Free plans to build your own epoxy-ply Western Skiff are available to download for amateur builders anywhere in the world.
Nic Compton reports. The Nigel Irens 14ft Western Skiff is designed quuest rowing or sailing � but can also be powered by a small outboard motor if fitted with a well modification. When Nigel Irens designed the Western Skiff 22 years ago, boatbuilding as a hobby was enjoying a modest but significant revival in the UK. Designers such as Iain Oughtred, Selway Fisher and Andrew Wolstenholme were qyest expanding portfolios of plans for amateur construction, and a highly successful amateur boatbuilding quesf ABBA was established, which is still going to this day.
Browse the complete set of eight articles in this series online. Designer Nigel Irens sails the prototype Western Skiff in The boatbuilding revolution has indeed progressed as Nigel predicted, and most of the boat plans offered by Oughtred, Fisher, Wolstenholme and others are now available in kit form through the likes of Jordan Boats and Fyne Boats. The design Nigel came up with all those years ago was a slender 14ft clinker plywood dinghy, with an upright stem and elegantly raked transom.
In fact, the sweeping tiller in two sizes: a long one for sailing and a short one for rowing was one of the defining characteristics quext the designs. There was no provision for an outboard, and the transom was deliberately raked at such an angle to woodem it very difficult to fit one � although I eventually found a way around this!
Much of the detailed drawing work for the boat was done by up-and-coming young designer Ed Burnett, who was working for Nigel at the time. It was an idealistic rather than a pragmatic design, and quite different to any other boat on the market. The plank joints, for example, were made up of long fingers, designed to maximize aooden glueing areas, which were slotted together in batches before being popped out of the sheets of ply.
This not only speeded up the process but also ensured the planks were lined up correctly. Instead, the angle between the planks was filled with epoxy, creating a series of incredibly strong and foolproof joints which also helped to stiffen the boat fore and aft. Living in Lewes in East Sussex, I rowed the boat regularly up and down the River Ouse, and I also had some great sails down as far as Newhaven, shooting bridges on the way, and then out to sea along Seaford Beach.
On one memorable occasion, a non-sailing friend came with me and, halfway down the Ouse, produced a flask and some china teacups and proceeded to pour us both a cup of tea as we careered down the valley past the point where Marine navigation lights for boats key Woolf drowned herself with the outgoing tide and Goat Island Skiff Plans Free Quest a following breeze.
But my skiff really came into its own nearly 20 years after I originally wooden skiff plans free quest her, when my family and I moved to Devon in One notable afternoon I sailed with my son off nearby Galmpton, with a pkans shadowing us for several minutes, before the rest of the family dog included climbed on board and we drifted home on a zephyr, wooddn whole river bathed in gold by the evening sun. Over the years, the skiff has attracted a lot of favourable comments and Nigel has received repeated requests for plans to build the design.
The simple clinker ply construction. Credit: Nic Compton. A lively conversation ensues with Ed Burnett discussing the merits of copyright, as well as the compromises needed to design a boat that plana well and yet still sails tolerably well.
The original drawings were specifically intended to be fed into a CNC cutter to produce parts for the kit and it was no simple matter to convert them into a set of construction plans. So the drawings stayed buried in a marine navigation lights for boats key, and the idea of relaunching the design remained just an skivf.
It was the response to gree skiff restoration article in PBO June that provided the impetus to get the idea going again, and this time we found a willing partner in the shape of Jack Gifforda former GL Watson draughtsman wooden skiff plans free quest had recently set up shop on his own in Falmouth.
Jack agreed to turn the drawings into a set of PDF files, complete with full-size templates for many of the parts, which could be sent out wooden skiff plans free quest aspiring amateur builders. Skicf has also agreed to distribute the plans free of charge. The only thing we ask is for you to make a voluntary donation to the fund set up in the memory of Ed Burnett see justgiving. Anyone wanting to build the boats for profit, will need to contact Nigel marine navigation lights for boats key at nigelirens.
The addition of an outboard in a well has allowed the family to explore further afield. See PBO June Credit: Zennor Compton. The Western Skiff was always conceived first as a rowing boat, second as a sail boat and not at all as a motor boat! For rowing, a long pair of oars is essential � the original kit came with a pair of 8ft oars, which seemed to do the job nicely. With one person rowing the boat is a bit light, and some form of ballast up forward � in the form of bottles of water, rocks, an outboard or, in my case, a dog!
The challenge for new builders is to design an improved rig, keeping the rig strictly within a set sail area the exact size is yet to be decided � but it will be smaller than the current set-up.
Rules are meant to be broken and, although the boat was not designed to carry an outboard, there are ways and means. After 15 years, I eventually succumbed to the inevitable and fitted an outboard well on my quesh � and it performs extraordinarily well under motor with a very small outboard the 3.
Being so easily driven and yet impossible to plane, it would be a natural contender for an electric outboard, budget permitting. Neither the plans nor the kit include the outboard conversion, which will vary greatly according to what outboard is chosen, but they will include a description of how I did.
There is also now a Facebook group: www. The motivation for this new initiative is simply to get a lot more of these wonderful boats on the water, giving pleasure to many more builders and owners. Even frfe large-scale and full-size PDF drawings to work from, cutting the parts for a 14ft dinghy can be a daunting task.
To make the marine navigation lights for boats key even more accessible to the amateur builder we teamed up with Alec Jordan of Jordan Boats to produce a MkII kit � as was originally intended. This approach means the builder can source the remaining marine navigation lights for boats key and materials according to their budget and inclination.
Some might like a simple, painted rowing boat, others might want a bright finished sailing version, with the corresponding difference in build time and cost. This might be a carbon fibre-sparred version of the original lug rig, or a completely new approach � Nigel is currently favouring using a windsurf rig, but it will be interesting to compare sail plans.
Alec Jordan � the founder of Jordan Boats � has the rare distinction of having learned to sail on the Kalahari Desert. After spending most of his childhood in St Lucia, he trained in IT and wooden skiff plans free quest a job in Botswana where he made his first solo sailing foray in a Finn dinghy on Gaborone Dam, on the edge of the Kalahari Desert.
Back in the UK, he settled in Aberdeen where he built a Sprite dinghy from a kit supplied by Jack Chippendale, which gave him the boatbuilding bug. The Oughtred-designed St Ayles skiff is his most successful marine navigation lights for boats key, selling upwards of kits to date. The Western Skiff is the latest addition to wooden skiff plans free quest range.
Thanks to his boat-mad father, Jack Wuest grew up thinking it was quite normal dree Flat Bottom Wooden Skiff Plans No dig up year-old boats from the mud and restore them, and from an early age became addicted to classic yachts. He spent his teens working for Dragon-meister Peter Wilson in Aldeburgh, before studying naval architecture at Southampton Institute. He worked wooden skiff plans free quest several years at the offices of GL Watson, working on projects such as the motor yacht Malahnefor which wooden skiff plans free quest helped design a new tender.
Inhe set up his own office in Falmouth to provide a range of naval architectural services such as stability assessments, coding and 3D scanning � as well as new boat designs. Recent projects include designing a new gaff and topmast for the Fife Metre The Lady Annecreating a new interior for a Nicholson 34, and designing five 26ft rowing boats for an Outward Bound organisation in the Lake District.
More info at jackgifford. Around this time, he designed the 80ft catamaran Formule Tagwhich set a new hour record of miles in with Mike Birch at the helm. Alongside this mainstream success, he found time to dabble in traditional boats, designing the 29ft lugger Roxane infollowed by her little sister, the 22ft Romillyand wooden skiff plans free quest course the Western Skiff in So I think messing around with different shapes and sizes of sail plans for different sized people could and should be a lot of fun.
In wooden skiff plans free quest there was any doubt about his story, he pulled from his phone, with all the flourish of a magician, a picture of he and his skiff yachting along on an Marine navigation lights for boats key lake. I say good for him wuest and good for anyone else who likes to mess about with boats, in whatever way takes their fancy. We estimate. Instructions for free Western Skiff plans � click here to download.
Overview pdf of Western Skiff plans 10 pages of A4 � click here to download. Full set of pdf plans of Western Skiff 39 pages of A0 � click here skifg download.
Building an outboard well during skiff marine navigation lights for boats key inby Nic Compton. Here is a selection of photos from the full original kit build by Nic Compton.
Let us know at pbo ti-media. The completed jig viewed from astern, mounted on trestles. Note the black-edged parts: the burn marks from the laser used to cut the original kit marine navigation lights for boats key in the s.
The free set of plans calls for two of the thwarts to be fitted to the building jig. The frames then slot into the thwarts. The Jordan Boats pre-cut marine navigation lights for boats key suggests a different method of aligning the frames thanks to extra features on the building jig.
Drilling holes to fit the plastic cable ties. Less is more at this stage � too many ties force the planks into unnatural shapes. The garboards and bottom panel woden over the frames and two of the four thwarts.
And the centreboard slot is aligned with the slot cut in the forward thwart. Note the overlap at the apron and the plastic cable ties helping to shape the planks. The very first completed boat by Anton Fitzpatrick minus gunwales and inwales at Devon Dinghy Workshop in Note the side buoyancy tanks fitted snugly between frames either side of the centreboard case.
Skip to content �. Home boats. Nic Compton reports The Nigel Irens 14ft Western Skiff is designed for rowing or sailing � but can also be powered by a wooden skiff plans free quest outboard motor if fitted with a well modification.
Under sail off Wooden skiff plans free quest. Alec Jordan. Jack Gifford. Credit: Emily Harris. Renowned designer Nigel Irens. Once printed, plqns together individual sheets by matching the corresponding numbers in each corner and aligning the target marks.
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