Building the duck barge

sheboyganjohn

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Aug 2, 2005
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Still plugging along. Nothing too terribly exciting. Pulled the whole boat back apart, glued and screwed it all back together. Filled all the screw holes and seams with thickened epoxy. Sanded it all back down. Cut all the glass to fit. Hopefully tomorrow I will have something more exciting. Plan on glassing the hull tomorrow. Doing a full cover of 6 oz cloth, then I will go back over the corners with some 17 oz or 24 oz cloth. I got it from the Palmer Johnson sale so I am unsure of the exact weight on this roll. Wetting this heavy weight stuff out is going to be the challenge. May have to break out the go pro for filming.
 

sheboyganjohn

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Aug 2, 2005
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Will hopefully get some more videos up tonight. Here are a couple of pictures. First is the hull all primed, second is painted with satin black. Might shoot another coat on it tomorrow night.

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sheboyganjohn

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Gluing and screwing the frame together and putting the plywood back on.
 

Woodonglass

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What thickness of plywood are you using? any idea about how much she'll weigh??
 

sheboyganjohn

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The hull is 3/4" ply, but most of it is lite-ply which is 30% lighter then regular plywood. The hull when I flip it should be around 400 lbs. Figure another 400 for the deck and blind (doing all that in 1/4" and 1/2") add 200 for motor, battery, and fuel and I'll be around 1000 lbs with out people. I think I calculated it will draft 4" at 1800 lbs.... ish. at 5" 2250 lbs... ish. I am not including the flair of the hull at sides nor the bow in the calculation so I am rounding up a bit.
 

sheboyganjohn

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Because that is what I got in the pile of plywood I bought at auction. There was some 1/2" and 1/4" but not enough to build a hull.
 

sheboyganjohn

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I also tend to overbuild things. Since stumps and ice are not out of the question with this boat, I erred on the side of overbuilt. If I had enough 1/2" I most likely would have done the hull in 1/2 and 2 layers of glass.
 

sheboyganjohn

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Glassing the hull. Decided after adding one section of cloth that I was going to wet out the wood through the cloth. It was a royal pain trying to lay the cloth back out over wet wood.
 

sheboyganjohn

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Aug 2, 2005
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Well we had a rain day, more of a storm day, so I worked on blind design. Took a couple of folded up tables, stack of boxes, and two chairs and made a mock up in the dining room so I could get measurements. Also some discussion on why I need to cut off the motor mount and add a motor bracket instead.
 

sheboyganjohn

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Aug 2, 2005
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Well it looks like we are going to have a real slow duck barge this year. I have a 2001 mudbuddy 16hp motor I run on the old duck boat. Well maybe a smidge more HP since I had the heads shaved down a bit. Anyhow, when my daughter did her co-op at Kohler Corp she was able to shop one of the employee tent sales and drew a low number. She picked me up a 27 hp Kohler engine. Took the old motor and new engine over to the brother in laws (builds race engines and machines custom anything for a hobby) to swap the motors around. Well two issues with the Kohler motor. First is it has a taper shaft instead of a straight shaft. Not that big of deal, can get custom U-joints for the taper shaft. The big issue is the thrust load. The drive shaft on the mud motor has regular bearings on it, so the thrust load is taken up by the motor. The model motor I got is a non-thrust motor. So we just pulled the 16hp off so I could fix an oil leak at the case and replace the upper bearing on the drive shaft. Looks like once I get the parts it is going back together and back on the boat. I will look at doing something with the Kohler next hear. Thinking of doing an off set with the motor and installing a timing belt drive system similar to what is used on the short tail mud motors, just keeping it as a long tail. Should only require a few extra parts. A heck of a lot cheaper then a new thrust motor or trying to swap out the driveshaft and bearings in the Kohler.
 

sheboyganjohn

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Aug 2, 2005
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Did some more digging on line and found the general service book for the motor. It shows the thrust bearing being in the rear cover. Based on that the bearing only helps with what I will call extension loads on the drive shaft, not compression loads. Since I will be putting a compression load on it I think I will be o.k. Just need to source a new crank with a straight keyed shaft. Seen a few used on E-bay around $100 and new around $240. I will most likely use the Briggs engine this year and work on the Kohler engine over the winter.
 

sheboyganjohn

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Aug 2, 2005
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Here is how you turn a boat hull over by yourself. Minimal swearing involved.
 

sheboyganjohn

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Aug 2, 2005
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Sorry I have dropped so far behind on posting. I have been out of town for work and busy with a fund raising banquet. I have made the inner frame for the blind and deck. Put the upper deck on. Made the motor bracket. Took everything back apart and have started getting ready to glass. I have put the fillets on all the joints tonight. Weather looks good for tomorrow and should get the glass in, the frame glassed back in place, and then painted. Opening weekend is next weekend so I will be humping it all week. If I am lucky I will have it all done by opening day. May not have the blind glassed, but that can always wait for next year. Tomorrow will be the reality check. If I can get everything done I have planned, I should be ready for opening day. I will try to get some videos up either tomorrow night or Sunday night. I will also look and see if I have any photos I can put up also.
 

sheboyganjohn

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Aug 2, 2005
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Forgot to say I had already done all the interior foam and glued and screwed the floor and inner side walls in place already. Boy am I really behind on videos.
 

sheboyganjohn

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Aug 2, 2005
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753
Building the engine bracket. Only had to do a complete modify once and ended up cutting the back side twice to get it to fit square Also missed with one screw when installing. it was partially sticking out the bottom. Ran it back out and put it back in another spot with an upward angle.
 
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