Wooden Boat People
By McKenzieDriftBoat.com
16' Double ender w/ transom
My first glimpse of a drift boat was on the Cal Salmon as a kayaker in the late 70s - i was intrigued by the way the boat rode through the wave trains and could handle the water. I got a better look a bit later on a couple of Rogue trips, watching them through Blossom Bar... I thought I'd like to try that. The idea of building one was cemented a few years ago after a visit to Andy Hutchinson's shop and seeing his build of a decked boat in sapele - what a beautiful boat. So as a start, I got Roger's book and built a model, getting an idea of how things went together and where the challenges might be. This spring, I traveled to Flagstaff to attend Brad Dimock's class, where I met an incredible variety of skilled folks, all interested in building - not to mention a shop to die for. Then it was off to Oregon and the wooden boat festival. I stopped in Bend, where I picked up a trailer and a bunch of great information from Mike Baker - now I had a trailer, and needed a boat. Materials were a bit of a challenge - I originally wanted Port Orford Cedar for the frames - in Bend, there's a reliable supply from Orepac, but in Victor, where I live, no such luck. I ended up with Alaskan Yellow Cedar for about $7/bf. Hydrotek was next on the list. McBeath lists it on their web page, but there was a 2 month wait, so I ended up getting mine from Edensaw. Following Brad's lead, I'm using epoxy from Resin Research. Now for the fun stuff...
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by David Witton on
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Yep - I figure the bi-axial glass is the bottom just like it would be if it were applied directly over plywood.
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The melted polypropylene cleans up off the multitool blades easily using a heat gun and a brass wire brush.
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I spent a fair bit of time on the edges of the Nidacore trying to maintain the same angle as the plywood sides - that involved using a straightedge, a block plane to trim, and thickened epoxy to fill. When I was satisfied with that, I wet out the top of the Nidacore so I'd need less resin on the next step, which is a layer of 18oz bi-axial. I checked my resin supply, and I have a half gallon left - do you think that's enough? I'd hate to run out before the next layer is saturated.
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Permalink Reply by tungsten on
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18 or 12oz? You wrote 12 oz earlier you need at least the same amount of resin as you do glass in weight. So 12 oz needs 40 grams of epoxy a sq ft to wet out. So if you have 3 lbs of glass to wet out you need at least 3 pounds of epoxy
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When it came time to cover the Nidacore, I discovered that what I had been shipped was a 25 oz bi-axial fabric - not what I really wanted. So while I was waiting for new cloth and more resin, I flipped the boat over and worked on the nails that had blown out of the sides of some of the ribs. Much of the damage was minor -
all I needed to do was thin down some Titebond III and inject the wound with a 21 gauge needle
then clamp it flush with a C-clamp protected with a bit of packing tape. About that time, the cloth arrived. I had read some posts about the difficulty of wetting out heavier bi-axial fabric, so I chose 12 oz for the bottom - now I needed to get the shop (and epoxy) warm enough. I jumped the thermostat wires on the garage heater so I could get more than 60 degrees out of it, and put the epoxy in a water bath on my trusty Coleman
I followed Tungsten's tip about laying a temporary layer of poly between the hull and the fabric to help with the final positioning of the cloth. With the shop at a toasty 75 degrees and the resin @ 80, things went smoothly. I followed with a filler coat of plain epoxy and two with a graphite mix - next step is a couple of coats of epoxy on the outside of the hull.
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I guess it all depends on how much the boat will see rocks?Maybe hold off on the graphite until a test float or 2.One layer of 12oz is not much, approx 1/2 mm thick.
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Permalink Reply by Mike Thomas on
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Hey David, Ive been keeping a close eye on your build, looking good. Was just wondering how did you measure out the graphite into the epoxy? Thats coming up this week on my project. I know too much is not good. Did you get a nice black finish from it? No pics? :) Maybe for crashing rocks (I wont be doing that here) but I thought that 12oz was pretty narly stuff. I`m glad the bottom doesnt need to look pretty.
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Mike - here's a shot of the bottom.
I suppose it would have been smoother if I'd used a bit of cabosil in the filler coats. I thought I was being pretty careful, but I ended up with a couple of wet bubbles and one dry one - I left the wet ones as is, but cut out the dry one and patched it - like you say, I'm glad it's the bottom. Good practice for the sides.
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Mike - The directions called for 1.5 tbsp per 8 oz of resin - I just re purposed a measuring spoon. Once the fabric fills, the surface is smooth & glossy.
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Thanks. Percentages by volumes dont really work for me. The west system I`m using has metered pumps on the cans, that works good for me,lol. I would think you could scuff sand and add more glass over that epoxy, same as the first coat, but we`ll let the experts chime in. Maybe should have went with that 25 oz you got first for rock boating
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Mike - the West System instructions I have say "10 strokes each of resin and hardener from the 300 Mini Pumps will dispense 8 fl oz of epoxy." They call for 1 1/2 tbsp to be added to that amount.
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