- stitch & glue boat construction since I have built seven s&g boats,
- light weight for ease of transportation,
- narrow with long water line for high speed,
- hard chines for stability and
- 300 pound capacity.
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| Design of Lengthened Boat |
I began looking for materials, particularly plywood. It has been twenty years since I built a boat out of marine-grade plywood and I was disappointed to learn that nowadays, ABX plywood is ugly. In the old days, the A side was free of defects, sanded and ready for coating. The B side was free of defects and needed only sanding to make it as sweet as the A side. The marine-grade ABX plywood was nearly cabinet-making material and with a little stain, it made an awesome bright-finish boat.
Not so true anymore. Now, the A side can have defects. I read somewhere that it can have up to 18 defects as long as they are plugged with wood. You know those annoying little football-shaped plugs? The plugs that never match the color and grain of the surface? You get up to 18 of them on the A side. The B side can have the same along with putty-filled gouges. On top of that, it is obvious that both sides are checking.
I think we killed all of the nice trees and have to make plywood out of twigs.
The good BS 1088 plywood is unavailable locally and expensive to ship. So, I paid a visit to the local building material stores to look around. Yes, they have maple, oak and birched-faced plywood but it is unavailable in thin (¼-inch) sheets. The maple/oak/birch surface is a veneer so thin that one boo-boo while sanding will expose the glue layer underneath, precluding a bright finish. And, it is expensive.
I may be crazy, but I isn't stoopid.
