plywood hull labor cost estimate

[wtarzia]

Perhaps this question offers too many variables to answer well, but I want to try:

I am considering seeking a pro boat builder in the Massachuetts/Connecticut/lower New Hampsire area to build part of a new project -- the canoe hull of NZ builder Gary Dierking's 24 foot outrigger sailing canoe (~22 inch maximum beam, ~maxium 21 inch depth at center): his Wa'Apa design (he has a website). It is plywood, sharpie-hull style, albeit designed in three 8-foot sections to allow options for storage, transport, or rapid conversion to a 16 footer (center section removed). The idea is, I would like to be on the water in maybe a year or year and a half, and if I build the whole thing, it will be closer to 3 years. I would be working on the cross-beams, ama/float, boards, and rig. I want a rough idea about what a bunch of you experienced folk think that may cost before I go and possibly waste the time of a builder in asking for an estimate.

Assume I am just thinking about labor costs for the basic hull of 1/4 inch plywood with chines and gunwales and some ply bulkheads, covered with one layer of glass but no other finish work. Assume the boat is very simple to build -- epoxy and chine, no torturing into difficult shapes (canoe-sharpie hull), very few mechnical fastenings. Assume I would supply the builder's plans. Assume I would even deliver the bulk of the plywood, which I already have. Assume I would pick up the finished work.

Gary estimated from 120-150 hours for the canoe hull for an experienced builder. Any opinions on what labor costs might be for such a thing? Thanks -- Wade

[Dave Wright]

Forgive me, but aren't you contemplating subbing out the simplest, least demanding, and quickest part of the entire project? Finishing always seems to take more time and effort than knocking out a bare hull. Does that make sense? Maybe re-evaluate?

[Boatsmith]

We could build you a Wa'apa hull assembly for $3200 plus material. No decks thwarts or other trim. David www.boatsmithfl.com (http://www.boatsmithfl.com)

[wtarzia]

Forgive me, but aren't you contemplating subbing out the simplest, least demanding, and quickest part of the entire project? Finishing always seems to take more time and effort than knocking out a bare hull. Does that make sense? Maybe re-evaluate?

--- It might seem so, but I don't have much time, and I work slowly. It took me almost two and half years to build my 16 foot outrigger, though perhaps some of that time was due having no plans, and having to do a lot of staring at the workbench. As for finishing, I hear you! I hate finishing with an unholy passion, but I have minimal standards for finishing (filled weave, no epoxy drips, enough latex exterior to protect epoxy from UV, though for this boat I might go for yacht paint). The work I left for myself is enough: the cross-beams (akas) and the ama and safety-ama will absorb enough time. I will be decking the two "end hulls" over water-tight and modifying the center section (cockpit) as well. If my Everglades Challenge fantasy persists, I'll want the boat made sooner rather than later (the list of prescription meds keeps growing no matter what I do. Some of you know that tale...). -- Wade

[JimConlin]

If you sub the work out, you don't learn how to do it. And, in that boat, the hull is the easiest part of it.

Find someone local with basic woodworking skills and the ability and willingness to read and follow directions. Everything you need to know is in the Dierking book (Maybe a sneak peek at the Gougeon book would be good).

Dive in!

[JimD]

I would shop very carefully for a builder with a plenty of experience with plywood and epoxy. There are very specialized techniques for building with ply/epoxy just like any other method.

[Dave Wright]

--- I'll want the boat made sooner rather than later (the list of prescription meds keeps growing no matter what I do. Some of you know that tale...). -- Wade


I understand, and apologies for bringing the issue up. I've fed a couple of boat starts to the wood stove because I lost interest and didn't want to complete them, so I know how a project can get off track. Health issues compound that.

Do the best you can for the lowest cost. Maybe after you buy the ply, you'll be inspired to draw the outline of the parts on the stuff one weekend. Maybe you'll decide to cut those parts out another weekend.

The boat is simple and maybe a couple of weekends invested will inspire you to assemble the thing, maybe with help from a couple of friends. Do what you can to avoid that three grand build fee. All the best to you.

[wtarzia]

I understand, and apologies for bringing the issue up. ....

--- No, no, not to worry: I posted to watch the issues brought up, and I have had been jogged to notice another option, so simple I don't know why I did not put it on the mind's table before: don't teach summer courses this year, lose my summer salary but devote the time to focused building and of course some time to sail the boat I have. Actually, I lose far more salary than the ~$3000 labor cost (which seems reasonable enough as far as I can see, by the way; thanks for the estimate). Hell, I'm a college teacher and never had a summer off. I will continue thinking the options through, though truth to tell, I do not like summer classes at all, was never into compressed teaching. --Wade

[seafox]

for a laugh compair your summer pay to the stiphen I got one year as summer newspaper photog. figured I put in about 20 hours a week and got $14.32. (grin)

I don't know the boat but I built a similar take apart johnboat and were I to do it again think I could proable cut glue and assembly the boat in a couple weekends. its the finishing that take 80% or more time. are you alergic to the epoxie?

best wishes what ever you choose. do you have a link to that dsign?

[wtarzia]

for a laugh compair your summer pay to the stiphen I got one year as summer newspaper photog. figured I put in about 20 hours a week and got $14.32. (grin)

I don't know the boat but I built a similar take apart johnboat and were I to do it again think I could proable cut glue and assembly the boat in a couple weekends. its the finishing that take 80% or more time. are you alergic to the epoxie?

best wishes what ever you choose. do you have a link to that dsign?

--- Yeah, newspapers are perhaps the worst compensated work I can think of. Immigrant farm labor pays more than newspapers. Unless perhaps "fisherman's mate" on a 6-pack....? The summer I worked out of Newburyport we made three trips per week (the captain was primarily a carpenter, secondarily a charter man) and I generally came home with maybe $60 for 36 hours of swabbing vomit from decks, gutting cod, and untangling lines (so I take that back: I made more than a newspaperman). I once got a tip for $40 which I remember because it was the only one ;-) I even remember the fellows -- a engineers from Seabrook nuclear plant; I was showing one the parasites I typically found in cod and he whispered, "Don't tell the women," for their wives were aboard. The tip must have been pay-off money. But that summer was well-compensated in experiences -- grazing the boat on a sandbar and getting yelled at, whales surfacing around us near Twin Lights when the engine quit and we drifted, dolphins at the bow wake, bluefin tuna leaping from the water, and two cruise missles over Cape Ann around the time the Navy was denying they tested the (then newish) cruise missles near American soil.... (I think I became a flaming liberal right then ;-) But I wander...

I wish the Wa'Apa could be built in two weekends! I do have Gary's book (and in fact edited its draft, which was easy because it was already well written). In the book he estimates 170 hours (for amateur build, I assume) for the entire 24' version boat including glassing the outer hull, and ~$3,500 (ca. 2006) USA dollars complete with sail rig.

The link to Gary's site (and his four models, both strip and plywood outriggers) is http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/garyd/ --Wade