Go Anywhere Boat Build

[jh504]

I posted a while back about a pirogue that I built for very shallow water paddleing. It is a great little boat but now it is time to move up the power spectrum a little bit. I am planning on building a 15' skiff based on a duck hunting platform. It will hopefully have about 5" of draft at 600lb load and it will be powered by about a 35-40hp mud motor or surface drive. For those of you who havnt spent much time in the bayou here is a pretty cool link to the kind of motor I am talking about: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZV8Fy...eature=related . It will basically be a go anywhere boat and can take up to a 1000lb payload. I will be using it for duck hunting, setting crawfish and crab traps, and exploring the swamp land. I should be getting the plans soon and probably starting construction after Christmas. I will have the details of the build on this thread.
Here is a pic from the plans I will be using:

[Mickldo]

I posted a while back about a pirogue that I built for very shallow water paddleing. It is a great little boat but now it is time to move up the power spectrum a little bit. I am planning on building a 15' skiff based on a duck hunting platform. It will hopefully have about 5" of draft at 600lb load and it will be powered by about a 35-40hp mud motor or surface drive. For those of you who havnt spent much time in the bayou here is a pretty cool link to the kind of motor I am talking about: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZV8Fy...eature=related . It will basically be a go anywhere boat and can take up to a 1000lb payload. I will be using it for duck hunting, setting crawfish and crab traps, and exploring the swamp land. I should be getting the plans soon and probably starting construction after Christmas. I will have the details of the build on this thread.
Here is a pic from the plans I will be using:

They look cool. Be no good around here as there is a lot of open water that can get rough between the mud creeks but up in the creeks they would be awesome for checking the crab pots.

[jh504]

They look cool. Be no good around here as there is a lot of open water that can get rough between the mud creeks but up in the creeks they would be awesome for checking the crab pots.

I have been considering the same thing around here. NC has a lot of swamp but we also have a good bit of open water out on the coast. I am actually considering going with a different design so I can get out into the sounds and explore some islands as well. The other design I am looking at is a 17ft center console skiff. The hull is designed for offshore use but it also has a 7" draft so it can get up in the shallows. It would be outfitted with a regular outboard though.

[Mickldo]

I have been considering the same thing around here. NC has a lot of swamp but we also have a good bit of open water out on the coast. I am actually considering going with a different design so I can get out into the sounds and explore some islands as well. The other design I am looking at is a 17ft center console skiff. The hull is designed for offshore use but it also has a 7" draft so it can get up in the shallows. It would be outfitted with a regular outboard though.

I build boats at work. See my sig line and http://expeditionportal.com/forum/sh...ad.php?t=19822

Our boats have a 17 degree deadrise, 3" reverse chines and a delta pad which combine to give good ride in rough conditions, economical running, good stability and a shallow draft.

The hull design we use is a Specmar design which is the Australian distributor for the original US Specmar company.

They are a brilliant hull and it is not just because I work for a company that uses these hulls. After comparing lots of different boats I really love this hull design.

[Mickldo]

If you are chasing a 17' skiff try the 1026 or the 620 hulls on the Specmar products page. I'll be using the 1200 hull for my project, it is a sweet little hull.

[jh504]

I build boats at work. See my sig line and http://expeditionportal.com/forum/sh...ad.php?t=19822

Our boats have a 17 degree deadrise, 3" reverse chines and a delta pad which combine to give good ride in rough conditions, economical running, good stability and a shallow draft.

The hull design we use is a Specmar design which is the Australian distributor for the original US Specmar company.

They are a brilliant hull and it is not just because I work for a company that uses these hulls. After comparing lots of different boats I really love this hull design.

Yes I have been following your thread some. After looking at the Specmar site, you guys have very competitive prices for the kits. It would almost run about the same, cost wise, as a fiberglass hull like I am thinking of building. Unfortunately I do not have any prefessional welding skills and I do not have the budget for someone else to weld it. I wish there was a way around that because I am sure the hull is very strong. I have no experience,to speak of working with metal, I am a carpenter and a CNC operator and all of my experience is with wood and composites.
Also how does the weight effect things? I am sure it rides smoother in the water, but would also need more power to cruise along right?
I would love to go with one of your kits but for this prject I dont think I am set up for it. I will be using our CNC at work to cut out all of my parts and doing all of the fiberglass work myself. With a metal hull I would have to sub out a lot of the work and I just dont have the funds for it. That doesnt mean I wouldnt be interested in the future though, since I definitely dont plan on this being my last boat build. Here are of few shots of the 17' skiff I might go with. It is a very light hull design and weighs in at less than 400lbs.

[Mickldo]

I suppose not having the metal working skills would be a deterrent but after seeing how they go together I now know how easy they are. I work at a boat building shop but I am hopeless at welding. I leave the welding to the other guys at work and I do all the fit out stuff.

The hulls are all CNC router cut and go together like a jigsaw puzzle. They are all just tacked together to start with and with the tacks on the alloy you need to do inch long tacks. Once you have gone over the whole boat and done several hundred inch long tacks you now have most of the skills needed to weld out most of the rest of the hull. All you need is a MIG for 99% of the work. The watertight hull joins need to be TIG'd to stop any porosity.

I am only an amateur welder at best but I am confident that I will be able to do one myself using my BOC 250R MIG and just getting one of my mates to bring his TIG around to do the chines and keel.

These hulls are very light and strong. I can't remember the actual hull weights for that size hull but we usually build lighter boats than equivalent sized fibreglass boats.

We would usually fit a 90hp 4 stroke on that size boat and get 38knot top speed, and a comfortable, economical cruise speed of 24knots.

[jh504]

From what I can tell the prices for the kits on Specmar are for the plans to use to cut your materials right, and not actually any hull materials?

[Mickldo]

From what I can tell the prices for the kits on Specmar are for the plans to use to cut your materials right, and not actually any hull materials?

Yeah the price on the website is for the CAD plans and release to be sent to the ally cutters. The hull would cost a couple of grand (just guessing there, I have NFI what the price of ally is in the US) but once it is delivered to you there is only a couple of lengths of extrusion that is needed to finish the boat off.

[jeepmedic46]

Looks good