Happy New Owner. Launch day June 1, 2003!
Their website describes it : "The Mill Creek 13 echoes the look and feel of 1920's "double paddle" canoes. Combining the stability and comfortable seating of a canoe with the light weight and decked-in security of a kayak, the Mill Creek 13 is perfect for photography, fly fishing, birding, or just relaxed paddling. Like all the Mill Creeks, the 13 is surprisingly fast thanks to her efficient 5-panel multichine hull and feather-light 40lb weight. The cockpit is 54" long, so entry and egress are easy for everyone."
Happy New Owner. Launch day June 1, 2003!
Length: 13"
Beam: 29.5"
Weight: 40 lbs
The Mill Creek plans come with several sheets of detailed drawings. Key parts are shown full size. The instruction - building guide book is over 200 pages long and worth the price of the plans even if you never build the boat. It is full of great how-to ideas and information. It really is a book on how to build a boat.
As I build the Mill Creek over the winter I will try to update this website with notes, photos and a running cost tally. Let me know if you have questions.
Once again I am using System 3 epoxy. I had good results with it on my Swifty 12 and feel comfortable using it. Be sure to read up on epoxy safety at their website. The Mill Creek plan book has some good basic info but I would recommend Sam Devlins book on building stitch and glue boats as well as the System 3 Epoxy book. See the System 3 website - you can download the book for free.
Chesapeake Light Craft Website
My Website about Building the Swifty 12
Hull panels blanks cut and ready to scarf
Day 1 (11/16/02): Rough cut all the hull pieces. These will be scarfed before cutting to final panel shape. Used a Skil Saw and a cutting guide clamped to the plywood. Worked slick. Marked, cut and planed/sanded the two bulkheads. Used a sewing pattern transfer device to transfer the patterns to the plywood. It is a small serrated wheel on a plastic handle that leaves a neat line of minor indents on the wood. I tried the pattern transfer paper but the wheelie thing was much easier.
I also cut the side coaming pieces.
Time: 4 hours
Cost Tally: $211.20 (3 sheets 4mm Okume, 1 sheet 6mm Okume, 1 gal epoxy resin, 1/2 gal fast hardner and 3 containers of wood flour) Note that the fast hardner works great for me in a shop where the temp is 50 - 55 degrees most of the time.
You can see my tiny shop. Will barely be big enough. I have to crawl under the table to get to the work bench.
Day 2: Cut back coaming trim and 4 hanging knees. The knees were glued together to make two thicker pieces. Made the deck nailing and deck trimming guide pieces from patterns in the book.
I decided to install 4" Beckson deck plates in the bulkheads instead of deck hatches so I marked the center of each bulkhead and cut a nice round hole. Much easier to cut them now rather than after the boat is built.
Time: 2 hours
Day 3: Cut hanging knees to final shape. Cut scarf joint on the sheer planks. Glued them up. My first scarf. I had done a practice joint so I would know what to expect. Good thing I did. A dress rehersal was really needed - there is so much going on - very quickly. Used a straight edge to align the pieces then tacked/clamped them to the work table. Then I could lift up the joint to apply the epoxy without worrying that they would move once they were all slippery.
Time: 2.5 hours with a dinner break
Scarfing hull panel blanks
Day 4: Bought mahogany stock to make sheer strakes and carlins. May also use it to do the rub rails. 2 pieces 9' x 1" x 4" for $20.70 Also bought the two deck plates I plan to mount in the bulkheads $18.00
Cut and glued scarf joint on the bilge planks. Just the bottom to do now. I sharpened the block plane just prior to starting my cuts and then touched it up about 2/3 of the way through the cutting. Found that I did not tear the grain of the last cuts if I angled the plane to more of a "top down" stroke instead of back and forth across the joint. I have never been able to find a write up on this other than to say "cut with a sharp plane".
Time: 1.5 hours including sharpening
Cost Tally: $251.90
Day 5: Cut and glued scarf on bottom panel. 1 hour.
Day 6: Cut sheer clamp, carlin and rubrail rough stock from the mahogany I purchased the other day with the help of my friend Pat. He has a nice furniture shop and the tools to rip lumber to skinny little pieces. Scarfed the sheer clamps to length. Cut the carlins also.
Time: 1.5 hours
Scarfing sheer clamps
Note on scarfing: I am not sure I would cut the scarfs in the 4 mm plywood again. I have seen joints made with fiberglass tape since I scarfed my Mill Creek joints and would seriously consider that option on the next boat. Note that Pygmy Kayaks use this technique. Butt blocks would also be worth looking at since the curves are pretty gentle where the scarfs fall.
Dave Carnell on "invisible butt joints"
Day 7: Lofting! First hull shape I tackled was the bottom. Laid out station lines, marked points (inches-eights-+/-)and drew curves with batten. Need two people to do the drawing since I can not hold the batten in place and draw the line. Worked just like they decribe in the books. Really helped to number each station line on the plans and panel. I also wrote the dimension on the panel at each station line before I did any marking. This saved me from at least one error that I know of. Cut the bottom out a bit fat with the saber saw and used the block plane to take it down to the line. Very nice result. Eased the edge for stitching and drilled the stitching holes.
I found lofting easier to do that transfering patterns from the plans for other parts. Even though there was a sheet of patterns for the hull planks it would just not be easy or accurate enough to use them.
Time: 2 hours
Plans and batten.
Day 8: Pretty much a repeat of day seven. Laid out and cut the bidge panels. It's a bit tricky to keep them together while you cut and plane off to the line but I figured out I could nail the pieces to the work bench with wire brads then pop them up and reposition to cut and plane some more.
Time: 2 hours
The bilge panels all cut and finished.
Day 9: Cut sheer planks. Again a repeat of the last two days. At this point I have all the pieces cut and ready to assemble.
Time: 2 hours
Total Time To Date: 17.5 hours - If I had ordered a kit I would have saved about 16 hours of lofting and cutting. With the kit you still have to glue up the scarfs on the hull pieces and sheer clamps. Not a bad trade off I think for the money I saved. More important is that I love doing this stuff.
Day 10 continued: Glued starboard sheer clamp to sheer panel. The book says to do both at once with one on top of the other. I don't much like glue dripping in my face so I chose to do them one at a time. Using spring clamps allowed the pieces to move too much. I may try pre-drilling for some temporary nails on the port side to see how that works. The nails would come out after the glue sets.
Time: 3/4 hour
The starboard sheer clamp glued and clamped.
Day 11: Glued port sheer clamp to sheer panel. I tried pre-drilling for some temporary nails. Used 5 nails. Worked great! I positioned the pieces then carefully hammered in the nails. Then added clamps. The whole slippery mess was much easier to deal with. The nails will come out after the glue sets. Found a small crack (about 3/4") in the other sheer panel near the bow end. Not at all sure how it got there but the 4mm stuff is very floppy so I probably just had an opps and did not realize it. I was afraid that it might spread when I stitched the panels together so I added a small piece of glass cloth on each side of the panel over the crack. Won't show on the inside and can easily be faired when finishing the exterior of the hull.
Time: 3/4 hour
Crack repair update: Repairing the crack was very similar to doing the invisable scarf mentioned earlier. Now that I have finished the hull I can say for sure that this did not show in any way once the whole hull was glassed and sanded. I also figured out the source of the crack! I tried to break some scraps and found the 4mm stuff very tough so it probably did not happen in the shop. I believe that the piece broke on the way home from the wood supplier. I have a small pickup and the plywood hung out the back, resting on the tailgate, on the way home. The 4mm piece on top really flopped and bounced on the way home even though the canopy hatch was strapped down to hold the plywood in. Next time I'll clamp the pieces together so the top one can not fly around at 50 miles an hour on the freeway.
Received my order of parts from CLC. I decided to take the easy way out and order a few odds and ends from CLC even though all of it was available locally. This was prompted by the fact that my local store was out of epoxy pumps. The MAS pumps from CLC are 2/1 just like the System 3 Epoxy I am using so I figured I'd get the rest of the things too. I ordered the glass cloth, glass tape, copper stitching wire, bronze ring nails (deck) and brass brads (rubrails) and pumps. The original order did not have the tape but CLC had it to me in 3 days. Good service. I don't think they mess up too many orders since the gal on the phone was clearly amazed. Nice people.
Turns out the MAS pumps are smaller than the System 3 pumps. I like them since they take 3 pumps to equal 1 pump from the System 3 pumps. I can mix tiny batches now and should have less waste. Takes more pumping though.
I should note that I ordered all 6 oz glass cloth for the boat and enough to do the deck in one piece (no seam). That was an extra $30. Order total including shipping $113.50
Cost tally: $365.40
Day 12: Found a place to store my Swifty 12 for a few weeks so I get to stitch and glue the Mill Creek in my garage! I feel like I am in heaven after the small shop. Started stitching the boat today. Got the bilge panels fully stitched to the bottom.
Time: 2.5 hours working alone
The bilge panels stitched to the bottom.
Day 13: Stitched the sheer panels to the bilge panels. Cut bevels on sheer clamps so the bow and stern meet in nice points. Also stitched in the bulkheads. Ran out of wire. The book says to cut the spools into 2 pieces (each piece is 180 degrees of the spool) but that gives you stitches about 6-7 inches long not the 4 or 5 that would be best. Ran down to Lowes for some 20 gauge steel wire. Cheaper than the copper and I think I like the way it snugs up better. More prone to breaking though if you try to loosen a stitch. (See note on days 17 and 18 about stitch removal.)
Fitting the bulkheads was tough. It took at least as long as stitching the sheer planks on. I measured from the bow and then to each sheer clamp to be sure they were square and also used a framing square to be sure they were not out of plumb. Had to do a bit of planing on each for a good "slip fit". Ended up using clamps at the sheer to keep the bulkheads right in place while I wired them.
Next I have to tighten up the stitches, checking that the hull pieces meet in nice smooth joints. Will save that for another day however.
Time: at least 4 hours, maybe 5 - I did not time my breaks, trip to Lowes and lunch time.
Bulkhead note: I have seen a lot of comments on the CLC forum about the bulkheads not fitting very well (even in kit boats) so I am wondering about installing them AS you stitch the boat not after.....I would put them on the bottom where the width matches and see how the boat stitches up. Pygmy does it that way as well as some of the other boats I have seen on the web.
The term "butterfly" has been used to describe this stage of stitching.
All stitched and ready for final tightening / tweeking.
Day 14: Hull is tweeked and checked for twist. Seams meet nicely and the stem/stern are plumb. I like the lines. Had to add a few stitches here and there to get the hull seams neat. Very few gaps in the seams. Most of the gaps close up nicely as you tighten the stitches. I worked 1/3 of the boat at time. Did the top seam on each side of the bow section then the bottom seam of the bow section. I then moved to the center cockpit section and finally to the stern section. The few gaps that do persist are 1/16" to 1/8" and short. Very minor. All hull lines look fair.
Installed knees. Ready to glue and tape! Will wait a few days and look over the boat again with fresh eyes before proceeding just to be safe.
Time: 1 hour
Total Time To Date: 26.5 hours
Day 15: Lots of epoxy mixing. I applied the fillets to the bow section and then taped the seams immediately. Coated the rest of the bare wood too. After it cures overnight I will 2nd coat the bow section and it is done. The book is vague (or I am dense)about the stem fillet. No specific directions. I thought about this a lot. I did a small fillet in the bow - a 1" radius fillet stick. I then filleted and taped the plank seams on each side of the bow section. The tape runs just up to the fillet in the bow. Note that the two bottom fillets meet and overlap at the bow/stem. I let this be pretty thick to be sure of a strong joint. My plan is to add a bit more fillet after this all cures up and then apply tape over that bigger fillet. May be over kill but the small fillet would be hard to tape smoothly. I like neatness even though no one will ever see it. With this method I will not do the bow/stern "pours" of epoxy.
Time: 1.5 hours
Day 16: Repeat of Day 15 for the stern section and center cockpit section. Tried pre-wetting the glass tape on a flat surface (work table covered in foil) and then applying the tape to the seams. Not worth the effort. I think it actually takes longer since you have to fuss with the tape to get it straight. If you were using multiple layers of tape I would do it however.
For the center section I put the tape on dry then smoothed it with a dry chip brush. That was the best way. My fingers are too likely to smoosh the wet fillet but the bristles push just hard enough. I applied the tape on each fillet as I went rather than doing all the fillets first and then taping.
I also second coated the bow section after I added the second fillet layer and tape to the bow seam. I don't think I would tape the bow and stern inside again. Not easy to do and probably adds little to no strength since the seam is taped on the outside.
I installed a "false endpour" at the bow and stern. Since I used substantial fillets at each end I am not going to fill up the ends with epoxy - it costs too much! Instead I cut a small wedge of scrap 1/4" plywood and glued it to the bottom of the sheer clamp. I put one at each end of the boat. I'll fill my little tray up with thickened epoxy when I install the deck. This re-inforces the ends and gives me something to put screws into for the padeyes I plan to install when the boat is done.
Time: 5 hours (in two sessions, I fillet slowly!)
All filleting and glass taping done.
The "false endpour" or breasthook piece.
Cost Tally: added $4.50 for another qt of wood flour. I was near the end of the 3rd qt and did not want to run out doing the exterior seam filling and deck installation. Total $369.90
Day 17: Applied a second coat of epoxy to the center and stern sections. Did a test of removing stitches. I have used a small hand held butane torch that is not much bigger than a cigarette lighter to heat wires for removal before but was eager to know if the method would work on this boat since the stitches are kinked in to the hull before filleting (the rounded part of the stitch, inside the boat, is pushed flat to the hull with a screwdriver - helps hold the panels in place). Worked fine. Got the bulkhead and knee stitches out and a few other ones too. Will wait until later today to pull the rest of the stitches.
CLC says to clip them off, grind flat and leave them in the boat. Devlin's book says abosolutely take them out. I figure that pulling them will take about the same time as clipping and grinding. Note that the copper stitches come out easier than the steel ones. The steel ones need more heating. Copper transfers the heat much better.
Time: 3/4 hour
Stitch removal update: Seems that the heating to remove the stitch can leave a light streak visible in the fillet from the interior. Likely that this is due to the thin bilge panel/sheer panel fillets. The thicker bottom/bilge panel fillets don't seem to do this as much. Would be a real bummer if you planned to varnish the interior but I will be painting. I have only done the bow section so will sleep on whether to remove or cut the rest.
All the stitches removed.
Day 18: Decided to remove the rest of the stitches. The copper ones come out easy with just 5 - 8 seconds of heating with the torch but the steel ones come out hard - need to heat far longer but better if you can heat both ends of the stitch. Got them all out with much less "tracking" inside the boat. I believe that overheating them caused the tracks when the stitch was close to the glass tape where the fillets are thin. Only 3 stitches would not come out or broke off too close to heat - all steel stitches. The flexible nature of the copper helps too I bet.
Time: 2 hours to remove the stitches.
Day 19: Rough sanded the interior cockpit. Much easier to do now without the side deck supports (carlins)installed which is the next step prior to turning the hull over for seam prep and fiberglassing.
Time: 1 hour
Day 19: Installed the two carlins. After much discussion about how to bend the pieces I made slight (1/4 way through) relief cuts on the inside edge (concave) of the carlins to ease the bend of the very stiff mahogany I am using. This is the same stock as the shear clamps but the bend is tighter and the pieces are shorter. After I cut the end bevels (where the join to the forward bulkhead) I did a test install and found that the bend was not as severe as I thought. I was worried that the butt joints at the forward bulkhead would not take the bending strain but no problem with the #8 x 1 1/2 inch screws holding them. Filled the holes with epoxy and coated the screws prior to installing. The relief cuts did the trick. The cuts will be filled in with epoxy when the deck and coaming trim is installed later.
Time: 1 hour
Carlins installed.
The carlin-forward bulkhead joint I was so worried about (needlessly).
Day 20: Prep sanded hull. Rounded off all corners and seams using the block plane and 100 grit on the random orbital. Filled some minor gaps with thickened epoxy.
Time: 1.5 hours
Cost Tally revised: I forgot to add the cost of the plans! The plans (including the great how to build book) cost $69.00 so the new total is $438.90 or more than I had hoped. Still less than the kit ($699 + $79 shipping) however.
Total Time To Date: 39.25 hours
Day 21: Sanded all that nasty epoxy I used to fill the holes and gaps yesterday. No go way to do it except lots of 100 grit paper. (1.5 hours)
Fiberglassed the hull. Used 6 oz. cloth. I used a brush to get the epoxy on the bow and stern ends and a plastic spreader for the middle of the boat(dump and spread). The straight vertical ends of the boat just made getting the epoxy onto the glass a real mess. The chip brush worked well however. Had to be really careful to smooth and straighten the glass away from the wet edge to keep it flat even though I had it all smooth and flat to start. The glass shifts a bit as you brush and squeegee. Sure would be a help to have a mixer helping. This took me a bit over 2 hours working alone. I could have cut that in half if someone was mixing for me but wife and daughters were making Christmas cookies and candy today. Yum.
After the epoxy had set I cut off the excess and put 3" glass tape on each end to reinforce the stem and stern. Got it to bend pretty well - only needed to cut one dart to get the tape to lay flat.
Time: 4 hours today total
Laying up the glass with epoxy.
All done! Sure looks good all nice and bright.
Day 22: Applied 2 fill coats to the glass cloth. One early AM (like 5 AM) and the other about 7PM. Using a thin foam roller. Looks like it will take at least 2 more coats to fill the cloth fully.
Time: 1.25 hours total
Day 23: Added a 3rd coat this morning. Again up at 5 so I could get it done before work. This looked good but unfortunately I dicovered that I had missed a few spots so had to touch them up in the evening. Will let cure now for several days then sand lightly. Then its time to turn the boat back over and install the deck or maybe finish the cockpit then the deck.
Time: .25 hours
Day 24: After letting the epoxy cure for several days I sanded the hull using the Porter Cable Random Orbital and 100 grit disks. I also use a simple dust collection system to make the job much more pleasant. I have a shop vac hooked to a plastic garbage can that has a dust collection top on it. The hose to the sander runs to this can (where the dust swirls and drops into the can) and then back to the shop vac. I wear ear protection and my respirator to sand epoxy. All the seams and corners were hand sanded to avoid spoiling them with the power sander. My hand nicely cups the sandpaper over the edges. I used the disks off the RO sander folded in half to hand sand. Since the disks had been "used up" on the power sander they cut just right along the edges.
Later in the day I flipped the boat to work on the cockpit. Since I have already done the major sanding on the cockpit and tape edges I just needed to fill the slight lip at the tape edges to fully smooth them out. I am painting the cockpit so I used a epoxy/microballons putty to fill in along the tape edges. Nice purple color.
Time: less than 2 hours to fully sand the hull.
Time: 30 minutes to putty the cockpit tape edges.
Hull is sanded and ready to turn over.
Total Time To Date: 47 hours
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