boat. The seats are laid on top of and screwed to these supports. We are using scrap pieces of mahogany for the supports. Our seats will be 1" by 8" mahogany. The seats are fashioned so that they may be removed for refinishing as needed over the life of the boat. We will varnish the mahogany seats and install them after the boat has been painted. We plan to just paint the supports and not fuss with varnish. Below, John is measuring the lengths before he cuts the small pieces to fit. After they are cut to length, we will have to sand and shape them to fall flat on the curved sides of the boat.

Last night, we went down to install the supports. We drew lines on the side of the boat to mark the proper positioning of each support and did final sanding to make them fit snug against the side of the boat. We carefully marked on each support where it's home would be (port stern, port middle etc.). Then we drilled the holes through the sides of the boat from the inside out using our positioning marks as guides. Below you see John countersinking each hole from the outside of the boat plank.

At this point, we discovered that we didn't have any of the proper sized screws left to fasten the supports to the side of the boat. Next we looked at the fasteners called for in the plans to secure the seats to the blocks and discovered they were way too big to do the job. So it was off to the computer to order another box of 1" #8 bronze flat head wood screws and some more appropriately sized screws for the seats.