Brand new to boat building

I think it would help to know what experience you have building things, what tools you might have and what kind of space you have to build in.

 

Hi Westkyle,

just thought I throw my thoughts in the mix.
there's truly a lot to consider other than costs. though that's an important one for sure.
I had do conisider a few things before I decided what to buitd.
how many passengers? what type of water (lakes, rivers, ocean?)
fishing/camping, motor, sail, row? (where do you want to go an for what purpose)
I guess to some it up, where will you use your boat the most?
and what options will you need them most?
Cost is certainly one thing, but I think its more important to build the boat you
really want.

I hope this helps a little.
best wishes with your build, and we hope to see the results.

DE

 

Passengers: 1-2
Water: Lakes/maybe a river
It's gotta have a sail on it. I have a hobie cat where I used to live and that thing was awesome.

 

If you dont have the 5 or 6 hundred dollars required for a simple small boat, dont build a boat.

Construction grade plywood is inferior, dont use it.

Epoxy simplifies construction and greatly prolongs the life of a boat.

 

Build your boat out of whatever you can afford, and go enjoy yourself. Better a boat built of 'inferior' materials than no boat at all, when you're talking about simple small ones. There have been times when I might as well have wished for the moon as wished for five or six hundred bucks for materials, but it never stopped me from having fun anyway. One of the flat bottomed canoes I had the most fun in, and used off and on for years, was built out of scraps from a construction site's dumpster.

Now if you want a boat to cross the Atlantic in, or you're planning a cruise to the Bahamas, maybe you should set your standards a little higher than what you can find dumpster diving...

 

I have built about 12 or so skin-on-frame sea kayaks and never spent more than about $100 on each, using second hand tools. The most costly one was a folder with an aluminum frame, about $250. Most of these came out very nice and we have used and enjoyed them many years, some over a decade.

I have built about 4 or so small sailboats, several with salvaged materials, some with hardware store quality lumber (carefully selected from the stack), they have all come in between about $50 and $100 each. Not the finest builds to be sure, but all gave us 3 or 4 seasons of fun use, and more with some heavy maintenance.

Once you have more experience and have a better idea of what you really like. than save your money and build the perfect boat that you will be proud to show off at the local boat builders gatherings.

 

Sounds good,
I'm a very novice sailor and I knew that I mainly wanted to row, but I also knew that I wanted to Sail a little on gentle breezes which I did for the first time last summer and really loved it. I can relate to the doing what you can on the funds one has. I don't have a proper sail persay, but what I did manage to pull together works just fine for me. For me it was also the advantage of not being reliant on the wind. and she rows with very little effort.

I believe its different for everybody and that's really one of the beauties of the
process. There a lot of great advice and ideas here and on the web. In the end ... one things for sure ... it'll be yours.

again, happy building

 

Buy some plans. You don't need a kit, just plans with instructions. Try Bateau. http://www.bateau.com/ Their plans are not expensive and they have a forum to help you with problems. I built their 12 foot rowboat, see it here http://newboatbuilders.com/pages/fl12.html. Also I built an 8 foot sailing dinghy from a set of 60 year old plans. http://newboatbuilders.com/pages/Dinghy.html

I used some marine and some exterior grade for the rowboat. The dinghy was all marine grade except the transom. It is solid wood from an old bed. Your can use salvaged wood for a lot of things, just look for wood like, oak, mahogany, cedar, spruce, and other typical boat building woods. Old barns and houses that are being torn down often have good boatbuilding wood in them.

 

I've decided to build a pram like yours Ike. It seems simple and will help me get a feel for building boats, and then I can go to bigger ones from there. Is there a way you could give me the plans for the pram is a form I can actually read on your website? When I download it I cannot get a glimpse of the measurements or words.

Thanks!

- West

 

Sorry. The plans I have, I bought when I was 16 (that would be 1961.) Scanning them was a major project. They may still be available from the American Plywood Association, now know as the Engineered Wood Association, but I doubt it.
7011 S. 19th Street,
Tacoma, WA 98466-5333
U.S.A.
Phone: 253.565.6600
http://www.apawood.org/
It was plan number 75, 7 foot 9 inch Pram Dinghy.

If I were building my first boat I would go with a far simpler set of plans and instructions.

Wooden boat's Nutshell Pram is probably the simplest to build and a very popular first project http://www.woodenboat.com/nutshell-pram Hundreds (maybe thousands) of these have been built by amateurs.

Sam Devlin's Petrel Dinghy is very similar and is a good choice.. http://store.devlinboat.com/micro-petrel-dinghy.aspx

Bateau.com has plans for a 7' 8" Dinghy called a Prameke http://www.bateau.com/proddetail.php?prod=PK78&cat=10#.UR511KUWKWw

There are others. Just search on pram dinghy plans.

Also see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=170ltK-6K0M I think this is the same boat I built. He built it using the traditional method, not the simpler Stitch and Glue.

I do have the scanned images. There are 18 and each is very large (over 6 megabytes per image). I would have to send them one at a time and uploading them would require a lot of band width. (my internet provider restricts how much band width we can use) so I would rather not do that. And the instructions are for traditional plank on frame, not stitch and glue. The bill of materials is made up of materials that were common in the 50's and not so common now. So you would have to figure out how to convert to a stitch and glue procedure. Building in S&G takes about 30 to 40 pounds off of the boat and is far simpler with no need for a jig to build it on and no need for molds to bend planks over.

 

I have uploaded the complete scanned image (there goes my bandwidth) to http://newboatbuilders.com/images/Monk_Dinghy_merged.jpg

BEWARE! this is almost 40 MB and takes forever to load and see on a browser, and you can only see parts of it at a time. You can use your browsers zoom feature to zoom in or out and make the image smaller or larger. Good luck.

 

Thanks for the help Ike, it is must appreciated and I will keep you posted on everything. Cheers!

 

I still plan on building a small boat like Ike's, but what is the strength of the hull on a skin on frame boat?

 

the strength of the hull is dependent on how heavy you make the frame. but the construction method is redundant and flexible so the individual elements can be much lighter than you would normally consider since a small amount of flex reduces the loads considerable, and usually even if one member fails the hull holds its shape and you can "get home" and fix it later.

skin-on-frame boats of all sizes (up to 36 ft) have been used on long distance trips many times, even to cross oceans. the strength is just a matter of the design, it is not inherently weaker. boats can be made from wood, fiberglass, steel, aluminum and other materials, is a properly designed one in any material inherently weaker or stronger than the others? Not really, each has good points and bad, but all can be made strong and safe enough for the need, same is true with skin on frame. Modern aircraft fuselages are essentially structural skin-on-frame: the Boeing 747 skin is only .020" thick Al over much of the hull, reinforcements, doublers, stringers and frames make it all strong and light and reliable to fly cargo and passengers across the world.

The skin is typically want concerns most people because it seems easy to puncture and damage, but a tough 10 to 20 oz fabric skin (lighter for smaller boats, heavier for larger) will actually hold up to more abuse than a hard shell hull. The only risk is a sharp object puncture, which is pretty rare, and easy to fix with duck tape and be on your way.

It is also easy to make a folding hull, with a frame you dismantle and pack up, with a separate skin, if you need max portability. The problem with this is it is more than twice as much work to build a folder than a fixed frame hull, and it will weight much more, because of the extra parts and details. And it will take time to set up when you want to use it.

 

Guys, I have recently begun a job and now have some income coming in. During the past few months I haven't really been able to find enough cheap or free wood to build a boat.

Regarding skin on frame boats; can I get the canvas as a drop cloth at home depot or lowes at 10 to 20 oz and be ok? Also, are there any plans for a SOF sail boat pram or any other type of small 2 person sail boat that includes how to make a daggerboard hole? My thoughts on that would make it seem like I would sink my ship with a SOF boat. Petros, from you post on the last page you seem to know what you're doing. Any information is helpful. When using cheaper exterior plywood on my first boat should I just use anything or go for a A or D grade(or b or bc)? Do they say what grade the plywood is at hardware stores?

I am kind of on the fence of drilling holes in my kayak to make it able to sail. Also, how did you guys build a mast? It seems difficult. I still want to build a pram eventually like what Ike showed me in those plans. I can't think of anything else to ask. Thanks!