1652 Hunt Deck Build

Jeffrey, that stern shot of your boat reminded me of this picture of mine during construction. My boat was built out of Core Cell foam instead of plywood [ It was free! ] The second shot was taken about three weeks ago. Rich










 
Rich, Thanks for posting! Awesome looking boat, love the name.

Can I ask dimensions, HP, and speed?

Thanks!
 
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Jeffery, my boat is 17'6" long 4 ft. wide on the bottom. It weighed 275 lbs. dry w/o the motor. It ran 24.2 mph. Sunday with just me and no gear. engine is a 23 hp Mudbuddy. Rich
 
It doesn't matter how the water gets to the rear of the boat, just as long as it can. Make it so you can clean out the sludge when it builds up. It will!

The seat bases were easy. Just build a lot of bracing. I layered ply under each base that was about 1.25" thick. This was then bedded in a mix of wood flour and 1/4" fiberglass strands 50/50. I mixed all of my fillets this way except the transom. The transom was done about 75/25 fiberglass to wood flour. The mount for the trolling motor is 1.5" thick.

The front compartment is actually a deck extension out of my Ranger bassboat. It is made out of solid fiberglass. Nothing like re purposing stuff. And it is water tight.
 
Rich, that is a great looking boat. My next boat is going to be built out of that. I want to lighten it by using that. How has it held up to rocks and logs?
 
Plugging along today. Checked the diagonals, they were identical.

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Got the bow transom and the front frame cut.

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Guys, I dont want to hijack Jeffrey's thread, but here goes. This boat is medium density corecell i/2 inch thick I preglassed all pieces with 10 oz cloth on both sides, then glued it together, held it with drywall screws till the epoxy set. I laid foam 45's in all the inside corners, then glassed the entire interior with an 18 oz 45-45 biax cloth. The bottom was only glassed on the inside before it was glued on, so it would bend up the front. I glassed the bottom with one kevlar hybrid cloth then went over everything with an 18 oz 45 biax. this boat is very tough. we recently did some work on a 130 mph Fountain canopy race boat, not a whole lot more glass and foam in that boat. we dont have many rocks and stumps here where we hunt, but when you are in this boat you can tell it is rock solid. I have never tried a 35 hp motor on my boat, the 23 is enough for me. Rich
 
Rich, is there any filleting on your seams? Does the interior cloth cover the seams, IE run from the floor up the bulkhead? I'm really interested in trying a Corecell build but I know next to nothing about working with it! Sweet boat by the way!
 
Cody, I hope I understand what you are asking for. I dont use epoxy fillets, too much sanding, and too much money. All the corners are filletted with foam 45's that I make out of the scraps and lefftovers. These are easy to sand and make it very easy to glass. I ran one continuous piece of 50 inch cloth down one side, across the bottom and up the other side. Each section between bulkheads, transom etc. was glassed separately from the inside. Remember the pieces were pre glassed individually before I glued them all together so this was the final layer that tied it all together. I used epoxy for this build, I got it for free too. Every time an epoxy salesman comes into my shop, I tell him to give me a 5 gal kit to try out. If I were doing this out of pocket I would probably just use polyester, it would save a bunch of time and money and be just as strong. You glue everything together with bondo, dries in a few minutes and you can sand and glass over it in a half hour. Plywood boats are a different story poly comes off too easy from plywood, especially this southern pine ply with that pitchy feel Hope this helps. Rich
 
I get what you're saying Rich-I was just trying to relate the process to S&G building which I'm much more familiar with. Are you also saying that you can use Bondo to join the bulkheads and hull panels, and then glass over them to hold them together? As far as poly vs epoxy, I worked with poly for many years building surfboards and after using epoxy for my last 4 boat builds I will never go back to poly-epoxy is just too easy to work with!
 
Cody, with foam and glass the strength is not really in the core, it just acts as the web between the two skins. We use nomex honeycomb panels with .018 epoxy cloth skins, light as a feather, but strong as all get out! If you peel some of the skin off you can crumble the honeycomb core up between your fingers. So anything that will hold the core material together until you glass it will do. Some of my friends use hot glue. Remember, the structure and strength is in the skins. Rich
 
Got it Rich, thanks for responding. I'm really interested in trying out some composites for building in the future! What core material would you recommend for building with as far as cost vs. weight goes? Can you build lighter than ply and glass with composites? I don't mean to hijack, we can take this to PM if you want.
 
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