Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Dan Williams on December 22, 2011 at 1:25pm

Yes!  i have designed and built an all-wood pontoon boat.

 

Are you looking to build an aluminum one or one from wood?

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Permalink Reply by eric stevens on December 22, 2011 at 5:08pm

I would like to see a picture of this , sounds interesting !

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Permalink Reply by Dan Williams on December 22, 2011 at 7:42pm

Here are some from the 2009 Wooden Boat Show in Mystic CT.  I didn't get as much finished as I had hoped, but took in All Spruced Up anyway.

Front View

Back View

 

Console

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Permalink Reply by chris towles on December 23, 2011 at 1:07am

WOW! remarkable craftsmanship

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Permalink Reply by Dave Z on December 24, 2011 at 5:11am

I'll admit, not what I expected to see.  WOW!  nice work!

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Permalink Reply by Rick Newman on December 24, 2011 at 7:57am

All you need now is a set of sweeps setup and you could run a whole bunch of rivers! It would be the fanciest scow ever seen!

All kidding aside the craftsmanship is wonderful and the design work is super. I am willing to bet that you suprised a few folks at Mystic too!

Rick Newman

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Permalink Reply by Boat-chippy on December 25, 2011 at 1:46am

Nice Work Rick.

Can you tell me any technical stuff about the pontoons,how they are connected to the deck,how high it floats and that kind of thing?

Seasons greetings

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Permalink Reply by Dan Williams on January 2, 2012 at 5:31pm

Thanks for the compliments.

 

The outboard hulls are strip-built with spruce, much like a canoe or kayak, except the stations used to shape the hulls were glued in place.  The center hull is cold-molded 1/8" plywood, over the stations (which were also glued in place).  The hull stations are typically 2 feet apart except near the ends where they were spaced at 1 foot.

 

Every 2 feet there are plywood-skinned trusses (2" x 7.5") that sit across all three hulls directly above the molding stations.  These are glued to the tops of the stations.  One half inch plywood gussets are glued and screwed over-lapping both the truss and the stations to futher tie the deck trusses to the hulls.  There are either 8 or 12 gussets per truss, depending on how many hulls are under each truss.  (The center hull is 7 feet shorter than the outboard hulls.)

 

The boat only drafts about 5 inches of water by itself.  Of course the more people that are on board, the deeper she sits in the water.  I have had 11 large adults on at one time for a slow trip around the lake.  It was real low that time!!!!!

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