New to the Forum so please help me out if posting in the wrong section.
Im looking for plans to build and aluminum duck boat. Basically a modified V Jon boat with some extras. Found plenty of places with plans using Stitch and glue plywood/NON ALLOY but so far I havent found a place where I can buy or download plans to build an aluminum boat like I want. A few manufacturers on the Gulf coast seem to be making them but no one in S. NJ is selling them and the cost of their boats is relatively high. I have the tools, shop and skills (I think) to do the build myself and hopefully be able to make my rendition of the perfect Duck/river fishing boat for my area. Please PM or post some links or places to search for plans so that I dont have to start the design from the ground up and likely waste material and resources.
Duck boat plans
Re: Duck boat plans
Welcome to the forum. Duck Boat is on my short list as well. I have seen where they take a Sunfish day sailer and turn it into a nice shallow water duck boat.
Jack Winninghoff has made Duck Boats for the crew that hunts the open water.
Here is a link:
http://www.winninghoff.com/common/index ... C&page=B21
Jack Winninghoff has made Duck Boats for the crew that hunts the open water.
Here is a link:
http://www.winninghoff.com/common/index ... C&page=B21
Re: Duck boat plans
The crowd over at www.duckboats.net have a few people who have experience doing exactly what you describe for exactly that kind of boat, modifying plans (mostly Devlin's various sizes of duck boat) to work in aluminum.
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kmorin
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Re: Duck boat plans
alloy T, thanks for the link that is one pretty skiff, I wonder if that's a Bill Lincoln set of lines, I know he's done quite a few designs for Win'g'hoff in the past? That sure educated me on what a 'duck boat' is!
boogieman, welcome to the AAB.com Forum; I'd remark about the design availability issues from my point of view. First, if there are 100 home builders 99.95% of them can and do work wood to some degree and there is no fire or burning involved- just layout, cut and glue (and fasten cold- like screws) so lots of the skills needed to build a wooden composite boat are in the group's skill set.
But that's not as true with welded aluminum, which you probably know is expensive- you can buy most of an entire wood shop for the cost of one decent welding power supply. Further, the time to learn to weld aluminum is time spent limited to one single activity -welding aluminum- but the time learning to work wood reaches a much, much wider spectrum of work and projects.
So when I combine all those circumstances; I see a designer would have to taking a bigger risk in selling fewer plans, and the sales would be a group with potentially less critical path skills. (if you can't layout and weld well the entire boat will be less than attractive and resale will be very low.)
So that's why I think there are so few aluminum plans packages for sale in the market; low demand, high preparatory threshold for success, and therefore fewer potential customers for those plans- as in 1/10,000th fewer.
The cost of sheet aluminum and extrusions is not really competitive, for the average home build, with dead plant parts glued to one another cold. High priced tools; high priced materials and high priced consumables seem to round out the fact that fewer men are in your interest (and ours here at AAB.com Forum) group- those who want to build in welded aluminum for themselves.
Don't get me wrong, I like building in welded aluminum, advocate it to be the best material for building and so does the Site and its readers. But I did want to remark that there do seem to be some factors to make your search for metal skiff plans harder.
You can convert cellulose and glue plans to sheet metal, and if you don't feel confident to do that yourself, you could consider buying a set of ply-wood plans and finding a design service to convert the plans for you? I'm not saying that cost will be to your liking, but it is possible to have conversions done.
I'm not sure of the exact hull you're seeking but Bill Lincoln of Response Marine ( http://responsemarine.com/ ) has designed hundreds of welded boats and John Simpson ( http://simpsonmarinedesign.com/boats/32 ... illnetter/ ) is also a well known designer in all sizes of welded aluminum boats.
Glen-L marine has quite a few aluminum designs, I've personally watched two Chinook models being built in our local area and both resulted in nicely performing boats even if they were somewhat modified from the original plans.
Please don't hesitate to post if we can help with any basic questions and don't forget the archive here is worth the time to search and read we've hashed over lots of similar ideas and projects that might help your planning?
Cheers,
Kevin Morin
Kenai, AK
boogieman, welcome to the AAB.com Forum; I'd remark about the design availability issues from my point of view. First, if there are 100 home builders 99.95% of them can and do work wood to some degree and there is no fire or burning involved- just layout, cut and glue (and fasten cold- like screws) so lots of the skills needed to build a wooden composite boat are in the group's skill set.
But that's not as true with welded aluminum, which you probably know is expensive- you can buy most of an entire wood shop for the cost of one decent welding power supply. Further, the time to learn to weld aluminum is time spent limited to one single activity -welding aluminum- but the time learning to work wood reaches a much, much wider spectrum of work and projects.
So when I combine all those circumstances; I see a designer would have to taking a bigger risk in selling fewer plans, and the sales would be a group with potentially less critical path skills. (if you can't layout and weld well the entire boat will be less than attractive and resale will be very low.)
So that's why I think there are so few aluminum plans packages for sale in the market; low demand, high preparatory threshold for success, and therefore fewer potential customers for those plans- as in 1/10,000th fewer.
The cost of sheet aluminum and extrusions is not really competitive, for the average home build, with dead plant parts glued to one another cold. High priced tools; high priced materials and high priced consumables seem to round out the fact that fewer men are in your interest (and ours here at AAB.com Forum) group- those who want to build in welded aluminum for themselves.
Don't get me wrong, I like building in welded aluminum, advocate it to be the best material for building and so does the Site and its readers. But I did want to remark that there do seem to be some factors to make your search for metal skiff plans harder.
You can convert cellulose and glue plans to sheet metal, and if you don't feel confident to do that yourself, you could consider buying a set of ply-wood plans and finding a design service to convert the plans for you? I'm not saying that cost will be to your liking, but it is possible to have conversions done.
I'm not sure of the exact hull you're seeking but Bill Lincoln of Response Marine ( http://responsemarine.com/ ) has designed hundreds of welded boats and John Simpson ( http://simpsonmarinedesign.com/boats/32 ... illnetter/ ) is also a well known designer in all sizes of welded aluminum boats.
Glen-L marine has quite a few aluminum designs, I've personally watched two Chinook models being built in our local area and both resulted in nicely performing boats even if they were somewhat modified from the original plans.
Please don't hesitate to post if we can help with any basic questions and don't forget the archive here is worth the time to search and read we've hashed over lots of similar ideas and projects that might help your planning?
Cheers,
Kevin Morin
Kenai, AK
kmorin
Re: Duck boat plans
I have done a little searching over at duckboats.net. Alumnum duck boats are not very common for custom builders, but I was able to find 3-4 guys who have built a few. What I plan on building (as of now) is the Devlin Snow Goose (http://store.devlinboat.com/snowgoose.aspx). SO far I have not found anyone who built that exact design. I did find a Devlin Scaup in aluminum as well as some custom aluminum based on Devlin designs.
From what I have read the builders have basically used the stitch-and-glue method to build using aluminum in place of plywood and weld in place of epoxy. Some bracing goes into place after the basic hull and stringers are tacked in. I also found that we have a shipyard near by that build large aluminum and steel boats. I plan to stop in and see if I can learn something that I can then apply down to the construction of a 15' boat.
From what I have read the builders have basically used the stitch-and-glue method to build using aluminum in place of plywood and weld in place of epoxy. Some bracing goes into place after the basic hull and stringers are tacked in. I also found that we have a shipyard near by that build large aluminum and steel boats. I plan to stop in and see if I can learn something that I can then apply down to the construction of a 15' boat.
Re: Duck boat plans
Not to change the subject but I was pretty darn impressed by the new welded construction boats Lowe is building. A guy at the ramp over at Quonnie was pulling his 20' out so I had a chance to check it out....simply put the boat is rugged and well build for a production boat.
Here is the link...I like the boat a lot!!
https://www.loweboats.com/hunting-boats/Roughneck-1546/
Here is the link...I like the boat a lot!!
https://www.loweboats.com/hunting-boats/Roughneck-1546/