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'Doris' UK east coast bawley

S

scratchbuild

Joined
Jan 4, 2023
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Doris is now complete. Another UK East Coast working boat added to my collection. I have made the deck furniture and rigging representational, I cannot claim great accuracy for I have worked mostly from photographs. Doris is a Bawley, once working out of the Thames estuary for shrimp or shellfish. You may have noticed that there is no boom. Mainsails were loose footed on these craft. I hope group members like my approach. I neglected to run log on this build so I have posted straight to completed builds.

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Very nice! I'm starting to become really interested in smaller 'workboats' such as this. I have a 'Hoy' taking form on my drawing board right now. Have you built any 'Hoys'?
 
scratchbuild said:
Doris is now complete. Another UK East Coast working boat added to my collection.
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Cap'n Scratch:
Nice! What scale is this model? There are many examples of loose-footed lugsails but loose-footed gaff sails like this are less common. Often, watermen using small craft disliked booms as hazardous. A boom can 1) be an extra stick that gets in the way of fishing and other activities 2) hit you in the head, and 3) trip the boat in a knockdown. Fair winds!
 
MThomas said:
Very nice! I'm starting to become really interested in smaller 'workboats' such as this. I have a 'Hoy' taking form on my drawing board right now. Have you built any 'Hoys'?
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Small workboats are fascinating and fun to model. You can build them in larger scales allowing much detail and less persnickety work. And you can avoid repetitious work (e.g. building 74 guns for a 74-gun ship of the line). Researching how distinctive small craft were developed and built locally for specific work is very rewarding. Some books on the topic include:
  • American Small Sailing Craft, Howard Chapelle
  • Building Classic Small Craft, John Gardner
  • Spritsails and Lugsails, John Leather
  • Gaff Rig, John Leather
  • Scottish Fishing Boats of the Nineteenth Century, Hamish Barber
  • The Little Boats: Inshore Fishing Craft of Atlantic Canada, Ray MacKean and Robert Percival
  • Model Boat Building: The Spritsail Skiff, Steve Rogers and Patricia Stay-Rogers
  • The Sloops of the Hudson River, Paul Fontenoy
  • The Whaleboat, Willits Ansel
  • The Sea Bright Skiff and Other Jersey Shore Boats, Peter Guthorn
Fair winds!
 
AndyA said:
Cap'n Scratch:
Nice! What scale is this model? There are many examples of loose-footed lugsails but loose-footed gaff sails like this are less common. Often, watermen using small craft disliked booms as hazardous. A boom can 1) be an extra stick that gets in the way of fishing and other activities 2) hit you in the head, and 3) trip the boat in a knockdown. Fair winds!
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The model is 400mm loa including the rudder (excl. bow sprit) so that's about 1/30. Its not that precise, I'm not a person who worries too much about scale. Hope that admission doesn't shock. I do not know precisely why these craft are boomless but a suspect it is for practical. I am thinking gear handling.
 
Nice build, some similar lines to an east coast (Bridlington) coble.
 
Very nice working boat Scratch (sorry I don't know your name). I also would recommend to you and AndyA, "Skipjack" by Christopher White, 2009. Regards Magic Mike
 
Magic Mike said:
Very nice working boat Scratch (sorry I don't know your name). I also would recommend to you and AndyA, "Skipjack" by Christopher White, 2009. Regards Magic Mike
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Thanks for your recommendation I will look that up. My name is Graham by the way. Just calling myself 'Scratchbuild' was actually a mistake when I signed up. I thought I was entering a category!
 
Nice to meet you Graham! Here are two more great books on skipjacks for you and Andy A: "Chesapeake Bay Skipjacks" Pat Vojtech, 1993; "Notes on Chesapeake Bay Shipjacks" Howard I. Chapelle, 1998 (includes plans). Regards, Magic Mike
 
Magic Mike said:
Nice to meet you Graham! Here are two more great books on skipjacks for you and Andy A: "Chesapeake Bay Skipjacks" Pat Vojtech, 1993; "Notes on Chesapeake Bay Shipjacks" Howard I. Chapelle, 1998 (includes plans). Regards, Magic Mike
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Thanks for the recommendations. I was aware of skipjacks, only because I used to subscribe to the 'Woodenboat' magazine which I think was published in the States. I will probably be fully occupied with UK workboats for the foreseeable. Thanks.
 
Magic Mike said:
Nice to meet you Graham! Here are two more great books on skipjacks for you and Andy A: "Chesapeake Bay Skipjacks" Pat Vojtech, 1993; "Notes on Chesapeake Bay Shipjacks" Howard I. Chapelle, 1998 (includes plans). Regards, Magic Mike
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Thanks Cap'n Mike! A couple of other books for those interested in modeling a skipjack:
Model Boat Building: The Skipjack by Steve Rogers. This is one of a series of books by Rogers that provide plans and step-by-step descriptions and photos of the project. It shows a skipjack model in 1/2" scale.
Chesapeake Saling Craft: Recollections of Robert H. Burgess by Robert H. Burgess. This book has a chapter on skipjacks with wonderful descriptions and photos of boats under construction, sailing, and dredging oysters. There are other chapters about log canoes, bugeyes, sloops, and schooners.
Fair winds!
 
scratchbuild said:
Thanks for the recommendations. I was aware of skipjacks, only because I used to subscribe to the 'Woodenboat' magazine which I think was published in the States. I will probably be fully occupied with UK workboats for the foreseeable. Thanks.
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There is much to keep you occupied! Being on the west side of the pond, I'm more familiar with local American types but I've read enough about traditional boats of England, Ireland, Scotland, Atlantic Canada, and Greenland to know they are varied and fascinating. One of the themes among little boats around the world is that they were developed to meet the particular conditions of the locality: available materials (wood, etc.), shoreline conditions (beaches, harbors), sea conditions (tides, winds, waves), and profitable activities (fisheries, transport). The result is an amazing variety of small craft waiting to be modeled. Fair winds!
 
Magic Mike said:
AndyA, speaking of Scotland have you seen the Scottish fishing boat "Fifie"? Magic Mike
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I have read about fifies in a couple of books:
  • Scottish Fishing Vessels of the Nineteenth Century by Hamish Barber
  • Spritsails and Lugsails by John Leather
A major characteristic of the type seems to be plumb (or nearly so) stem and sternpost. What strikes me beyond the large variety of small craft that were found around Scotland is the variety of fascinating names: fifie, scaffie, zulu, niseach, yole, whammel, coble, etc. What I don't know is how to pronoun "fifie."
Fair winds!
 
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