Barry Jensen built his first boat, a Sabot sailing dinghy, 55 years ago, when he was just 14 years old. As an adult, working as a librarian in Victoria, British Columbia, he built more boats: a 14′ plywood Petrel sailboat and a couple of cedar-strip kayaks, to name a few. And, while it was in him to retire after a 34-year career doing work that actually put food on the table, he hasn’t been able to shake his habit as a serial boatbuilder. The workboat documented by John Gardner was carvel planked, but Barry decided that he'd strip plank the hull.
Photographs by Barry Jensen
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What a great looking “salty” craft!
I would like to see a pic of the finished interior. Also, what are the dimensions?
Thanks John. Appreciate your kind comment.
The Down East 18 is 18′ LOA, and 6′ 4″ W. It is 2′ 5″ inside depth amidships.
I’ve included a shot of the interior here. In a nutshell, there is a double v-berth in the forward cabin, and two seats in the pilot house. No room for a sink or stove so I cook in the cockpit. I have a porta-potty that sits in front of the port seat, the helm being on the starboard side.
Thank you and good “sailing!”
Mr Jensen,
For health reasons I have to give up sailing our Whitby 25, which is a f.g. Folkboat with some extras the Nordic Folkboat does not have.
Thank you for showing us what can be done with this pretty boat. I shall very likely go to Brentwood Bay and try to spot CHK and convince my sweetie that this is what we need, sailing out of Maple Bay.
David Phillips
3d July, 2023
Beautiful boat! , I would love to see some more pics of the cabin. Thank you! Saving this build for reference on my current project:)
Barry,
Very nice vessel. I don’t see any fasteners in the pictures – no brass screw heads, for example. I would expect to see some in the pilot-house framing at least. What was your choice of fastening method?
Thanks again for sharing,
Jim Fischer
Thanks, Jim. Sorry for the delay in responding.
I’m going by memory, but here’s my best attempt to answer your question.
In the hull itself, there are no fasteners, since the cedar strips are glued together with Titebond III, then, after fairing, covered in two layers of fiberglass set in WEST system epoxy outside, and one inside. I eventually through-bolted the 2″ by 2″ kayu batu keel to the bottom of the hull with stainless-steel bolts with the heads set into the wood and covered with Sikaflex (in case I ever need to remove them. There are no other fasteners below the waterline that aren’t fully encapsulated, and then only those required to hold things together while the epoxy glue cured. The stringers are glued down with thickened epoxy, and the sole on either side of the middle two-foot wide accessible compartments was screwed down with deck screws, then again fully encapsulated in fiberglass and epoxy.
I set up the deck framing and used galvanized-steel deck screws and glued the framework with epoxy. Eventually, everything was encapsulated in fiberglass and epoxy. I set up the corner posts (after the mock-up as described in Chris’s article), through-bolting them to the carlins and deck beams. Then I added the decks and forecabin sides, again using deck screws to hold everything in place, eventually filleting all joints with thickened epoxy, and covering all surfaces with 6 oz. fiberglass cloth set in epoxy. Similar methods were used for the pilot house.
There are no through-hulls in the boat, and no underwater exposed metal (except when the outboard leg is lowered), no drain plug.
Beautiful job congrats! I am just finishing a Point Comfort 18 which I am intending to equip with a canopy. Your boat is very intriguing. Maybe next time?
Steve
Thanks, Steve.
I considered the Point Comfort too. Beautiful boats!
I had built a canopy, or bimini, over the cockpit last year. (Visible in the last picture.)
This winter, I replaced that with a hard canopy, since I never bothered to collapse the bimini anyway. The hard top is handy for storing stuff temporarily.
Just love why you VIOLATED conventional wisdom: Because it was your boat.
Absolutely gorgeous.
Hi Barry,
My wife Luanne and I met you at Sidney Spit two summers ago when we were aboard our boat Rosie. We have since seen your boat at it’s berth in Brentwood Bay. It puts a smile on my face every time I see it. Hope we cross wakes again sometime. I am a sucker for that lobster-boat look. Rosie’s design was also inspired by a lobster boat.
Cheers,
Ken