ferro cement methods at samson marine

[jpazzz]

Hello, I have a curiosity question. Samson Marine Design was, I believe, in the early 70s building ferro cement boats as well as selling plans. I wonder if there's any one who might know what hull construction method (Upright wooden open mold, cedar plank inverted mold, inverted open mold, etc.) that they used to build the most popular of their designs at the time...the various iterations of their 45 ft , clipper bowed, motor sailors, e.g. Jubilee, C Strutter, etc.?

To answer the questions before they're asked: no, I'm not thinking of building anything in ferro. At 83 I have no plans to build anything in any medium. The wonderful Scampi 30 that I've owned for fifty years has sat in its shed since the beginning of the original Covid epidemic. I'm too old and crippled to sail it. It happens.

Thanks for any input here. I'd appreciate it.

Cheers, John

 

[bajansailor]

I have a copy of the book 'How to build a ferro-cement boat' by John Samson, and in Chapter 10 (about the Cedar mould method) he notes this :

"This is a method specially developed by Samson Marine Design Enterprises in a bid to speed up the building time and give a better finished boat.
In short, the cedar mould method will give a boat which is fairer in line in far less time than by using the pipe framework system.
It should, however, be clearly understood that while the pipe framework method is well proven through trial and error, the cedar mould method is still in its infancy. It has not been time tested".

This book was published in 1968 though, so it is rather old.....

There are a few copies of this book currently for sale on Amazon :
https://www.amazon.com/build-ferro-cement-boat-John-Samson/dp/B0006C7I6Q/ref=sr_1_1

 

[rangebowdrie]

There was a quote by Andy Warhol, it went something like this;
"Everybody deserves 15 minutes of fame".
Well, Ferro boats got their short period of fame, and it was enough.
I too had the Samson book, and in the early "70s there was a yard near me which only had Ferro boats in it that were Samson designs.
They were almost all built with the inverted "cedar mold" method, the big ones in the 45>50 ft range were built right side up, usually with the "pipe frame" method.
The owner would build his own mold and the armature over it, and then a crew would come in and shoot-on the cement, (like making a swimming pool with a "Gunite" gun.
The yard owner had a pro team of plasterers who would trowel and fair the hull.
Many of those boats were quite good looking, they had well faired and smooth hulls.
But as others have noted, the hull is only a very small part of the total expense of an operational boat.
Ferro-cement had its day-in-the-sun, like 8-track tapes.

 

[jpazzz]

Thanks to bajansailor and rangebowdrie for taking the time to answer.

Cheers, John