One of my archery buddies called a while back and wanted to use my pirogue design to make himself a pirogue. He is an older guy and had built a couple of short, lumberman pirogues, but wanted something longer and easier to paddle. He mostly wanted to build a pirogue for the experience. He has a nice stripper canoe for serious paddling. Because he just wanted to build and not use it much, he wanted to do it cheaply. We went over the usual options- okume and glass, wood strips and glass, luan and glass, and plain marine ply. He didn't want to drop that much on this project so, against all protests, he built the pirogue out of 5.2mm luan ONLY - no glass - just paint and varnish.
At first I thought I thought he was just killing a couple of weekends of work to have a boat that would see the trash heap after the first outing. Wrong. We put in at Bayou Corne and took a couple of mile trip and , you know what, the boat did not fall apart. It was a slick looking , easy paddling , genuine watercraft. It came out a little heavy because he was scared of the flimsy ply so he put in more and heavier ribs,etc.
We all know that this boat will not last nearly as long as one built out of better materials. But, the guy had two weekends of fun building it and less than $50.00 in it. Keeping good paint and varnish on it , he could probably use it for a few years for the 1 or 2 times a year he might use it. Not saying it is a good way to go, but it might be an option for someone wanting to get something on the water fast and maybe see if they like the sport before commiting to an expensive build.
Joey
At first I thought I thought he was just killing a couple of weekends of work to have a boat that would see the trash heap after the first outing. Wrong. We put in at Bayou Corne and took a couple of mile trip and , you know what, the boat did not fall apart. It was a slick looking , easy paddling , genuine watercraft. It came out a little heavy because he was scared of the flimsy ply so he put in more and heavier ribs,etc.
We all know that this boat will not last nearly as long as one built out of better materials. But, the guy had two weekends of fun building it and less than $50.00 in it. Keeping good paint and varnish on it , he could probably use it for a few years for the 1 or 2 times a year he might use it. Not saying it is a good way to go, but it might be an option for someone wanting to get something on the water fast and maybe see if they like the sport before commiting to an expensive build.
Joey