We have seen very nice boats built in Norway with dowels instead of nails; they were clinker built, and the dowels were about ½in., or fully as thick as the planking. A number of rods, from 3ft. to 4ft. long, are planed up to the required size, and cut into lengths say, when two thicknesses of ½in. plank are to be clinched, to 1½in., or, when the two planks and a timber of perhaps 1in. are to be fastened, to 2½in., so that both ends may project a little beyond the wood they are to fasten; the dowel is then split at each end with a sharp chisel, taking care that the cut is made at right angles to the grain of the plank or rib, wedges are driven in, and the end, being slightly spread out by the use of the clinch hammer, is trimmed off not too close; the wedges should be all neatly cut with a fine saw, and by sawing them in breadths from a board, and then splitting them to the required size, labour may be greatly economised. The holes should be bored with a sharp centre-bit; and if the dowels fit tightly the wedges may be dispensed with, as the ends will spread sufficiently under the clinch hammer without breaking the grain.
In building, if any difficulty should be found in drawing down the end of the plank to the stem, it will be advisable, after having fitted it carefully, to slack up the centre, let the end come to its place, fasten it, and then again bend the plank downwards. In some boats, especially in the navy, the planks do not run fore and aft, but two thin layers are crossed over each other diagonally, and clinched together; this leaves the outside perfectly smooth, and is perhaps the strongest known method of boat building. In planing up the edges of planks, &c., it is absolutely necessary to have a vice of some kind, and nothing is better than a tree vice, unless you have a blacksmith’s. Saw off a young tree from 6in. to 8in. thick, at about 3½ft. from the ground; saw the stump down the middle as low as you can; bind the lower part tightly with thongs of raw hide to prevent its splitting, then insert wedges to open the upper part, put your planks in, withdraw the wedges, and it will hold tight enough. It is as well to cut the upper part of the opening sufficiently wide to admit an inch plank, as short pieces can easily be put in to fill up should you wish to hold a thinner one.
Portable steel boat.
We have already mentioned the principle on which Mr. E. D. Young’s portable steel boat for the Livingstone Search Expedition was built; and although, as we then said, none but a skilled workman could hope to turn up the edges of a curved sheet of metal, we think the principle might be applied to a flat-bottomed boat by merely snipping the flanges at the turn of the bilge, and bending upward the sides at any convenient angle; by cutting these more and more diagonally from the centre, the boat might be tapered to each end—not, indeed, in a true curve, but in a succession of short straight lines, which would tolerably represent one.
