Recent content by Ben Mahaffey

my buddy is making a carbon copy of my (still being built) 17ft freedom. We are going the route of foam to increase the structural integrity of the boat. Looking around there are a ton of different divinely weights...what are your favorite weight lay up on a boat the has two layers of 6oz carbon...

Thanks Jim! I have thinking about using a spray automotive clear coat instead of varnish. The epoxy i use is already uv resistant so I am thinking the the varnish may just be more work for something that I already have...suggestions?

Glenn- the basketball is actually in the bow of the boat. My 2yo sits in the boat and paddles when it is on the stands and i think there is some bad wood in the sawhorses which is leading to the screws slowly pulling out and making it a bit uneven

Pictures may not look the best but the gunnels are on. I have the lumber sawn for the seats. Going try a laminate seat with cherry and basswood, ala the conk seat, we will see how it goes!

[No message]

It has been a long process since the start of this build. Since I started we had two kids, maybe part of the reason the timeliness has been stretched out so much! I have gotten to the point of "just needing" to build and mount the seats and thwarts. I am going with cane seats and the original...

Great that is what I was thinking. Alan I am surprized that you can get away with just spring clamps. Really love the amount of freely shared information here too! Thanks all

I have finally gotten around to cutting the scarf joints for my gunnels and am now left with the question of how to glue them up. I am thinking thickened epoxy and then just simply clamp and wait, but wondering if anyone is using something different Thanks Ben

I am slowly working my way to a finished canoe (freedom 17) and have gotten to the gunnels. I will do scuppered gunnels with a capped outwale, thinking about 1/2 think (not including the capped portion) but wondering what most people are using for depth of the gunnel. My plan was to have 1/4...

Thanks for the tips, and brian i have been looking at your post as well. All good info, when my boats starts to make more headway i will update my thread instead of continuing to high jack jim's here :)

Thanks Jim, i am thinking about what to do for my freedom 17. Was heavily leaning towards scuppered gunnels but just the specifics were not there. Was thinking about cutting a large cove out of one piece for the inwales but i may go your route. I am doing cherry to save a bit of weight and was...

Jim the boat looks great! Looking at your gunnels and am wondering what you dimensions are for the spacing scuppers are as well as your inwale dimensions, i see you got the outwale dims i the post above. Looks really good with the scupper blocks being a different species. Thinking about doing...

Jim here are two of the pics that have the shrink wrap not too great but shows a bit of what the process was

Wow all thanks for the education! I live down in the la crosse area and get up to the cities enough to get a sheet of foam. Will talk to my buddy about doing it :). Jim - i will take a look at my photos and see if i have any pics of putting the shrink wrap on. My buddy just went to a marine...

That is great information to hear. I have been nicely urging my buddy that we may need more beef in there, maybe this will be the ticket. He wants to keep the price down so maybe we will do a cedar inlay, i think Jim did this on one of his composites. I kind of want to try the foam but cost may...