Hina: We Built A Live-on Boat For $300! Part II

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Here's a cutaway view of the bulkhead, the ballast keel, and the beam that runs between bulkheads and to which the keel is bolted.

RUDDER: Of course, no boat-not even Hlna!-can be kept under control without a rudder. Our vessel's steering setup is quite rudimentary . . . but it works just fine.

Your local scrap yard can outfit you with rugged, dependable rudder hardware for next to nothing. All you need are some short pieces of angle iron (or you can make bent steel straps of your own), a hacksaw, and an electric drill. We rustproofed all of our steel fittings by coating them with plastic asbestos roof coating, which worked well.

In this drawing you see every part of the rudder depicted twice . . . once from a distance and once up close. The rudder hinge, for instance—which we made by bending a 1/8-inch X 2-inch steel strap around a 1/2-inch pipe and welding the two together—is shown with the entire rudder and the transom in the upper right, and by itself in exploded view in the center.

OARLOCKS: Despite the fact that—at a length of 21 feet— Hina was a bit large and heavy for sustained rowing, we included oarlocks in our design. We made them from small, shaped wooden blocks attached to the hull as shown.

MAST AND BALLAST: We also utilized the bulkheads on Hina as supports for our mast. The mast itself was simply a planed-down warehouse beam. (A straight, sturdy tree would have done as well.) We bolted our mizzen holder stoutly to a thick cross-member called the mast step, and rested this upside-down-T construction to the fore and aft bulkheads.

Our ballast keel was sort of unusual . . . an 18-inch-deep section of steel I-beam with 6-inch flanges. This hefty piece of equipment measured in at 5-1/2 feet long and 300 pounds. The ballast keel, of course, hangs down from the centerline of the vessel and provides an inertial pull against swaying and tipping. It keeps the boat from bobbing about like a cork.

This drawing depicts the internal framing to which both the ballast keel and mast are anchored. Notice the interlocking relationship between the deck beam (A), bulkhead (B), cross-member (C), and stringers (D). This system of construction spreads stress loads from the mast and keel over a large area.

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