My Order of Construction

I do not make the claim that this is the definitive order of work for building a Brick, or even a complete description of how I went about it. What I will try to do here is cover the general order of work and choices that may be of use to others.

I scrounged a few of the materials and purchased most of them.

Pick One: Gold-plated or Thrifty

The first decision point is how fine a boat do you want to build. Remember that plywood boats in general tend to have no particular resale value. You will likely not be able to sell a Brick for the cost of the materials it took to build. So, the boat you build will be yours until you use it up or give it away. There are two paths one can go with these square boats.

Option A is to go all out, get the best possible materials and bring it to a sparkling yacht-like shine. This would be the gold plated option.

Option B is to build a serviceable boat as cheaply as possible. This option is the thrifty practical option. After studying the plans I decided be thrifty. No matter which way you decide to go you still have to do just as good a job cutting and fitting. A thrifty just won't last as long because of the materials used or shine as pretty. Your choice on how long you want to have your brick around. To my eye a yacht finish on a brick is a little too much.

My major materials choices were Luan plywood from Home Depot, a green polytarp sail, and latex house paint for a finish. All locally- sourced urban-indigenous materials.

I built my boats from the small-scale drawings in Bolger's Boats with an Open Mind book. I tried to execute the plans as faithfully as I could and resisted the temptation to "improve" on Mr. Bolger's design - with one small change: a kick-up rudder. More on that Later

The first thing I did was scan in the plans at an enlarged scale and print them out on heavy card stock. I drew up a lumber list, cleared out the garage – sort of, and went to Home Depot for materials. In the first major shopping run I purchased materials for the hulls. I went with exterior luan plywood and SPF (also known as Spruce/Pine/Fir) dimension lumber. For the mast stock I chose to skip the "home center" lumber in favor of goods from an actual lumber yard. I told the yard guy what I was up to and was excruciatingly careful about leaving the pile in good order when I was done. There is a certain lumber yard etiquette that one must not transgress to remain welcome where the good wood is sold.

My general plan was to fabricate all the hull pieces for both boats first and then assemble them. Mini-factory style.

Cut the sheet goods out very carefully

I cut out all the sheet goods first. Be very careful when you lay out your sides and transoms – good Mr. Bolger has truly done an excellent job of getting a lot of boat out of three sheets of plywood. This means there isn’t a lot of room for error. He wasn’t kidding when he said that he only left about an 8 by 32-inch rectangle unused. Follow the suggested layout, measure carefully and there will be just enough space. Botch a cut too badly and it's another trip to the lumberyard for another sheet of plywood. The sides and transoms serve as patterns for all the framing, gunnels and chines.

The sides were the first pieces I cut. I lay the sheet goods on a sheet of Styrofoam, clamped a commercially made strait edge down the center and ripped the sheets exactly down the center.

I stacked the four 2’ by 8’ sheets together, made sure they were all lined up against the factory cut long-edge and ends and drove a couple of small finishing nails in areas that I knew would be scrap and very very carefully laid out the curve for the bottom. I had a long batten from a previous boat-building project, which I used to draw the curve. I put a brand-new 100-tooth plywood blade on my circular saw and slowly cut rout that long curve. It worked beautifully. There was almost no tear-out and the curve cut by the circular saw was sweet and clean, much better than the results I’ve gotten trying to use a saber saw for long sweeping curves in plywood. The cut out sides were so pretty leaning up against the side of the garage. Very boatlike.

Next I stacked the two sheets for the transoms, rudder and dagger boards. Again I lined up the factory cut edged, and drove in a couple of small finishing nails to keep the panels aligned. I measured the parts out cut them to size with a circular saw.

To cut the transoms and other parts out exactly to size you need to be aware of the size of the kerf your saw will make. I cut my parts out in this order.

The red lines indicate the cuts to make first to get the parts out of the sheet The blue lines indicate the cuts for the finished dimensions of the pieces. Make all the red line cuts first, in order. Then cut the blue lines. Stack your transoms to get them exactly the same with. Stack the dagger board pieces and cut the curve with a router on a trammel.

Note: This piece of plywood is NOT the one to cheap out on. The rudder and dagger board take a lot of strain. Choose wisely and laminate well.

After I had all my sheet goods cut I ripped my 1x8s into strips for chines, transom frames and gunnels. I’m afraid I didn’t do a brilliant job of fitting the chines along the bottom. There were gaps that I had to fill with epoxy. Blessed be thickened epoxy.

I glued all the framing to the plywood with polyurethane glue. I chose poly because I had more of it in my shop than I had epoxy and It has worked will for other boat projects. I don't expect that my Brick will spend enough nonstop time in the water for absolute waterproofness to be an issue.

I applied the framing with clamps and drywall screws. Check out a Tools and Tips section of this site for a description of the clamps.

Rudder and Dagger Board

The plywood destined to become the rudder and dagger board is laminated to a half-inch thickness. The curves on both pieces were easiest to cut with a router on a trammel.

 Applying the Chines, Frames and Gunnels

I left all of the chines and frames about 1/8" proud of the edged of the plywood and trimmed them flush with a flush trimming router bit. This is an example of using the plywood parts as a pattern. Leaving that little bit extra to trim off with the router freed me from having to be too precise when I was bandsawing out the chines. When it came time to fit the bottom I had wonderfully smooth fair curves to bend the bottom onto. If I were to make a larger number of Bricks, as a school or boy scout project I would toss a sheet of 1/4" masonite onto the stack when I cut out the sides. The masonite would serve as a pattern to run a flush trimming router bit against. One could cut the sides out with no measuring.

Masts and Spars

The second major lumbar yard trip was for materials for the masts. The plans call for a maximum width of 2 1¼"which is just about as deep as my circular saw will cut. I trimmed the rounded edges off of the 16 foot 2x8s that I had purchased and saved the trimmed off pieces for making the rub-rails for the bottom.

I used every clamp I owned and wished that I had a few more. I think the next time I make a square mast I will take the time and make a bunch of shop-made clamps so I can put one every six inches or so. Harold Payson has some good descriptions of mast building in his Build the New Instant Boats book. The mast for Gypsy is pretty much the same as the mast called for with Brick. I made up a version of the spar-making jig described in the appendix to mark out the facets for the eight-sided mast

Attaching Sides to Transoms

I assembled the boats on the upside down on the floor of my garage. The exterior chines give you a place to put a spring clamp to keep the parts aligned while tacking them together with some drywall screws. Some have argued that the exterior chines add a great deal of drag to the boat and should be converted to interior chines in the interest of greater speed. I cannot judge the veracity of that claim, but I do strongly recommend that for one's first brick follow what the designer has specified as closely as you are able. For your second brick, feel free to indulge you creative impulses, compare, contrast, and see how much practical wisdom Mr. Bolger has put down on paper for you. Modify at your peril.

Because this is a square boat, you can check the alignment of the transoms to the sides with a framing square. Doesn't hurt to make sure the diagonals are the same also. It is pretty important to be sure you get your sides and transoms square. If they are too far out of alignment your will have some trouble getting the bottom on.

Putting on the bottom

The bottom went on with sheet rock screws, polyurethane glue and some ring shank boat nails. Be sure that you keep your sides plumb, it's easy to let the middles lean inwards a little. You will have to trim the bottom to match the bevel of the transoms. A sharp block plane does the job easily.

The Gussets

I looked at those 1/4" gussets that I had cut out from the sheet that provided the sides and thought - these are just too flimsy to work. Also, I could envision using the gussets to haul the boat up onto the beach and didn't like the idea of grabbing onto wood that thin. There was sufficient 5/8" scrap in my shop to make alternate gussets. I suggest you do the same. I would even go to 3/4 inch. Did I just contradict myself? Why yes, but do remember that the hull material I choose was luan plywood - quite splintery. I like to think that had I gone with douglas fir plywood of sufficient quality I would have stuck to the plan as drafted.

With the boats together I taped the bottom seams with fiberglass and epoxy to seal them and help with abrasion resistance. I recommend doing this. The Brick as designed is flimsy boat. That little big of epoxy helps out a lot.

The Finish

For paint I used some good exterior latex primer followed by several coats of flat exterior latex that was a shade too light to use on the garage. Followed by a coat of semi-gloss exterior latex in a color called "electric orange" - which is very close to "safety orange", also know in some circlea as "OSHA Orange". I'm told it makes the boat very very visible on the water.

The sails

I made the sails from green polytarp. The edge laced to the mast uses the factory edge. Several grommets were added as needed. The leach and foot were reinforced with 1/8" braided nylon cord. When you get your polytarp - look for tarp repair tape. A single roll will about do a Brick sail. It works well enough to be worth the cost.

The offcuts from trimming the mast to width made excellent battens for cutting out the sails.

The grommets look nice, but are not designed for marine applications. Although they are set in at least two layers of tarp I’m pretty sure they will eventually tear out. Time will tell.

Materials/Cost List

And here are the costs: $$$

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