Barnacle Bill Magazine February 2016 | Page 21

21 The Bosun’s Mate Every month in “The Bosun’s Mate” we’ll bring you technical tips about boat building and maintenance, rope work, rigging, sails, and everything related to the subject from professional boat builders, chandlers, shipwrights, designers and wood workers. This month regular contributor Mike Field owner of specialist chandler’s Wooden Boat Supplies of Australia, brings us instructions on how to fit and remove plugs the right way...i.e. NO BODGING! and NO EPOXY! Mark Aplin, boatbuilder from Overwater Boats here in the UK brings tech tips on marking our curved pan el edges, shaping curved panels and cutting a centre board or dagger board slot Tools Building or maintaining your boat requires some work. It’s a hell of a lot easier if you have the right tools for the job. Wood is a joy to work with the right tools, with the wrong tools it is a nightmare and can cause damage. Finding tools can be an expensive business especially if you are buying quality woodworking tools. A professional plane can cost you upwards of £500 ($800). However, second hand tools especially vintage or antique can be a cheaper and better alternative. Car boot and lawn sales are good places to find quality tools for not a lot of money. I picked up a lovely set of carving chisels last summer for under £10 at a car boot sale. Antique fairs can also be a gold mine. eBay is OK but the years of finding bargains on eBay are past, especially in the and especially in a field like vintage tools. Another source can be to put out a request to family and friends, it’s amazing what people have got stuffed in the attic or the shed. Often tools like this will need a bit of TLC, a bit of emry paper, a sharpen on an oil stone and perhaps a new handle is all they will often require. Then there are companies who specialise in selling antique and reconditioned tools. The Best Things Corp. of Virginia, USA are specialists in quality tools and vintage wood working tools. Although not a boatbuilder’s tool specialist, they stock many of the chisels, planes, saws, rasps etc that boat builders use as often as any other wood worker. You can find them at: www.thebestthings.com BARNACLE BILL’S TECH TIP! Got a screw that has snapped off when you’ve tried to remove it? Simple - get a spring pin of a larger diameter than the screw, cut a couple of notches in it with a hack saw or a Dremel in the bevelled end of the pin. Then fit it into a drill and use it as a cutting tool to remove the screw and surrounding wood as a whole. plug and fill as usual. Lee Richmond, one of the founders of The Best Things Corp. has been dealing in tools since shortly after he graduated from Swarthmore College in 1985. In 1997 he joined with another entrepreneur to found The Best Things Corp. While continuing to grow the traditional woodworking business that Lee founded, The Best Things also sells products in other categories, but always with the same goal of only offering the best. Today Lee is one of the country’s leading experts on antique cabinetmaking tools. Some of you will have seen Lee on the popular PBS series, The Antiques Roadshow, appraising antique tools as an expert on the show.