Rib Tip Replacement Criteria

Michael Graessle

Enthusiastic about Wooden Canoes
I am trying to determine which rib tips to replace on my 1924 OT. I am not sure what a good rule of thumb is for determining which to replace and which to leave. Should I be concerned with a small crack or two in the top or how much "meat" is left to tack the rib back to the gunwales?

If you would not mind, of the attached photos which should be replaced? I included a sampling across the canoe. I have a feeling 65- 75% of the 104 ribs may need replacement.

Additionally, Should I be concerned with weakening the cone by replacing this many?
 

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Cracks, yes, but I'm not seeing a lot of rot in the rib tips in these photos. Assuming that is correct, I'd put a couple drops of epoxy into each crack rather than replace. The only questionable rib tip is photo 2 with the hunk out of one side. Maybe I'd replace it, but I've also patched some like that with a wedge of new wood plus epoxy. I've replaced a lot of rib tips when the wood was punky, but I've also damaged good tips and inwales while trying to pull out badly rusted nails, so have become averse to tip replacement unless it is really needed. Tom McCloud.
 
Tom, Thank you for the advice. I purposefully left the rot as those were simple decisions to replace. For the most part, those rib tips are just simply gone. There are a couple that were broken a long time ago and incorrectly repaired as well. Most of these are in the stems, which will have to be repaired and scarfed as well.
 

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AWCWO - Good question I am facing the same issue. I'm also questioning whether to "clean-up" some less-than-optimum previous attempts at rib repair or just suckitup and replace them.

TOM - Your answer (a couple of drops...) was refreshing.
 
Is there room to tack a canvas to these ribs?
There seem to be scads of nails present. At most you would expect two nails to secure the rib to the rail..
If you search this site you will find quite a bit of discussion related to rib tip repairs and replacement.
As with any parts on a canoe, replacing bits is done out of necessity...when a repair is not possible or when visible, attractive.
 
MGC, I have looked through the forums, there is also a lot of information on the "how to " aspect of rib tip repair and replacement, but found very little in the way of guidance of good/bad rib tips, other than the obvious rot. It may be just a matter of using a poor search string on my part.

I do have a lot of nails in the tips and I am removing A LOT of staples (steel of course) from each tip. This is when I started wondering when is too much abuse/nails/cracks/etc too much? Is it more practical just to change the rib tip and start over with fresh wood and just two nails? I also want to make an attractive gunwale when it is all said and done. If I use epoxy to seal some cracks, how will it look after I varnish everything?

Thank you for the help and with having patience with my inexperience.
 
If I use epoxy to seal some cracks, how will it look after I varnish everything?

Remember that new wood will be a different color than your old tips, so if you replace, you will be staining new tips to match. Epoxy in a cracked tip will be nearly invisible. If there is a large crack that requires sanding dust mixed with epoxy, you can color match by using lighter colored sanding dust than the old wood, as it always looks darker when set up in epoxy. If you are pulling rusted nails out of the old tips with either a tack puller or vice grip, slide something solid, like the blade of a putty knife, underneath the puller to minimize the crushing of the adjacent wood. Tom McCloud
 
Tom, Thank you for the advice. Unfortunately, some of the rib tips do have areas of crushing. Admittedly, some was caused by my inexperience as learning curve developed. I was pulling staples with a pic and used a chisel for the backer. It was not wide enough and did crush some spots. Thankfully, I many of the self induced damage was on a rib tip I plan to replace or is below the visible tip.

I plan on practicing epoxy fills on a couple rib tips I have to replace. My thought was to use some of the damage tips to use as sanding dust, but on your advice, this may be too dark.

Is there a rule of thumb of how much tip to replace? Can I replace the upper two inches with the scarf angled toward the outside so most of the original rib shows and the scarf line is obscured by the gunwales?
 
I'm not aware of any rule of thumb for this job, just cut back the old rib tip to where you have solid wood to tie into. If the glue joint is within an inch or so of the inwale, it's in a place that is not really visible. I do try to make the scarf joint rather long, 3/4 - 1 inch of contact. Tom McCloud
 
An alternative would be to soak each tip in rot wood hardener then use bronze embedded nuts in the inwale and pull tight with bronze flat head machine screws
 
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