strip

Freedom 15 Launch!

Doug Smith
Last weekend the family and I launched the Freedom for the first time. It wasn’t quite “finished” in that I hadn’t varnished it yet, but I wanted to wait for the weather to cool a bit before spraying the urethane.

Inside Hull Fiberglass Pictures

Doug Smith
The gallery below has some pictures from my trials and tribulations in fiberglassing the inside of the hull. The weave is mostly filled and I’m leaving it like this.

Canoe Flips Over

Doug Smith
Sunday was sort of a big day for me, as I finally got to take the Freedom off of the strongback.

Add the Outside Stems

Doug Smith
With the stripping done, the next task was to attach the outside stems. First I trimmed the strips flush with the stem along the leading edge.

Touching Up the Strips

Doug Smith
With the stems finished I had to touch up the strips prior to the final shaping of the hull. There were two things I wanted to do.

Finished the stripping

Doug Smith
Over a period of a couple of weeks I hit the board hard finished the stripping. Once I rounded the bilge the stripping went pretty fast.

Accent Strip

Doug Smith
I decided to put some accent strips on the Freedom. For this, I am using a thick band of American walnut with thin strips of Alaskan yellow cedar on either side of the walnut.

First Strips

Doug Smith
With the stems shaped and everything in place, it’s time to start stripping the boat. The Freedom looks like it is quite a straight-forward shape to build and I’ve decided to try out some different techniques for this part of the building process.