Wooden Boat People

By McKenzieDriftBoat.com

Looking to visit a Rapid Robert or Trapper in the Gorge

Hello . .

I'm in the planning stages of a boat build. I almost always thought I'd build a 16' double-ender with transom . . . classic. But, I'm now thinking that I should at least consider a Trapper, or a Rapid Robert. I sure would like to see some in person.

I live in the Columbia River Gorge (the Sunny Side (Washington)), but I'm willing to travel a bit to check some boats out.

I will mostly be floating the Klickitat River, but occasionally might travel, and occasionally might like the ability to throw a little motor on and tool about bobber fishing for summer steelhead, or touring my lady.

The Klickitat runs very low during prime fishing season, and I just hate the sound of a rigid, stiff aluminum boat banging/scraping on those rocks.

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Permalink Reply by lhedrick on September 25, 2012 at 8:02am

There is an issue with your idea of a double ender with transom.

Since the sides of a drift boat are flared, when you pull the side together back at the transom, it lifts the floor. A dirt boat with a motor just doesn't work all that well with rocker at the back end when a motor is on the thing. You also need a long shaft motor. Making a 5 foot long downward arching line back toward the transom on the side panel will flatten out the bottom but, since the line of the chine on most of these boats is a straight cut when working with 48 inch stock there is no material to add below the chine once it's cut out.

Roger's book is great because it shows all the side panel layouts of the different boats and how they map on top of the flat panel stock. Adding rocker on the sides is possible but it's not really possible to take it away unless you use wider stock.

I would advise starting with the plans in the book and building some models. Then build another with your ideas and changes. You will quickly see how 48 inches wide panels limits our options if we must get both panels from 2 end to end sheets.

In the book look at the side panels of the Briggs design. Since each side is cut out from a full 48 inch panel the result is a complex boat with a flat spot in the middle and rocker up front and rear but, a bunch of plywood is left over and it's kind of an odd shape. When a Briggs panel is laying flat, the chine and gunwale lines are long arching lines whereas the Mckenzie boats are all simple straight lines. The Briggs and Rogue boats are the dory type boats which are complex. The properties of the Mckenzie are trade offs constrained by the number 48. The Briggs design exploits more possibilities at the expense of wasting some plywood. I know the Briggs is not what you are looking to build but it illustrates the point.

I would recommend building what you want, not what stock material dictates.

As for the idea of saving plywood by 100 percent usage of a 192X48, it's a clean idea but, no matter how much work I do I am always looking for scrap plywood for something. Waste for me never comes into play.

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Permalink Reply by Eric Loudenslager on September 26, 2012 at 7:53pm

Take a look at Rick Finnel's page. He has pictures of his RR. Provides a perspective on whether it would meet your needs.