Hello! I got ahold of one of these fellas yesterday and I'm hoping to get a little advice on hull materials. I'm planning to put in blocking for transom support and conduits for internal wiring, then fill the bottom cavity with closed cell foam.

It seems like hull construction varies from nothing to scrap boards to laser cut sheet aluminum with rivets. I want to do it cheap, but not poorly and hope to get a few years out of this thing. If I use plywood (sealed with 5200) and some kind of epoxy coating, will that be enough? I've never worked with fiberglass, is it crucial to fiberglass the bottom or can I adequately seal the plywood without the extra investment?

With the hull full of marine foam and a plywood bottom, will this be sufficiently bouyant for a 220lb guy, trolling motor+battery and some fishing gear? I saw one guy put 2inch foam board under the plywood but I assume you need to fiberglass that to protect the foam. Will the fiberglass/resin stick to the boat plastic?

I admit that I am a kayak fisherman with literally zero boat making experience. Any advice or opinions would be extremely helpful! Let me know if I'm over/under engineering this, or if I'm expecting too much. Those viral videos don't really discuss longevity so idk how long this thing is supposed to last

I recently found an old fiberglass K1 racing kayak being given away by a neighbor. As a former rower, at first I thought I’d hit the jackpot and found a free single scull.... I quickly realized it wasn't a single but I decided to bring it home anyway.

My potentially-unrealistic dream would be to convert this into some kind of frankenstein rowing scull… Not something raceworthy, or at all fast, but something I could take out on flatwater for exercise and which approximates the ergonomics to a real racing shell: sliding seat, outboard riggers, and overall appropriately buoyant and balanced.

Has anyone done anything similar to this? If so (or if not), do you think it’s tenable with the geometry of this boat?

The K1 is about ~18' long, which is significantly shorter than most single sculls (usually ~27’), but it does have the added width at the stern which could potentially make it similar in proportion to an ocean/novice shell… I imagine that it must have ~the same overall buoyancy as a single (both accommodating the weight of a single paddler), but the potentially differences would be the forward-to-back weight shift that a scull as to accommodate, the weight of the seat, riggers, etc., and the fact that the rowers weight is up at least a few inches higher because of the slide, etc. I would also have to widen the hole in one direction or another to make more of a rectangular cockpit with room for a sliding seat. I’ve seen that they make drop-in rowing units (like this one: https://www.adirondackrowing.com/oarmaster-ii-rowing-unit/) for custom shells/rowing canoes, etc., but haven’t found anything online yet that sets up the basic geometry that would be required to make one of these things work.

Anticipating the question “Why bother?”: I would really like to be able to row for exercise, but rowing shells are expensive. Even used singles typically go for minimum ~$6k. Obviously I’d probably have to throw at least a few hundred in for riggers, oars, etc., but if I could get a rowable boat out of this for less that $1k I’d be stoked.

(Not the K1 I found, but fairly identical)

I was thinking of building a small dinghy. Does anyone have a good source of 1088 marine plywood and other woods needed for a small boat in eastern Connecticut? Willing to drive for a good place to get a small amount. Ie a few sheets of 4 mm ply.

Hello boat enthusiasts 👋 ⛵ I come to you in search of wisdom, in this my hour of need. I don't actually own a boat, but I do have a 1960's lorry, a s21 Foden (similar to, but not the one pictured, for your viewing pleasure and to illustrate the scale of the job). The cab and bodywork are all fiberglass, there's as many as 6 layers of paint and it's all flaking and or cracked. I'd rather not spend the next decade sanding it but know better than putting standard stripper on it, I've attempted with electrical tools in a discrete area but it's so easy to make a catastrophic mistake. I have tried searching the internet but only ever get suggestions for standard automotive (not suitable) or citrustrip (not available in the UK from what I can see). I imagine with boats being similarly vast and being fiberglass, someone who's done one in the UK would be able to set me on the right path. I have since bought a orbital sander but there's so many curves and crevices and again I'm afraid I'll damage it. I hope you'll forgive the unrelated nature of my post and my rambling. Thanks in advance for any advice. 👍

Been repainting and restoring an old El Toro plywood dinghy. Very tight budget so I went for home depot clearance paint. I’m thinking my best bet for sealing the wood and paint would be a coat of clear epoxy but I’m open to suggestions. Any Advice? Thanks

Hi all. My son is moving into boatbuilding after a few years of general carpentry work. Some of this is professional (he has a job doing this work) but he also just loves knowing how things are/were made. I’d love to get him something for Christmas on this. Can you recommend any good books on traditional boatbuilding? The more traditional the better in his case. Anything from wooden lake boats to masted sea vessels. I don’t mind hunting for used/vintage/out of print either. Thanks in advance!

I’m curious I’m sure a lot of have our own strong skill sets, some of us are mechanics, carpenters, engineers, etc.

If you recently purchased a nice solid body, lets say marine ply under fiberglass. (maybe, maybe not with some small panel work) but it’s just a nice shell.

What can YOU do with a 10k budget to get it ready to go without the cost of rigging, sails , etc (unless you can somehow bring it back to life alone 😅)

I thought I would be fun to see how interesting some people can get with this stuff.

I’m trained as a career mechanic, with self trained carpenters skills, and I’m pretty handy at that.

I’d start with a solid body trimaran if I did this. (pic for attention)

Has anyone tried using west systems g-flex epoxy on teak deck? And how it holds up over time ?

I’m about to buy a small wooden boat in the Netherlands. It’s in fantastic shape and I have plans to add on to the interior build and make it and inboard electric. I have sound carpentry skills but I am concerned about it being docked in the canal when they freeze. Will a wooden boat survive the freeze or does it have to be dry docked?

The kids have been into fishing this year, and I think it's a great opportunity for us to make great memories over the next few years.

16 ft wooden boat, no motor. He had a 6hp on it, but it's not for sale with the boat.

Would five horsepower be sufficient? Would it be ideal?

Would most likely typically be one adult two children, sometimes two adults and two children squeezing on it.

Sorry for the bad picture. I was walking through the marina and saw this material on the hull of an Albin vega. It reminded me of skin or a very short fur, maybe like a sea otter and it's soft on the touch. Never seen something similar before. On the web I searched for antifouling foil but the ones I found look nothing like this. Does somebody know what it is?

Can someone please recommend me a water heater to supply a shower and 1 sink please? I have a narrowboat with mains power at the mooring but would also like to be able to run it off my solar panels if need be.

I currently have a truma diesel heater but it has died and too expensove to get repaired.

I built a dinghy last winter and took it on a road trip up to Lake Superior. The design is called Oonah, by Doug Hylan.

I know it's a bit of a weird and difficult question but we have this rod (around 9m long) on our westerly 33 and I'm not sure what it is for?

I thought maybe a spare baton for our sail? But the diameter is a bit thinner than what we have currently in the sail.

It seems to be fibreglass.

I'm hoping it's suitable for my sail as we lost 2 batons, could I cut this to size and put it in the sail?

I’ve been going through a lot of resin on my project. I currently have two empty 5 gallon vinyl ester resin buckets and some empty cans.

They still have residue in them.

Can I just put them in the recycling bin? What do you guys do?

I was wondering if someone might have any idea what this knocking might be. I bought this boat last week so I don't have any history of it. The Seller said the engine runs like new, no mechanical issues with the boat. The engine came out of a 2002 Chevy Blazer, and they made the modifications for marine. This guy seems to buy an rebuild cars, so I thought I could trust him.

I took it out for the first time and after 5 minutes, a bunch of smoke came from the engine compartment. Checked and it was coming from the power steering pump. Was bone dry. Limped back to dock and adding fluid and it leaked out the front PS pump bearing. Replaced PS pump. Took it out to test it and it ran fine for about 20 minutes cruising at around 3500 RPM. All the sudden I lost about 100 RPM and I heard some light knocking. Stopped the boat and checked power steering pump and it was empty. Had fluid onboard so I filled it back up, thinking it was air in the lines or something. Tried running the boat again, and knock worsened. Limped back to dock and rechecked. I found there was a split hose where it connects to the PS cylinder. Repaired that and refilled PS pump. Still loud knocking.

Checked oil, was at correct level. Oil pressure gauge was reading around 35 at 3500 RPM, and not registering at idle but I assumed that was an issue with the gauge itself. Power steering issue may not be related, but thought could be relevant. It sounds to me like the knocking is coming from the rear of the engine, not the front. I did remove the belt just to make sure it wasn't the new PS pump causing the knocking somehow since it ran dry again with the hose leak. No change in knocking. I tried adding a quart of oil just to see if any change. No change.

Also, moving the steering wheel back and forth doesn't have any change to the knocking.

Here are 2 videos. One from the front and one from the back of the engine.

I'd appreciate any insight that can be provided as to what might be going on here.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1t-5_mPc233mrp63udb1X7BpqtweRcy85/view?usp=drive_link

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1szyqZJqt-1IqYKti7572MtpjreurtYyo/view?usp=drive_link

I have been planning that I want to buy a boat that I would use essentially in the same way that people use jet skis (to zip about the bay that is outside the harbour in my town). The main idea I had was that I would buy a cheap hull second hand from someone ideally nearby who if I would store in my local harbour and keep in storage over the winter and then stick a 20-25hp outboard in the back that again I find cheaply on somewhere like Facebook marketplace but I would be willing to buy something such as a 10 or 15 horsepower motor as I know that a 25hp one could be expensive. I would really like it to be under £1000 overall and I feel like I could figure out with some other people how to mount the outboard on the boat hull after some YouTube. Regarding the motor I am still not sure whether I should buy a cheaper two stroke or try and get a 4 stroke so I need help on that too. Any help would be appreciated as I am not sure on other things such as where I should buy the hull and motor from or if I should carry out this project at all.

I will be using this boat in saltwater too.