AluminumAlloyBoats.com

starbright,  Welcome to the AAB.com Forum, as welder has mentioned, build sequence image posts are always widely read here, hope you'll share yours? My primary problem with trying to realistically predict the man-hours to complete a little pre-cut skiff-kit is the “unknowable” differences between fi...

Ethan, the pictures seem to indicate your builder's paint job didn't include an etch and chromic acid conversion of the surface to chromium oxide- accomplished with chemicals like Allodyne on wet rinsed acid etched 5000 and 6000 series aluminum?  The mill scale seems intact in the images, but the co...

roamer58,
5052 will weld to 5086 with 5356 alloy fillers and will work to patch holes, corrosion areas or other defects in the original hull.

Cheers,
Kevin Morin
Kenai, AK

Hey Justin, welcome to the AAB.com Forum.
The links don't open for me? and I don't see images in the text? In fact, on my display I see the string printed out.
May want to edit the post to see if the image attachment feature is OK maybe its just my old PC?

Cheers,
Kevin Morin
Kenai, AK

m32, If you rivet or bolt the deck to the topsides at the shear (?) you'd have to have some flange or guard deck/shear clamp to rivet or bolt too - if I understand the question?  That piece would be welded to the topsides along the shear- so why not skip that pc (shear clamp/rivet flange) and just w...

Mark, congratulations on getting close to retirement and we're glad you're considering building your own welded aluminum boat, welcome to the AAB.com Forum. I can't speak to a "good size for the Great Lakes", but 20 to 26' LOA have proven to very successful boats in many different waters. ...

Hard_Way, First the transom bolt doubler 'pan'.  It appears this is a bent piece of sheet and the bends look like they were done with a knife edge brake die?  This resulted in a weakened piece of metal due to the strain hardening of the bend areas; by not using the correct (4T Radius Upper Nose Bar ...

Hard_Way, To directly answer your question about the inner transom plate; yes you should open up the void to see what's inside.  If the inner plate is the liner to a void that was created as a 'sandwich' or double sided built up 'box'(?) then it may not have been stiff enough internally? The bolt he...

In the 70's, of the last century, I used to work on a group of welded 32'ers that were built in Vancouver and Sea/Puget Sound for a fish packer in the Kenai River.  I'm not sure if the alloy's used were defective or not? Nut I've only seen this type of corrosion in those boats.  The boats were all b...

V'Huck, Buy her right (for a song?) gut her and sell the Cat's to finance a pair of decent sized O/B's and put a bracket w electric/hyd. engine jacks on her stern. Use the old engine room as great cabin and cruise into the sunset? Hull must plane or they'd have no use of trim tabs? Still w those hug...

salmonater, I'm not the coatings expert here, that title goes to (member name) Chaps as he's involved in that business and has seen first hand about everything that's involved with coating marine alloy aluminum. So, if he's not dropped by to comment then you might try the archives/search function?  ...

ModG, welcome to the ABB.com Forum and the discussion of aluminum boats.  Manufactured boats are very often not made of the (main welding) ‘marine alloys’ that is; 5000 series sheet/plates and 6000 series extrusions. The forming process of rolling ridges into sheets or pressing or stretch-forming is...

chille51,  Welded boats’ hull panels are quite thin compared to the hull sizes they form. As a result there are a couple of different ‘types’ or purposes of framing elements. Not that all framing isn’t intended to contribute to a very strong, rigid hull but there are main frame elements and ‘local’ ...

hatcher, looking at the Grady video there were several term revisions that are examples of how we (all) mis-use our terms sometimes.  The intersection of the topsides panel to the bottom panels' outer most 'edge' is a The Chine.  This is a single line of intersection - not a flat area - but a single...

hatcher, I think you've stated a pretty good summary of the welded boat shape attributes that contribute to a good ride .  There remains a discussion of structural framing ideas but the shape that meets the water is what mainly determines ride. Only issue I see is the idea of trim tabs and transom r...

hatcher, you've mentioned reverse chines and I wanted to address them in light of my previous remarks. If you leave the hull's chine to chine beam the same between two boats of the same LOA and (relative) displacement you could sharpen the deadrise/V bottom angle by putting reverse chine flats insid...

Hatcher, JonH, "RIDE" is a big topic to try to converse about online, being that it's in text not eye-to-eye and on the water boat testing together in a controlled circumstance.  So someone who's spent a lifetime in nearly flat bottom work skiffs will think even a slightly warped bottom 14...

chille51, I did use transverse deck beams but.... they don't touch the hull directly so they're dropped into notches in the hull longs or were extended down to shorter hull longs w angle legs laid against each angle and flat bar intersection in plan view. https://hosting.photobucket.com/albums/oo273...

chille51, I've shown this build before but repeat it here in part to help you see the different structural elements that can be used to frame a plate hull in the size range you've discussed. This skiff is 25'-26' LOA and built for a local lake that is 50 miles long and the occasional salt water trip...

dingahling, I'm not a fan of fully welding rub rails, but this was not my boat and I was 'crew' in the building. Yeah I designed her but I don’t own her or make final decisions for the Skipper.   "The Skipper is Always Right" phrase is the general retail trade axiom from the "Custome...

norfbay, Welcome to the AAB.com Forum.  I don't know a great deal about riveted hulls- only those I've repaired for 30-40 years but almost always welding near or on a riveted seam with a strip of elastomer as sealant made the problem worse. On the other hand rigid epoxy like castings probably will ...

Some years ago I posted, during a conversation here, about the concept of having more than one deadrise angle in the bottom of a planing boat.  I haven't found that post- had some images in it and a brief discussion of why I thought this concept would be worthwhile to build. A long time friend deci...

Doback, Welcome to the AAB.com Forum. Serious corrosion usually described pitting of some level.  Since you don't show pitting and you can wipe the white corrosion sites off the surface with a fingernail?  Then I wouldn't call it serious. From the photo you can see the hull wasn't etched of mill sca...

Spark, usually acid is sprayed onto a hull from the bottom up - so the foam has already lifted scale and contaminants lower down - then when foaming acid above flows down; there are no streaks.  This method seems to be the most reliable in terms of a uniform coloration (whitish or dull silver gray)....

Mike, I'm glad I wasn't being seen as rude and that as a designer you already know that centerline of pipe is as key to pipe layout as the keel plane of a boat!  Everything depends on an accurately drawn or designed centerline to run pipe (I used to do pipe design for oil and gas offshore here in th...