Cheap Canoe / Nice canoe

[vincent7]

Hi,

I have been looking at building a cheap / nice canoe for a while now. I am in Ireland, the problem I have is the "good" marine ply is very expensive and must be imported form the UK also the epoxy resin is expensive.

I know you get what to pay for give the cost it is not economical to but a ply canoe. I am likely to only get out 6-8 times a year and will store the canoe in a garage the rest of the year. Given this would WSP be acceptable, also I was going to paint as follows:
Prime
sand and fill
3 layers domestic undercoat (sand and fill between)
2 layer domestic gloss paint.

Would this be OK and save me glassing the whole hull?

I was off the opinion I any only build a canoe once and should use the best materials but given the costs if this is the case I am unlikely to build on.

Thanks for the advise.

[nort]

Having built several of the cheap and nice canoes, you can use other than marine plywood and get a good canoe that will last quite a few years. If you store it inside you may never have any problems. I would build it with epoxy and coat all the wood with at least three coats of epoxy before you paint it. Just watch for checking in the wood and fill in the cracks as they appear. I built my first canoe from luan underlayment, painted it with porch paint, it sat outside in South Mississippi through a hurricane and it still lasted five years. If I hadn't built the rubrails from cheap pine it may never have rotted out. That is where the rot started and it spread to the hull.

[Charlie]

If your plywood is of good quality (equal thickness veneers and waterproof glue) you don't have to glass the whole hull. But you need to epoxy and glass all the seams in and out. I covered the parts of my bottom that weren't already glassed with 4 strips of glass tape to ward off all the gouges I was getting running rapids. I also painted the hull in and out with epoxy. Epoxy makes a very good primer but paint will work as well although it won't adhere as well.

[vincent7]

Thanks for the replys guys.

Can anyone give me an idea of the amount of epoxy resin required for the following situations:

1. Nice canoe with epoxy seams and filler.

2. Nice canoe with epoxy seams and filler plus epoxy primed outside.

3. Nice canoe with epoxy seams and filler plus epoxy primed inside and out.

Thanks for any help guys.

[AMC]

About a gallon and a half for epoxy inside and out. I put a layer of 3.25 oz glass on the outside, and it doesn't seem to take any more epoxy then just a plain coating, and light glass like that is very cheap, I think it was less then $20.00 for the glass.

edit: 11 yards of 30" 4oz is about $41.00, 6 yards of the 50" 3.2 oz will run about $33.00.