Classic Boat – September 2019

CRAFTSMANSHIP

Boatbuilder’s Notes

WOOD

Tough and

fiery yew

RO

BIN

GA

TE

S

RO

BIN

G

AT

ES

BY ROBIN GATES

Since growing up between Kingley Vale, Europe’s

finest yew wood, and a Sussex creek of old wooden

boats, yew and boats have remained inextricably

linked in my affections. A teenage attempt at using the

timber on board, replacing the dinghy’s rowlocks with

yew thole pins, was not a success, but that was down

to my clumsy oarsmanship. Practically, there could

hardly have been a better timber for the job.

Although saddled with the label ‘softwood’, yew is

in no sense soft. It’s considerably harder than English

oak, with similar weight, lower shrinkage and

consequently better stability than our benchmark

native ‘hardwood’. The fiery colours in a fresh-split log

are breathtaking, ranging through orange, scarlet and

even purple. When planed, the lustrous, blood-red

heartwood is as intriguing as the muscular and

meandering boughs of the trees themselves. Yew is

fantastic for furniture, typically applied sparingly as

edgings and veneers, but it’s also among the oldest of

our tough boatbuilding timbers.

Its key qualities are durability and resilience. That’s

why the Vikings made treenails of it, and way before

that Bronze Age people made twisted lashings from

its pliable withies and roots to join the oak planks of

their flat-bottomed boats.

True, all parts of the yew (bar the bright red aril

around the seed) are poisonous, but unless you

anticipate having to feed on your timbers while

marooned on a desert island that’s not a problem.

It probably accounts for yew’s excellent resistance

to insect attack.

Left: File the tip of the screw flat; Right: Testing for evenness of depth

Depth without

numbers

The more that numbers can be

eliminated from boatbuilding, the less

prone to human error it becomes.

Whether to use metric or imperial

measurements is irrelevant if you build

using templates, story sticks, and

perhaps this little adjustable depth

gauge you can make in minutes using

an offcut and a woodscrew. Bore the

timber with a pilot hole (not clearance

hole) to suit the screw, and file the tip

of the screw flat so that it bears on the

surface rather than digs into it.

1 Ancient yew at Kingley Vale

2 Mirrored halves of a split yew log

3 Bright red aril around the seed

4 A translucent shaving from the plane

4

3

2

1