The Stern-piece
The stern-piece can be fashioned out of two-inch pine boards, and may be made as wide or narrow as you choose. A narrow stern makes a trim-looking craft. With your saw cut off the corner of the tail-piece, so that it will be in the form of a blunted triangle ([Fig. 214]), measuring three feet ten and one-half inches across the base, three feet four inches on each side, and nine and one-half inches at the apex. The base of the triangle will be the top and the apex will be the bottom of the stern-board of your boat.
Diagrams showing the construction of the rough-and-ready.
Now make a brace on which to model your boat. Let it be of two-inch pine wood, two and one-half feet wide and seven and one-half feet long ([Fig. 207]). Measure twelve inches on one edge of this board from each end toward the centre and mark the points; then rule lines from these points diagonally across the width of the board (A, B and C, D—Fig. 207), and saw off the corners, as shown by the dotted line in [Fig. 207].
Lay the boards selected for the lower side-boards on a level floor and measure off one and one-half foot on the bottom edge, then in a line with the end of the board mark a point on the floor that would be the top edge of the board if the board were two and one-half feet wide; rule a line from the point on the floor to the point marked on the board and saw off the corner as marked; make the other side-piece correspond exactly with the first ([Fig. 206]).