The Bear Mountain Boat Shop

David,

Try Jamestown Distributers. They have a good selection.
www.jamestowndistributors.com

Ray, I built a 16' Bear Mt Prospector in my cellar. It was a bit of a challenge at times, but no problem with fumes or dust. I built a "clean room" with plastic drop cloths stapled above and around the canoe and work area during the really dusty sessions. A good vacuum set-up on your sande...

David, If you clamp a peice of scrap on the gunwale, you could drill with a spade bit. Drill a very small pilot hole through the scrap for alignment purposes, then drill to the correct depth. Do not try to "free-hand" with the spade bit on an existing hole. (Don't ask me why I say this!!!!...

G&P

I would do the same thing in a heartbeat! When I visited the college my daughter is going to, I found myself mentally taking apart the cedar benches on the college quad because of the beautiful clear cedar boards.

John,

Very nice job! I am also a little biased toward the Prospector design.

Mike,

You can try some temporary fasteners to see if you like the height, then plug the holes later when you are happy with it. Making seat spacers a little shorter or longer is a pretty easy job.

Rob, If you want to use the entire length of your board, I would recommend the Skil-saw method. With a good, thin-kerf blade you can make excellent strips without spending a lot on tools and it is easier to move the saw than the long boards. I ripped all my own strips from 20' boards and have only 2...

Ed,

I have had the same experience with foam brushes. I look for the "good" ones at Ace.

Tim, I bought all kinds of fancy plug cutters to make my own plugs out of some scraps I had left over. What a huge PIA! I finally gave up and bought 2 "mahogany" dowels at the hardware store for about $1. Took 5 minutes on the band saw to make my gunwale plugs. And they look great, contras...

Cost of building your own canoe...........Priceless!

For everything else, there's Mastercard.

zpeteman,

Cut on the bias means at a 45degree angle to the perpendicular weave of the cloth, so the piece you are working with has the weave running diagonally instead of straight accross or up and down. This allows the cloth to conform to odd shapes and curves much better.

CB, Welcome. In the most recent Wooden Canoe, published by the above mentioned WCHA, there is an article about a guy who builds cedar canvas canoes using a pretty simple canoe form which does not take the huge investment that a typical cedar canvas form entails. I was very intrigued by method, and m...

Cy,

That was exactly the thought I was trying to convey. You said it much more clearly than I did!

Wil, It sounds like you are enjoying this project. That is great! When you glue your gunwales up, be sure to allow unthinned epoxy to completely saturate the scarf joint area before you glue, then wipe off the excess and glue with thickened epoxy. Try not to clamp to tight or you will starve the glu...

Ed, I was fortunate when I built my Prospector in that I found some 20' WRC boards locally. They were planed 3/4" already so I just ripped and routed the B & C onto the edges. I was not worried about some minor differences is board thickness, as the routing process tends to even things out....