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20 foot freighter canoe

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Feb 1, 2013
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Location
Geraldton, Ontario
Been thinking about building a freighter canoe for a long time. When I lived on a reserve up north, the 20 to 24 foot freighter was the standard boat of choice. They were all wood/canvas canoes, functional and beautiful.

So I first found some plans that looked like they had been lofted from a freighter. Tim Marchetti is the designer, and I bought the e-plans off him. Here’s what it looks like:
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Now one of the unfortunate things about living in a small town in the middle of no-where is that it is difficult to procure anything that doesn’t come from a convenience store. I was having a heck of a time getting the very large plans printed out.

So I contacted my go-to guy for canoe plans, Martin Step from Greenval.com. Martin provides plans for all of John Winters designs, and had provided the plans for my 17 foot square stern, the Nipissing. The lines for that are shown below:

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I asked Martin if he could expand the plans for me, to make it 20 feet long, 54 inches across and 20 inches deep. He said he could indeed, and within a week, I had the full size plans in my hands.

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Up to now, I have drawn all the stations out and have begun to cut them. There is a lot of cutting! I will be building with ½ inch thick strips. I have a lot of spruce and pine laying around, so I think I will use that, mostly because it won’t cost anything. This canoe is going to have to be trailered, as I suspect it will come in between 2 and three hundred pounds.

I found this beast on line to do bead and cove on ½ inch strips. Might experiment with it today.
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At this point, I am planning on using 10 ounce cloth, doubled on the bottom and the inside. I have an old two stroke six horse that I will probably try with it. Since it is a displacement hull, I’m not sure if a 9.9 will move it much faster, and it is hard to justify $3000.00 for a new 4 stroke.

Hopefully I will be starting construction before Christmas!
 
What happened to that CNC machine at school? That's a lot of really big forms to cut out and sand!

Alan
 
Wow ! That's ambitious !

Totally looking forward to following along !

How will you build the Bow stem ? Inner and outer ?

Jim
 
Inner and outer, that's my style. Since weight doesnt matter might use something exotic for the outer, like good one side plywood or sumpin.

I ain't puttin lipstick on a pig Alan, it is what it is, lol.
 
Mem,
Too many years ago, I built a 19 ft long, 7 ft beam, high performance sailboat. I stripped it with 1/2" thick cedar strips...
I found it impossible to use any sort of standard (at least from a strip building view point) staple gun.
I bought a 1/4" crown air stapler, and I used staples that were, uhmmm, over an inch long. That was the only way I could keep the strips in place on the forms.

I imagine you'll need to so something similar?
 
Build it like a landing craft with a bow that opens, get a small quad loaded in, with a rack that rotates, use the quad for portages and motor along between them. Easy peasy.
 
That will be a unit for sure. I could have sold you an 18 foot Kildonan for cheap a few years ago ...it ended up going to Doug Ingram. I agree that it will be way too heavy to wrassle around by hand so you will also need a custom trailer. And a sail, you gotta have a sail.

You are truly ambitious for an old guy.

No we are not building a Higgins boat.

Christy
 
I agree that it will be way too heavy to wrassle around by hand so you will also need a custom trailer.

I had to move our 110lb RX 20 footer yesterday. Again. I thought I had seen the stern of that canoe wave goodbye up the driveway, but no.

In the last 10 years I have carried it further than I’ve paddled it. And I’m about to put the third seat back in, so it isn’t getting any lighter.The longer I have it the cheaper the get-it-outa-here price drops. Custom side motor mount and 3[SUP]rd[/SUP] seat included.

And a sail, you gotta have a sail.

I absolutely second that. Why burn gas and endure motor noise at when times when you can quietly sail for free? Even simple downwind sailing is too much fun.

Sometimes the magic works

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLso0ZBqOi4

When it does it feels like payback for years of headwinds.

Which sail rig (and leeboard design) opens whole new worlds. Maybe a tiller?
 
I haven't worked with 1/2" strips, but can imagine the trouble bending them around canoe forms, especially Pine and Spruce !

This might be a time I would shy away from bead and cove, and do like REAL boat builders do, and hand plane the strips to fit !

Again I'm curious how you "Skin this Cat !" or canoe !

I might even but ribs in it !

Sorry for my thoughts !

Jim
 
I'm going to use bead and cove, I've done some test bends with the pine, it's stiff but doable. Although I'm not building Tim Marchetti's boat, I did buy the plans from him, and am following his advice for such a large motorized canoe. Everything will be pretty much the same, except I am not putting in the 3" oak strip down the centre on the inside. Have a look at Tim's stuff here: http://forum.woodenboat.com/showthread.php?117135-20ft-freghter-canoe

If you google around, you will find another guy who built Tim's freighter and put a 25 horse on it. He navigated the entire length of the Mississippi river in about three weeks in it.
 
Thanks for that link, it answers a lot of questions. I'm looking forward to this build...and see how she sits in the water.
 
Speaking of matching curves I love the bow lines in this new project...more canoey and less shippy if you know what I mean.
I found it interesting to read a suggestion of using wedges and (halo) arc to hold strips in place as a stapleless method. What about using scrap strips tacked temporarily to the stations and all held down with cam straps? Much slower than staples but without all the tiny blems. Just a foolish idea from an all thumbs carpenter.
 
Making progress, all the forms are cut and sanded, and soaking the stems for steaming. Hope to go into construction within two weeks.

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