The first big project through our shop in 2018 – 3 whitewater aluminum dories.

2017 wrapped up for us in the shop with an order of 2 dories.  We we're lucky enough to get to work with AzRA and Brad Dimock on a new dory design.   The hulls are what we’re calling a "Dimock" evolved Briggs design.  The boats is 6% longer, 8% taller, and 10% wider than a standard Briggs hull.  With commercial loads these days, the old Briggs style boat may be too small to do what is asked of it.
And so the construction began:

Overall the boats are going to be 17’10” in length, 88” in width, 52+" floor, transom ended, with a removable transom cap.  To keep the floor stiffeners from communicating water, we are using 1” square tube that will be capped on the ends.
And, because we have yet to find an extrusion that can accommodate the bow and transom angles, there are the doublers on the bow and the stern.  Thanks Bob for the nice curves!

Building the Jig

All those hours playing with an erector set as a kid really helped when it came time to working with uni-strut.
We’ve fretted over how to get the good fair lines for the boats, here’s what we came up with:

With a clamp every station, we can manipulate the curve to keep it fair and constant with the lofting plan.  That’s Colin in the picture, pleased with how well we can hold the curve.
And then the laser keeps us honest.

The boats stay in the shape jig for bulkheads and seat back framing. Thanks to Bego for all the pictures.  More to come...