Boat building in the context of "Larch"

Carvel built or carvel planking is a method of boat building in which hull planks are laid edge to edge and fastened to a robust frame, thereby forming a smooth surface. Traditionally the planks are neither attached to, nor slotted into, each other, having only a caulking sealant between the planks to keep water out. Modern carvel builders may attach the planks to each other with glues and fixings. It is a "frame first" method of hull construction, where the shape is determined by the framework onto which the planks are fixed. This is in contrast to "plank first" or "shell first" methods, where the outer skin of the hull is made and then reinforced by the insertion of timbers that are fitted to that shape. The most common modern "plank first" method is clinker construction; in the classical period "plank first" involved joining the edges of planks with mortise and tenon joints within the thickness of the timbers, superficially giving the smooth-hull appearance of carvel construction, but achieved by entirely different means.

Compared to clinker-built hulls, carvel construction allowed larger ships to be built. This is because the fastenings of a clinker hull took all the hogging and sagging forces imposed by the ship moving through large waves. In carvel construction, these forces are also taken by the edge-to-edge contact of the hull planks.

Clinker-built, also known as lapstrake-built, is a method of boat building in which the edges of longitudinal (lengthwise-running) hull planks overlap each other.

The technique originated in Northern Europe, with the first known examples using metal fastenings that join overlapped planks in c. 310-320 AD. It was employed by the Anglo-Saxons, Frisians, and Scandinavians in the early middle ages, and later in the Basque shipbuilding region where the Newport medieval ship was built. It was also used in cogs, the other major ship construction type found in Northern Europe in the latter part of the medieval period.

Lofting is a drafting technique to generate curved lines. It is used in plans for streamlined objects such as aircraft and boats. The lines may be drawn on wood and the wood then cut for advanced woodworking. The technique can be as simple as bending a flexible object, such as a long strip of thin wood or thin plastic, so that it passes over three non-linear points, and scribing the resultant curved line; or as elaborate as plotting the line using computers or mathematical tables.

Lofting is particularly useful in boat building, when it is used to draw and cut pieces for hulls and keels. These are usually curved, often in three dimensions. Loftsmen at the mould lofts of shipyards were responsible for taking the dimensions and details from drawings and plans, and translating this information into templates, battens, ordinates, cutting sketches, profiles, margins and other data. From the early 1970s onward computer-aided design (CAD) became normal for the shipbuilding design and lofting process.

Caulk (also known as caulking and calking) is a material used to seal joints or seams against leakage in various structures and piping.

The oldest form of caulk consisted of fibrous materials driven into the wedge-shaped seams between boards on wooden boats or ships. Cast iron sewerage pipes were formerly caulked in a similar way. Riveted seams in ships and boilers were formerly sealed by hammering the metal.