Shortcut needed: contemporary formulations of ferro-cement for canoes

I've cruised the internets a bit for ferrocement, but a lot of that literature is unreliable, amateurish or very outdated.

Does anyone have recent experience with ferrocement? And what's a standard formulation for the cement?

• How many liters of water and sand per kilogram of cement?
  
• Any interesting (contemporary) additives?

Looking into exploring low-tech canoes. I'm aware of the "concrete canoe" races, but these students' formulations are way too over-engineered.

 

Concrete canoe???? Why would you use that material for what is usually a very lightweight boat?

 

I have my own reasons. I'm in a program to cut deforestation. All the alternatives to wooden canoes are too expensive or too complex.

The weight difference between a currently used wooden canoe (a log shaped into a canoe), and a ferrocement version, would not be too big.

 

Sources for concrete canoes and boatbuilding

Bruce Bingham wrote the definitive work on ferro-cement boatbuilding, called "Ferro Cement Design, Techniques, and Application." It was published by Cornell Maritime Press in 1974. I doubt if it is still in print, but you may find a used one somewhere.

There are also some SNAME technical papers that were published through the years, some of which you may know about since you are familiar with the canoe races, namely:

"The 1973 University of Michigan Ferro-Cement Canoe Project", by Tracy T. Coveyou. Published in Marine Technology, April, 1974.

"Material Development, Design, Construction, and Evaluation of a Ferro-Cement Planing Boat", by A.L. Dinsenbacher and F.E. Brauer. Published in Marine Technology, July 1974.

"Design and Construction of the Concrete Canoe California II", by R. Cengiz Ertekin and Bradford A. Porter. Published in Marine Technology, July 1986.

I hope that helps.

Eric

 

Recently I was in a small village out side of Shanghai where many of the small (16 to 20ft) sampans were made of cement...these were smaller than any other cement boats I've seen.....also some damn big ones.

 

Thanks man, this helps.