The Gartside Pram Progresses

Each week throughout this past summer, members of OLAS have been gathering at the shed on the docks to build a beautiful little wooden boat. A pram designed by Paul Gartside.

Earlier this summer the last of the planks went on and a celebration was called for to celebrate the hanging of the ‘whiskey plank’. Some whiskey may have been consumed.

Then, long time member Gerry Stensgaard came down to lead a refresher course on the finer points of creating rivets with copper nails and specialized washers called roves and how to use them to make fast the boat’s frames or ribs, to the planking. Thanks again Gerry!

We then brought this little barq’ie to the Vancouver Wooden Boat Festival and ‘she’ fit right in. The weather was fine and as always, it was lovely to see a fleet of folks messing about in wooden boats. One of our members paid a quick visit to the festival in false creek is his new little double ender, shown below with a full compliment of crew. Many thanks to all our members who volunteered to make this year’s festival another success!

So the pram came back to the shed on the heritage harbour and we started to frame in earnest. Here a club member uses a pair of end nippers to clip off a nail after a rove has been driven home in preparation for peening. This is how a rivet is made.