Help me build a very small houseboat !

Hi there, I've been planning for a while to build a small houseboat at my camp to use on the lake, nothing fancy. It would be for my 5 year old son and I and 1 or 2 of his buddies to spend the night on and fish a bit. It only needs to sleep 2 or 3 people and maybe room enough for a small table and chairs. Maybe 8' or 10' wide by 12' or 14' long. Nothing fancy, just for on the camp lake, no motor either. How do I go about building this, what do I build it on ? Can I build it on 2 old aluminum 14' boats, or should I build pontoons ?

 

Somethin' like this?



http://www.bateau.com/proddetail.php?prod=HB18&cat=17

 

I've seen that on the web before. What I would like to build is more like a small floating camp,sort of, lol ! I will just tow it and anchor it at different spots on the lake.

 

Find and use an old pontoon boat.

 

Oh ok, how about something like this?



Sorry, couldn't resist.

I've seen plans somewhere for small pontoon boats that you can build yourself. Give me a chance to find the link. I'm sure you want it safe for your kids to use. What kind of ammenities are you thinking it should have? Head? Galley? etc. Even though it's unpowered and on a lake you should make provisions for proper lighting so it doesn't get run over by some drunken boater on a moonless night.

 

This is what can be done with an old pontoon boat:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/2007...ryZ63684QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

 

Good one Knotty!! Although I think those upper deck guard ropes look very dangerous! Perhaps a more substantial rail of stainless pipe would be better!!

 

LOL!!!!!

 

All joking aside, you might actually like Lisa B. Good. The plans are free and it's a
great looking mini-shanty if you ask me. The one feature I might change is to
make the ceiling/roof flat and install a ladder between the picture window and the
front door -- especially for the kids who will want to climb up and jump off - even
if it means shortening the front roof a bit:

http://www.geocities.com/geezerboat/page5.html

http://geezerboatworks.photosite.com/GeezerBoatDesigns/LisaBGood/

 

http://www.jemwatercraft.com/pontoon.php

 

Guys, I don’t mean to be a fuddy duddy, but am I the only one who has picked up on the fact that this craft is for a five year old and his buddies for overnight fishing? That would definitely be a point of concern for me. 5 just seems a little young to be placed in a potentially dangerous situation (sudden adverse weather, fish hooks etc) without adult supervision.
Just voicing my point of view. Here I am, shoot me down in flames if you want!

 

A five year old, his buddies and his dad, if I read the initial post correctly. (There's an "I" in there too.) Sounds like good family fun to me.
At 14' long by 10' beam, that's more like a floating dock than a boat. It won't move around very well. Might I suggest a bit longer and a bit narrower? Remember that anything over 8'6" wide will put you through bureaucratic hell when you try to trailer it to the lake.
If you were to go, say, 8' beam by 14' or 16' long in a flat-bottom barge shape, you could do it with standard plywood sheets and ordinary lumber, with minimal cutting. Such a boat would give you a lot more useful space- and many more years of use before it's too small- than an 8x10 or 8x12 one, despite costing only a hair more at first. The kid might even help nail and screw it together (probably wouldn't accomplish much but he'd love to work with Dad using his 6-ounce hammer and paintbrush). An 8' wide box barge is amazingly stable. You can start with just railings and a tent on deck (build the railings to the same standards as for a deck on a house, since you've got little kids on board), and add features (roof, walls, etc) as the kids grow.
I've seen some interesting conversions based on the standard 14' aluminum boat (houseboat, pirate ship, etc) but they usually have a "Red Green's Handyman Corner" look to them (Canadians will understand) and the structural issues are killer when you try to glue a pair of them together.
How much do you want to spend on it? (This more than anything will determine what you end up doing.)

 

Thanks Marshmat, that's good advice. I'll always be on the boat with them, no worries there. Also it will never be trailered because it will be built right at the camp and stay on that lake. It's a small lake with only a few other camps on it. We'll use it as a raft too and Dad (me, lol) would like to climb on the roof too and jump in with the kids. Plywood and lumber would be the way to go but what will make it float ? Remember, it won't be anything fancy just practical.

 

Something like this perhaps?
You'll need freeship or delftship-free http://www.delftship.net/ to see and edit the file (btw, this took less than 5 minutes to draw, consider it public domain ).
The one shown here would float almost 700 kg drawing only three inches. Plenty of capacity for ballast low down to stabilize it if you want to, but stability would be pretty darn good to start with (initial metacentre is at 21 feet up at 3" draught).
As long as something of a shape like this is watertight, it will float. As long as the weight isn't too high up, it'll float upright. You could build nearly anything onto a platform like this, dirt cheap if you keep most dimensions as being multiples of standard plywood sheets so there's no wasted wood.

 

Nothin' wrong with a little (or a lot) of Ducktape . RG is a staple of Public Television in this neck of the woods.

Steve