wood or plastic

Originally posted by Blobby So ultimately it would appear that composite construction would be fastest as you can build a lighter, stiffer boat...and I am conveniently ignoring all the class specific issues with that generalisation!

Yes, but don't forget the class specific issues are very very important!

Originally posted by flat is fast wood is far better because when it gets wet you can always dry it out and when plastic boats start to delaminate wooden ones can be maintained with alot more ease

Obviously a man who's never had to deal with delaminating plywood, or thirty year old wodd boats where the aerolite has gone brittle and is letting go!

Wood is still a fine boatbuilding material, and if you are building a boat for the pleasure of working with the materials and seeing the finished object then I prefer it to epoxy/foam. I have a wood boat, a wood decked foam boat and an all foam boat, snd there's no doubt in my mind that the all foam boat is far less hassle to maintain as well as needing less work.

Nowadays I would almost always build only consider ply for a quick knock up/throwaway boat to try something out and even then there would be a lot of glass carbon/epoxy in it.

i have completly restored a boat and it wasnt that hard. however it did take me 3 months but i was 16 at the time so i didnt think i did that bad! plus these days epoxy is far better than it used to be west and sp are just so much stronger. They dont use castermite much now because it goes brittle with age but sp and west altho expencive last longer and hold stronger.

Edited by flat is fast