Hello again from the Hammond Shop at Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding!

We moved on from carlins and spur beams and the new theme of last week was blocking. There are several different types of blocking on a boat, but their main purpose is to provide extra strength and support to the deck and the structures on it. Blocking also gives you more “meat” to fasten things to. For example, Felicity Ann has a deck-stepped mast, so rather than having only an inch of decking to fasten the mast’s tabernacle to, we now have an inch of decking plus an additional inch and a half of purpleheart blocking to fasten to and support it. We also installed additional sapele blocking toward the stern of the boat and douglas fir sheerline blocking which will support the deck edge and the covering board. Our next step is to carefully plane and sand the tops of the blocking to fair them with the curve of the deck.

-Jo

Purple Heart Blocking                                  Douglass Fir Sheerline Blocking