Kansei -- Finished!

Today was the last day before our launching in Kobe harbor, and I wrapped up the boat, installing a little door aft under the deck, rigging lines for the sculling oar and the paddle, mooring lines, cleaning up, etc.  But I need to back up a bit here and show some of the final shots of construction.  It was a wee bit stressful, so I didn't take so many photos...

Roughing out the stem.  I cut the taper as best I could from both faces using the circular saw then cut through the remainder with a handsaw.

Here is the rough stem wedged in place.  Eventually it got nailed from the inside through the inner stem.  Murakami san doesn't plane the planking flush to the outer face of the inner stem, instead he leaves about 1/4 inch proud.  He says this makes it easier to fit the outer stem because all you have to plane are the plank edges.  He actually leaves the gap at the bottom which is probably smart so water can drain out of the space between the inner and outer stems.

I decided to use the toko, or aft beam, that Murakami san sent us.  I had a lovely chunk of hinoki picked out for this but in the interest of time (and one less thing for me to worry about making) I used his.  I felt is was also a nice way to honor him, having something he made in the boat.  It is mortised into the side planking about two inches.  There was about a 1/4" difference in the mortises between his boat and mine.

These planks form the cover of the fish well.  The hole is to get a finger in to lift them out and the V-cut is to help orient the boards.  The floorboards, visible to either side, are made the same way.

Here are some views of the boat finished.

An L-shaped bolt drops down through the toko and passes through the kuru koberi and the planking.

The rope loop hanging off the port side aft is for the paddle.  Try to imagine paddling a boat from this position, swinging and feathering it while it hangs in the rope loop.  I made a few attempts at this last spring in Tohoku but failed miserably (and I thought paddling tub boats was hard).  The fisherman I was with could easily and quickly propel the boat this way.

View of the finished boat from the bow.  Our sculling oar and paddling are sitting alongside.  I will be using the sculling oar at our launching tomorrow.