Repair or replace these planks?

[Ben Russ]

I am sure I already know the answer to this question but I will throw it out for a consciences. The gaps between my planks are horrible and I was looking about pulling most of the planks off, cleaning up the edges etc. and then tightening the gaps, but I have noticed that several planks have split at the tacks and I am wondering if I just pull the whole plank and replace it or is there a way to fill bother the gaps and the cracks?!

 

[Dave Osborn]

You could go either way. If you are not concerned about originality, replace them, although it’s sometimes difficult to match new patina to old.
On the other hand, it’s an old canoe, and gaps happen. Cracks happen too. All part of the legacy of the canoe.
For the most part, I’ve always left them as is. Filling with thin wood or compound is fatal and ugly.
I did have a Carleton Canoe that had gaps greater than 1/4” in places, so I removed all of the planks on the bottom, cleaned them up and tightened them up. That left a 3/4” gap on the centerline which I filled in with a piece of plank from a “donor canoe” that had the old patina. No one ever knew.

 

[Ben Russ]

None of these gaps are bigger than 1/4”, most I would say would be 3/16’s” maybe. So just leave them and do the repairs I need to do and move on?

 

[floydvoid]

I would just leave what you have, I’m not seeing anything to adverse in your pictures. When you take a plank off it always gets some damage from extracting the tack head from below the wood surface. Then when you reinstall old planks the hammer blooms don’t always re-expand after wetting the hull down, leaving some dents. As they said above, if the gaps are more than a 1/4” that might be more of an issue. If the plank is misshaping the hull in some way that would be cause for redoing them, but otherwise the whole boats going to get covered up with canvas no matter what.

 

[floydvoid]

When planks are cracked, I’ll add a tack in a key spot to secure it to the rib so that it isn’t bulging and the hull is fair. Sometimes just the head holding both sides in and the shaft of the tack inside the crack. I observed that they did this in the factory as well, just secured the planking so it is firm and fair, cracks are less critical.