<<<<<< DORY - BUILDING THE GLOUCESTER GULL DORY No 1 >>>>>>

Gloucester Gull Dory (Photo from the internet)

The Gloucester Gull Dory was designed by the innovative American yacht designer Phil Bolger. Harold Payson popularized this Dory with his book 'How to Build The Gloucester Gull Dory'. I have had Payson's book for years and have now decided to build my own Dory. With arthritis affecting my left ankle and right knee to the point that long walks or running (what's that?) are distant memories. So I am going to add to my fitness kit of sailing my OK Dinghy and riding my Brompton folding bike with rowing my Gloucester Gull.

The first step is to read the manual. This is all that I have to go on - no full sized patterns or plans. But the book will do - but I need a magnifying glass, not just because of my age, but because some of the measurements are a bit blurry and hard to read.

I drafted the shape of each mold out onto half inch construction plywood. The first four molds are ready to go. I cut them out close to the drafted lines with a jigsaw and fine tuned the shapes with a small hand plane.......... to be continued - much more to come.