Hi Cliff!
As GL noted, I have DS1 Number 37 from 1957. Original seats, although rotted. I'll show you how mine is set up, but as far as I know - via Internet research - O'day and Marscot Plastics really didn't have a standard way of doing things in the early years. They popped one boat a day off the mold from 1957 thru 1960 and fitted it out according to the shop foreman's mood. Anyway, here's my seats and thwart taken out of the boat and fitted together upside-down on the driveway (mind the hurricane debris, I'm still cleaning up!):
- Seats from beneath
- IMG_20180929_131727 (1) copy.jpg (164.91 KiB) Viewed 11445 times
As you can see, each seat has two c-shaped mahogany brackets underneath, they measure aprox 10" long x 8" high on the higher side (amidships), 6" high on the outboard side. I'm not going to reproduce these, I'll just do square legs, braced against the outboard side of the hull stringers (that bump in the bilges, assuming you have them on your early DS1). Here's a closer look at the plate that connects the seats to the thwart, it's just a 1/4" thick hunk of steel:
- Connection
- IMG_20180929_135038.jpg (168.65 KiB) Viewed 11445 times
Lastly, the thwart goes straight over the centerboard, screwed to a set of original-manufacture L-brackets that were glassed to the centerboard trunk (with an additional sheet of cloth to spread the load):
- Thwart Support
- IMG_20180930_102139 copy.jpg (82.17 KiB) Viewed 11445 times
The outboard end of the thwarts are screwed to wooden cleats (long 1x1.5 piece of wood) which are, in turn, screwed to the outboard "wall" under the side-decks. These cleats support both the thwart and the seats - they go all the way aft and then there's a cleat on the back "wall" of the cockpit to hold up the aft end of the seats. Needless to say, these are quite important as they take most of the weight of the seats. So, some notes, for what they are worth:
-My original cleats are mahogany and were screwed in with wood screws with a bushing on each head, just like the first photo in this thread (except mine are bronze).
-My original cleats had rotted from the outboard side (against the wall) inwards, so I assume that water got trapped there over the years and caused the rot. The inboard sides (exposed) were fine. So, if you build new cleats, make sure to protect the outboard side. Now you're welcome to not believe me, but I brush antifreeze onto any wood that I want to preserve. Yeah, straight from Autozone or your local equivalent, get yourself a jug with the highest glycol percentage you can find. Where did I get this crazy idea?:
https://www.simplicityboats.com/chemorot.htmlFWIW, I started doing this 5 years ago and no wood rot (I paint all surfaces as well).
-I'm replacing my cleats with 1" thick x 1.5" wide (true size not nominal) red oak from HD, it bends by hand to fit the curve of the side wall, and should hold out OK (with antifreeze and a coat of primer). However, I am not screwing it back into the side walls with the bronze woodscrews. I've closed all the screw holes from the original cleats using thicken epoxy and instead I'm using stainless steel drywall anchor screws. These are screws that come with a little plastic jacket that you tap into the hole and then the jacket "mushrooms" when you tighten the screw. This "mushroom anchor" winds up on the inside of the side tanks (against the fiberglass sidewall) and should prevent the screws from pulling out. Also, the nice plastic jacket should go some ways towards keeping water out of the side tanks - they don't have to be 100% airtight, there's foam blocks in there - but you want to keep the foam dry during ordinary use. Likewise, the jacket should spread the downward forces on the hole in the sidewall a bit better than just the woodscrew. I'll take pics if you are interested, otherwise just ask for expanding anchor drywall screws next time you go to the big-box store. I used #6 gauge screws, I figure they're enough, 10 to a side.
-In the original setup, the thwart is screwed to the cleats and L-bracket using a longer bronze wood-screw, the bronze bushing, and a bronze tube that fits around the screw. In other words, the screw threads never went into the wood on the thwart, instead there were slightly larger diameter holes in the thwart in which the bronze tubes were fitted. The screw goes through the tube and bites into the cleat or L-bracket, and there's the bushing at the top to hold it in place. The seats, on the other hand, are screwed into the cleats normally. My guess is that this tube setup is to allow the thwart to "play" a little as the hull and centerboard trunk flexes. Anyway, I plan to reuse the tubes... if it's good enough for George O'Day, it's good enough for me.. and I'll post pics once done.
OK, sorry for the exhaustive detail. Since our early boats don't have the molded in seats, the whole thwart/seat set-up gets deceptively complicated.
Just to make life more fun, I'm also planning a "wife-friendly cruising configuration" for the boat, in which I'll have additional removable thwarts covering the centerboard from the cuddy back to the mainsheet block, almost 4 feet. Why? So that my wife has a nice platform to sprawl out on - out of the bilges, amidships (keep weight off the stern!) and relatively out of my way. She can just scooch on over during tacks. She's a lead-mining keel-boater through-and-through and hates the dinghy tacking scramble/chinese fire-drill. On the other hand, she's done a lot more offshore passagemaking sailing than me and actually has an ICC cert, so I keep my mouth shut... and on the other, other hand, don't ask her to roll tack unless you want a winch handle upside the head! Anyway, see the John Welsford Navigator for what I have in mind, kind of a Bridge Deck:
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-63hw7Sn-cRs/ ... %2Bsat.jpgSo, out for a picnic cruise with wife - drop in some extra thwarts and and a big floatable pillow, everyone is happy, the extra weight (of the thwarts not wife!) should keep boat more behaved as well. Out for "adventure" - take out the platform and rig the hiking straps
. This is an overwinter project, again will post pics. Also, I have to figure out what happens with the jib sheets in "cruising configuration"... decisions, decisions. But that's the fun of tinkering with our boats!
Tom