Ships Fastenings
Introduction
As Wreck Inspector for the Western Australian Museum I came across many ships fastenings and in trying to provenance and correctly describe them studied those from the well-documented 200-year period after the advent of the underwriters, Lloyd’s of London around 1760. It revealed nearly 100 English-language terms in European-tradition wooden boat and shipbuilding alone. These and other encountered later appear in the list taken form my latest (2005) work on the subject.
My first work on the subject appeared in 1983 in the pages of The Bulletin of the Australian Institute for Maritime Archaeology (AIMA) and went out to an international audience three years after in the pages of The International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 25(3): 177-206. My 2006 work entitled Ship’s Fastenings: from sewn boat to steamship expanded on those works and was based on hundreds of sources. An overview spanning millenia and many boats, it remains but a pointer to a myriad of deeper studies by expert others past and present who, though far to numerous to list here, appear in the references to the 2005 work. Clearly I defer to them in their respective areas of expertise.
Notwithstanding the alarmingly long list appearing below, the fastenings used to secure craft ranging from the sewn boat through to the steamship can be divided into two main categories, the metallic and organic forms. These in turn can then be distilled into surprisingly few major subsections.
Organic fastenings can be divided into ligatures (i.e. anything used in binding, or tying) and wooden fastenings.
Ligatures of rope, cord or threads were made of organic substances like papyrus, reeds, coconut fibre, grass, coir, hemp, reeds, grasses, vines, rattan (a form of climbing palm), root, animal sinew and leather, ‘withies’ i.e. young shoots or thin branches of wood. This ‘cordage’ can appear in the form of ‘stitches’, lacings, ligatures, and lashings.
Wooden fastenings, which can appear in the form of dowels, pins, treenails (trunnels), pegs, tenons, ‘keys’, mortise-and-tenon joints, and coaks were constructed of an equally wide variety of timbers.
Treenails, can be found ‘short’ i.e. not passing completely through the timbers being joined, or ‘through’, and are generally ‘wedged’ and/or ‘pegged’ to help secure them in place.
Types of Organic Fastenings
a) Wood
cleat
dottle
double dovetail clamp
dovetail key
dowel
draw tongue
free tenon
ligature peg
locked draw tongue
lath
loose tenon
coak
peg
pegged tenons
plug treenail
punch
rail
spile
pegs
tenon
tenon pegs
tongue
treenail/trunnel/trennel
treenail wedge
treenail plug
treenail peg
unpegged tenons
wedge
withy
b) Natural fibre
braid
cord
lashing
ligature
rope
sennit
thread
Metallic fastenings generally comprise iron, copper and copper alloys like bronze, Muntz Metal and others similar. These can be divided into nails, bolts and miscellaneous forms, with the last category including keel staples, dovetails and other plates.
Some types e.g. the large square-sectioned nail (or spike) have been in use for thousands of years. Large circular sectioned nails that do not project though the timbers being joined are called short–or blind-bolts. These (and occasionally spikes) were often ‘ragged’ (with barbs) to provide greater holding power.
While often appearing on the boat or ship as ‘straight nails’ to finish with their ends ‘short’ or ‘blind’ within or beneath timbers; large nails—that pass ‘straight’ through frames and strakes—can be found with the projecting end bent once, to become ‘turned nails’ (single-clenched) or twice to become nails that are ‘hooked’ (double-clenched), back into the timbers. Sometimes nails are hooked over quadrilateral washers called roves. They also appear in the lapstrake or clinker form, though this tradition exhibited a once unique form of clenched fastening, the lapstrake rivet. This was a nail with its projecting end nipped off after it passed through the strakes, to be peened or deformed over a rove.
As boats, ships and timbers evolved becoming progressively larger, the forelocked bolt, appeared. This type with its cotter or wedge secured over a quadrilateral rove, or ring, was followed by another form of through bolt, the clinch bolt. Its end was closed over a rove and later over a clinch ring. Sometimes a ring is found at both the head and end. All bolts that pass completely through the timber being joined can also be class as 'Through Bolts'.
G.F. Muntz’s 60:40 alloy of copper and zinc, also called ‘yellow metal’, being more durable and easier to drive, soon replaced copper as the preferred sheathing and fastening medium. Sometimes (as with the copper form) the heads of Muntz or Yellow Metal bolts were ‘clinched’, ‘upset’ or ‘peened’ over circular clinch rings to become ‘clinch bolts’, or were clinched at both head and end, to become double-clenched rivets. Large circular section copper alloy nails—or short bolts for they are both—eventually came to called ‘dumps’ and while these too could appear ‘ragged’, they were often ‘plain’.
Types of Metallic Fastenings
bilge bolts
blind fastening
blunt bolts
boat nails
boat spikes
bolt
breast hook bolts
butt bolt
butt through bolt
brads
carriage bolt
clamp bolt
clamp nails
clamps
clasps
clinch (clench) bolt
clinch (clench) nail
clinch (clench) ring
clinker nail
clinker rivet
clout nail
chain bolt
chain plates
clout nails
copper nails
coppering nails
coopers flats
crutch bolts
cut nail
cast nail
deadwood bolt
deck bolt
deck nail
deck spike
devil
double deck nails
doubling nails
dovetail plate
deck bolt
drift bolt
dump nail
dump bolt
edge bolt
eye bolt
fender bolt
filling nails
fish plates
fish tackle
fish tackle eye bolt
fishtail plates
flat nails
fore and aft bolt
forelock bolt
frame bolts
furring nails
garboard bolts
gudgeons
gripe irons
hasp
hook bolt
horseshoes
horseshoe clamps
holding down bolt
in-and-out bolts
keel scarph bolt
keelson bolt
lag bolts
lag screw
large nails
lead nails
limber strake bolt
lost point bolts
medium nails
mortise
nail
nut bolts
'P' bolt
penny nails
pin
pintles
plate
plate nails
port nails
pointer bolt
pound nails
preventer bolt
preventer plates
pump bolts
pump nails
rag bolt
ribband nail
ring bolt
rod bolt
rivet clinker
rivet (lapstrake)
rivet (industrial)
roove
rove
round headed nails
rove
rudder hangings
rudder irons
rudder nail
rudder pintle bolts
rudder brace bolts
saucer head bolt
set bolt
scarph bolt
sham bolt
shackle bolt
shelf bolt
sintel
screw bolt
screw pointed bolts
screws
scupper nails
sheathing nails
sheathing tack
short bolt
shoulder bolt
single deck nails
sister keelson bolt
span shackle
spike
spike nail
short driven bolt
square bolt
standard threaded bolts
staple
stemson bolt
sternson bolt
stirrup
stopper bolt
stud bolt
threaded bolts
threaded rod
threaded short bolts
threaded through bolts
throat bolt
through bolts
through bolts with nuts
through fastening
through fastening drifts
through screw bolts
toggle bolts
up and down bolts
water way bolt
weight nails
welts
wire nail
wood screw
wrain (or wring) bolts
wrong nails
Notwithstanding that the holes for all fastenings, organic and metallic, both short or through, were drilled with a modicum of ‘drift’ i.e. with slightly smaller diameter than the fastening to be driven into it, long, ‘blind fastenings’ with tapered ends have come to be known as ‘drift bolts’ in many shipbuilding circles.
While they are late in arriving on board, screws and nut-bolts became common on wooden and composite ships and in the decks of iron and steel vessels. This period was followed by the decline of the iron ship and the advent of the steel hull, with its rivets of steel or iron. Then the weld in the modern sense came into being such that by the end of WWII it was recognised as the most appropriate form of fastening in the steel steamship.
While the steam-powered ship formed the terminal point for my 2005 work it is noted that modern clinker and carvel craft are still fastened with clenched (i.e. deformed) turned, or hooked, copper nails, or with clinker rivets closed over roves or burrs of copper.
Looking for more information? Check out Ship’s Fastenings: From Sewn Boat to Steamship, you can find a preview on GoogleBooks here.
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