In the days of sail, ship caulkers were important shipyard workers, finishing making new hulls and decks tight and leak-free and restoring older hulls to the same degree of fitness before every extended voyage. Their job required skill, but a fairly simple arsenal of tools. These included caulking mallets of two or three types, a group of caulking “chisels” or “irons” that were really tampers, and a small array of hooks or narrow scrapers to clean the seams between the hull or deck planks before caulking. The actual caulking material could be comprised of cotton yarn or string, and most importantly, oakum, which was usually the yarn from which manila or hemp cordage was made, tarred with pitch.The calking chisel is an example of the tools needed in the shipbuilding trade to build and seal the hulls and decks of ships to keep them watertight. Similar tools are still used when building, repairing and restoring wooden ships and boats.Caulking Iron or Chisel: Single Crease, item is part of a seven-chisel and caulking iron set as outlined in a drawing, painted blue on handle, rounded striking ends. flagstaff hill, flagstaff hill maritime museum and village, warrnambool, maritime museum, maritime village, great ocean road, shipwreck coast, caulking chisel, caulking iron, shipbuilding, shipping trade, caulkers, marine technology, ship caulker, shipyard worker, ship building tool, oakum, manilla cord, hemp cord, pitch

In the days of sail, ship caulkers were important shipyard workers, finishing making new hulls and decks tight and leak-free and restoring older hulls to the same degree of fitness before every extended voyage. Their job required skill, but a fairly simple arsenal of tools. These included caulking mallets of two or three types, a group of caulking “chisels” or “irons” that were really tampers, and a small array of hooks or narrow scrapers to clean the seams between the hull or deck planks before caulking. The actual caulking material could be comprised of cotton yarn or string, and most importantly, oakum, which was usually the yarn from which manila or hemp cordage was made, tarred with pitch. The calking chisel is an example of the tools needed in the shipbuilding trade to build and seal the hulls and decks of ships to keep them watertight. Similar tools are still used when building, repairing and restoring wooden ships and boats.Caulking Iron or Chisel: single crease. It is part of a seven-chisel and caulking iron set as outlined in a drawing, painted blue on the handle, with rounded striking ends, and an angled blade. flagstaff hill, flagstaff hill maritime museum and village, warrnambool, maritime museum, maritime village, great ocean road, shipwreck coast, caulking chisel, caulking iron, shipbuilding, shipping trade, caulkers, marine technology, ship caulker, shipyard worker, ship building tool, oakum, manilla cord, hemp cord, pitch

Caulking is the use of cork or other substances to seal the seams and joints of the vessel to make them watertight. Caulking lasts for quite some time but eventually dries out and needs to be replaced. A hammer is often used with a caulking iron to drive it along the seams. The caulking iron’s blade is tapered to be narrower at the tip to make it easier to remove it from the joint. The shipwright’s tools on display in the Great Circle Gallery are connected to the maritime history of Victoria through their past owner, user and donor, Laurie Dilks. Laurie began his career as a shipwright in the mid-1900s, following in the wake of the skilled carpenters who have over many centuries used their craft to build and maintain marine vessels and their fittings. You can see Laurie’s inscription on the tool called a ‘bevel’. Laurie worked for Ports and Harbours, Melbourne, for over 50 years, beginning in the early 1960s. He and a fellow shipwright inscribed their names on a wheelhouse they built in 1965; the inscription was discovered many decades later during a repair of the plumbing. Many decades later Laurie worked on the Yarra moving barges up and down the river and was fondly given the title ‘Riverboat Man’ His interest in maritime history led him to volunteer with the Maritime Trust of Australia’s project to restore and preserve the historic WWII 1942 Corvette, the minesweeper HMAS Castlemaine, which is a sister ship to the HMAS Warrnambool J202. Laurie Dilks donated two handmade displays of some of his tools in the late 1970s to early-1980s. The varnished timber boards displayed the tools below together with brass plaques. During the upgrade of the Great Circle Gallery Laurie’s tools were transferred to the new display you see there today. He also donated tools to Queenscliffe Maritime Museum and Clunes Museum.The shipwright’s tools on display in the Great Circle Gallery are connected to the maritime history of Victoria through their past owner, user and donor, Laurie Dilks. Laurie began his career as a shipwright at Ports and Harbours in Melbourne in the mid-1900s, following in the wake of the skilled carpenters who have over many centuries used their craft to build and maintain marine vessels and their fittings.Caulking iron, or broad chisel, wooden handle with reinforcing on the ends, metal shaft that tapers down from the handle to the end of the blade. It has an inscription. It once belonged to shipwright Laurie Dinks.Stamped into metal " - - WARD /(image of crossed swords) WEFT / WARRANTED"flagstaff hill, warrnambool, great ocean road, shipwreck coast, maritime museum, maritime village, shipwright, carpenter, shipbuilding, ship repairs, hand tool, equipment, ship maintenance, cooper, tool, marine technology, caulking iron, jerry iron, broad chisel, caulking, sealing, laurie dilks, l dilks, port and harbours melbourne