Maritime Wood

Master boat builder Sigurd Bjørkedal is descended from a long line of Bjørkedalen boat builders, and with previous experience in replica building (including the 7th-century Kvalsund ship replica built in 1973), he was an excellent choice for the job of building the Skuldelev 1 replica. The biggest vessel to be built in Bjørkedalen in modern times, it required, first of all, the extension of Sigurd’s old building.

In the summer of 1982, Sigurd searched his forest for pine trees that were big enough for the huge strakes of the knarr. The longest strake was to be 13.5 meters (about 44’) between scarfs, and 40cm (16”) wide. Even the local sawmill had to be extended, and it took additional work with a chainsaw to mill the huge log. Oak for the keel and stems had to be imported from Denmark, while the not-so-huge oaks needed for floor timbers and keelson were found in Nordfjord, a bit farther south on the Norwegian west coast.

The keel was laid in October, 1982, and on April 23, 1983, the ship was ready for launching. A little volunteer help came in handy in the last stages, but most of the work was done by Sigurd Bjørkedal and his two sons Jakob and Ottar.

The reconstruction plans supplied by the Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde, Denmark, gave the dimensions of most strakes and timbers, and the direction of the planking. As the original knarr is not complete, reconstruction of important details in stems and sheer was based on analogies made with other ship finds. A lines drawing was included with the plans, but, like most boat builders of western and northern Norway, Sigurd is not used to lofting and building with molds. When the keel and stems were ready and set up, building proceeded in what is, for the Bjørkedal boat- builders, the usual and normal way: without molds. As the replica was to be as close to the original as possible, Sigurd Bjørkedal used the 1/10-scale strake diagram supplied from Roskilde as a basis for his strakes, and checked shape by measuring the hull at three stations as work progressed. Some of the technical solutions used on the knarr are unknown in modern boatbuilding, even in western Norway, the stronghold of traditional clinker building.

The stems were not rabbeted, but stepped for the lowest strakes. On the inside face of the stem, snowplow-like transition pieces were fitted. These, which may be a relic from times when boat builders would hollow logs rather than fit planks, were not well preserved in the original vessel, so here Sigurd and sons had to use their judgment, using the reconstruction drawings as a rough general guide. They did much of the shaping in the traditional way, with an axe, but they also made extensive use of more modern tools, such as chainsaws precision tools in the skilled hands of these boat builders. The transition pieces were shaped to take three strakes each, with the lowermost ones taking six strakes, three on each side of the ship. Three pieces were fitted above one another on each stem.

Five strakes were fitted and shored temporarily before any framing went into the ship. Then the oak floor timbers were cut and fastened to the strakes with trunnels. The heavy keelson was fitted next, before the planking got too high. The century-old boatshed, intended for smaller vessels, was filled to the rafters, but even the huge 13.5-meter- long strakes could be lifted and fitted without too much trouble. The gentle curves made it unnecessary to steam any of the planking.