Painting the Canoe
The canvas should be given a coat of shellac before the paint is applied. This makes it waterproof. Then four coats of paint are applied to fill the fibers of the canvas. To make a smooth finishing coat, rub down the second and third coats with fine sandpaper. The entire woodwork of the canoe should be finished with three coats of good-quality outside spar varnish.
A slatted grating, made of soft-pine lattice stuff, about 1¹⁄₈ in. wide and 1¹⁄₄ in. thick, will afford protection to the bottom of the canoe. For summer use this is desirable, but may be omitted on long trips and when soft footwear is worn. The grating should not be fastened to the ribs, but the parallel strips screwed, or nailed, to cross strips, curved to fit the contour of the canoe’s bottom. The grating should extend from well under the stern seat up to the stem splice in the bow, and should be nicely tapered to make a neat appearance. By fastening two or three little blocks of wood so that they will extend up between the slats, one may screw small brass buttons into these blocks to keep the slatted floor in place, thus making it easily removable when washing out the canoe.