The first few steps

1 The plywood parts are held in place by wooden ‘tabs’ which have to be cut to release the parts. This part of the process took longer than Jeremy expected – nearly a quarter of his time so far. He found a Japanese rasp ideal for cleaning up the cut tabs afterwards. 4 To ensure the planks were correctly aligned, a tack was tapped through the pre-drilled hole on either part of the scarf. The hole is deliberately not centred to make sure the plank-halves are not flipped by mistake. 7 The assembled jig, the right way up. The lugs are locked in place using a simple but ingenious system of wedges. 10 The frames all slot into the jig. The hull is shaped by the frames alone, which remain a permanent part of the structure. Note: the building jig and frame alignment method differs on the set of plans and instructions on pbo.co.uk

2 The Jordan Boats kit offers two options for joining the planks: short finger joints backed with GRP or traditional scarfing joints. Jeremy opted for the scarfs, which he measured up here to give a ratio of 6:40, or about 1:7. 3 He built a simple jig to produce the desired scarf angle. The guides of the router will run over the blue strips of wood, with the plank held firmly in place underneath. 5 A string is then stretched between two pre-drilled points at each either of the plank. When the string lines up over the middle tack, the plank is aligned. 6 The components of the building jig are broken out of the MDF sheet and ready to assemble. It’s important to put them together in the correct order… 8 Jeremy improved on the basic jig by adding legs to raise it to a better working height. He suggests it would be even better if some diagonal braces were added to the legs to stiffen them up. 9 A rectangular block screwed to the inside of the transom is used to locate it. Note the flat ‘lands’ precut to receive the planks. Unlike traditional boatbuilding, the edges are not bevelled: the gaps will be filled with epoxy instead. 11 The apron (or ‘inner stem’) is locked in place between the jig and the forward frame/ bulkhead. Everything is in place, ready to receive the bottom board. Note the limber holes precut on the undersides of the frames. 12 The bottom board is in place, and the garboard planks are being offered up. This is the hardest plank to fit, as there’s considerable twist where it meets the apron.