We received an email from builder William Bains with photos of his absolutely gorgeous Squirt, our popular 10-foot runabout. We asked Bill a few questions about this build:

Why did you choose Squirt design? 

I chose the squirt for a few reasons. My first requirement was that the boat had to fit in my shop because I like to be able to stay warm when I'm working on projects and the North Olympic Peninsula here in Washington gets cold for a good part of the year. Secondly, it had to be a design that I had the required woodworking skills to actually be able to build and as I started looking for that I happened upon Glen-L and the many designs made especially for the home builder. Looking through the web site I was intrigued by the Zip, but its fourteen-foot length was too large. I then came upon the Squirt and immediately felt that this was the one. It has those classic lines of the early Chris Crafts and at only ten to eleven feet it fit in my shop. Finally, being a small runabout made with 1/4" plywood, it wouldn't cost a fortune to build, I thought.

Did you find the build difficult? 

I didn't have too much trouble building the Squirt, although there were a few hiccups along the way. The full-size templates for the stem, breast hook and frame members were very helpful and made those parts easy to fabricate. I ran into trouble when I broke the first and second attempts trying to bend the chine into place. I finally rigged up a steam box using my Coleman stove with a large pot attached to a four-inch flexible hose connected to a ten-foot long, four-inch diameter plastic pipe. I left the third chine in that contraption for about a half hour and it bent nicely into place. I had a similar problem getting the 1/4" marine plywood to bend at the transom to form the tumblehome. I again solved that with my Coleman stove and boiling water steaming up into a plastic tent formed around the stubborn plywood. After about twenty minutes the bend was easily made. I think one of the harder parts of the build was in the fairing. I spent a lot of time with a variety of planes getting all the framing ready to accept the plywood skin. Also, finishing the completed hull was a challenge with the first step being fiberglassing with epoxy resin. I found there was a bit of a learning curve to that process and when it was cured the final sanding took a very long time. The paint scheme on the hull, part of which I borrowed from Art Atkinson's Squirt was also challenging since I had never done anything quite like that before. It was really satisfying seeing that come together.  

Any modifications or deviations from plans?

I only made a few deviations from the plans. Since I am a bit over six feet tall, I added six inches to the cockpit and two inches to the foredeck making the boat 10' 8" long. Also, since the plans call for a ten-horse engine and I wanted more power, I reinforced the transom by inletting the coaming a half inch into it and I added corner blocks where the transom meets the chine, shear and both sides of the coaming.