Figuring out the cockpit

Posted on by David

The Great Auk has a generous size cockpit but I wanted to add some detail to accent the opening. I found quite a few examples on the interweb and chose a basic design.

A recessed cockpit for lack of a better description, creates an “apron” around the cockpit. Some recesses are small areas in the front and the rear. Some a bit larger. The pattern I picked starts with a fairly larger recess which disappears towards the middle then restarts.

Actually building the cockpit will be done in two posts, the second coming after the deck fiber glassing starts in a few weeks. I can feel the anticipation building…

This is the template from the plans for the actual cockpit opening
Perspective from the stern
If you’ve been asking yourself what the heck that blue thing is, it’s a drawing flex-curve. I was just tickled to pull that out of my old drafting bag and actually use it. I don’t think it had seen the light of day since my college mechanical drawing class. But I digress.
It helped me transfer and expand the cockpit outline.
Once the outline was drawn, I need to reverse the pattern for the starboard side. Take note I used a nautical term. As a public service reminder, port is left (same number of letters). Also a green navigation light means right ( same number of letters) (as right not starboard). But once again, I digress.
I used tracing paper to copy the lines for the other side.
But before flipping the paper, I used the trusty push pin method of marking the lines. And yes I could have just cut the paper along the lines but what fun is that.
All I’ve got to do is connect the dots with a flowing line. Where’s that flex-curve?
The cutting begins. Taking a saw to a perfectly good boat is scary. But it’s early in the construction process and I can always fix a bad cut. Just wait until I have to cut the hatches later on. That will cause me to loose sleep. But all that comes in a future post. More anticipation building…
Done, including cutting the forms down
Starting the recess which is all light cedar. The cross pieces are to keep the planks level and even. Note the walnut edging feature.
The one detail I did not anticipate. To keep the recess level, it came in a little bit below the back. My panicked yet otherwise elegant solution was to add a bridge piece. I’ve never seen it done like that before but then again others probably thought further ahead and avoided to issue.
Is my plan making sense yet?

Sign up for a notification when the Boat Building site is updated

When you click the Subscribe button you will need to verify that you are you using Capcha