# Duck Boat Build Questions



## rockwalker (Jul 3, 2011)

Hey guys I am gonna start on my duck boat build and thinking on the flooring solutions and considering using the new plastic looking decking material seen at HD and Lowes. Anyone see any reason to go with another material ?? I was thinking about going with an aluminum floor but that will be pricy for my budget and I would have to cut some other things that I really want to do. 

The boat is a 16 foot Mod v aluminum boat.


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## Larry Young Jr (Jul 3, 2011)

are you building a blind on the boat or blind you put your boat in.
Larry


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## rockwalker (Jul 3, 2011)

I will be building a blind of some sort we don't hunt many areas that we may need a blind but the guys I hunt with have never had a boat that would serve us to hunt in that fashon. With this larger boat I gope to open the range of areas we hunt.


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## king killer delete (Jul 3, 2011)

*bottom of the boat*

I dont use a floor in my boat. I hunt salt water and I have a big open scow 17 ft bass tracker. I will put marsh grass in the bottom of my boat so when the birds fly over and look down the see the real deal marsh grass. Floors add weight and I want a light boat I can pull over a sand bar. Allot of guys down here on the coast have  a 4 wheeler winch on the bow of their boat to pull over the old rice  dikes. When you get ready to build your blind , shoot me a pm and I will give you some ideas that might help you on how you can build a blind cheap.


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## Larry Young Jr (Jul 3, 2011)

If you want a floor use 3/4 marine grade or pressure treated ply wood. Use very little anchors to fasten it to your boat. This way you can remove it to clean and dry out the wood. Get some dark color out door carpet and clue it to the wood. You live Griffin I live in Mcdonough if you like I can give you some pointers. Give me a pm. I build blinds for boats.
Good luck and besafe
Larry


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## rockwalker (Jul 3, 2011)

Larry I see you mentioned pressure treated plywood I have heard that pressure treated plywood will react with aluminum and cause pittting in the metal and in some cases eat holes through it. Is this something I should be concerned with?????


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## Larry Young Jr (Jul 3, 2011)

No, I have use pressure treat wood for years. It is some time hard to find marine grade plywood. I really like marine grade because it just better. I have use pressure treated wood on all kinds of metal, alum. etc. never had any problems. The only bad thing with marine grade it is Costly.
Larry


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## Hairy Dawg (Jul 4, 2011)

Marine grade plywood will need to be sealed, if you choose to go that route. The only real difference between marine grade plywood and the plywood that you buy at Lowes, is that the marine stuff is free of any voids in the center, and you can get it in lighter weight woods, such as oakume. If un-sealed, it will rot just like untreated plywood.

Pressure treated lumber, at one time, had chemicals that supposedly ate the aluminum. Now that the tree huggers have gotten their way with pressure treated wood, I doubt that there is much of anything in it that would react to the metal, or insects and weather for that matter.

In my opinion, your best bet is to go with aluminum. Cutting the flooring to fit in the boat is going to be a pretty substantial job. If you plan to keep this boat for a long time, you'll never have to repeat the process, and if you decide to sell it, it will increase the value of the boat over plywood.

Just my .02


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## rockwalker (Jul 4, 2011)

I think I will end up going the aluminum route. I was at Lowes last night and looking at the composite decking they have and that stuff would just be to heavy to use. I didnt realize it was as heavy as it is. I think it would hold up but just add to much weight in the long run.


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## Larry Young Jr (Jul 4, 2011)

Hairy Dawg I like your 2cents. Alum is the way to go. But it is pricey. Most guys cant afford it. Yes, Marine Plywood needs to besealed, I just seal it with fiberglass resin and it is a little lighter. P/T Plywood is cheaper than the other two. The wood is eazyer to install. But a little heaver but only a few lbs. It is all got to do How much time, money and what you want. Its your chioce. My last boat I used P/T plywood and put outdoor carpet on it. Its still looks good after ten years and the guy has it now says it still great. One other thing is wood is not as noisey as alum.
Hey Thanks for the P/T wood history, I never had any problems but that good thing to know.
Good luck and besafe.
Larry


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## chet1725 (Jul 4, 2011)

My boat floor is 1/2" CDX (exterior) ply with brown astro-turf. The 1/2" is easy to shape to the boat ribs and not too heavy. I stayed away from aluminum because cost and fear of freezing issues in winter. The carpet is wrapped about 3" around the bottom on all sides and stapled. I used an Arrow stapler and galvanized staples, I never bothered glueing it. The floor was never secured to the boat so it's easy to remove when I want to wash out the bottom. The boat is out of the weather about 9 months a year and the floor is still solid. I put the floor in during the summer of '99. To cheap out on the blind I used condiut, a bender, scrap camo fabric, spray paint and copied ideas from catalogs. A footnote, be sure to use grade 8 bolts if you build it yourself, the standard grade 5's will bend.


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## duck-dawg (Jul 5, 2011)

If it were me, I would get some cheap plywood, seal it with resin, then fiberglass it in. If you use fiberglass, you could probably get away with 1/2" plywood. You'll spend a lot less going this route, and that floor will last you a long time.


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## rockwalker (Jul 6, 2011)

*Build update*

Well I got the boat torn down and began working on it some Monday. I pulled the wood from the transom area to replace and the pictures below show what I found. This was from the area where bolts passed through the transom and into the wood. These areas were in contact with the 2 layers of pressure treated plywood. I will be going back with an aluminum transom. I am going to be using 2" X 1.5" 1/8 wall tubing and build up the transome and then welding a stiffener don each side to join all the pieces together. This should hold up with no issues. 

So with this information I will say this is the 3rd or 4th time I have seen transoms like this and I now know what the cause is. I know the guy who originally gutted this boat and this as just done about 3 years ago. So in 3 years of exposure the damage below took place. So if you had any questions about wether or not pressure treated lumber reacts with aluminum then please know that it will. I was skeptical at first as well but after seeing this first hand and reading into it some more on the tinboats forums it seems that this is still an issue. Just an FYI guys and wanted to pass this info along.


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## Popgunner (Jul 6, 2011)

I just cleaned under the decking on our boat and found no damage from the pt plywood we put in 3 years ago.  The ribbing of the boat still has good factory paint on it, and even though the decking is free-floating, no abrasion or pitting has occurred.  I really don't see a need for sealing or glassing the pt wood, when some paint on the metal works well.  We didn't use the 3/4" because of the weight, but I don't remember what the next thickness down was.  Maybe 5/8, but I think maybe 1/2.  The spacing of the ribbing is small enough that we get no flex or sponginess at all.  Some low grade indoor-outdoor carpeting, glued to the plywood made for a really inexpensive solution.  We were set to replace the whole thing after 2-3 years, but it looks like 4-6 years is not out of the question.  Under-cover storage for the off-season is no-doubt helping, but it wouldn't be hard at all to pull the decking out and store it inside if that's what you needed to do to extend the life.  Still, $25-30 per year wouldn't be too bad, if you only got 2 years out of it.

I'm already looking for things to do to make the boat more user friendly for the upcoming season.  Bored Yet??


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## rockwalker (Jul 6, 2011)

The issue here I believe is that the Aluminum had no covering what so ever no paint carpet or nothing. I think even a coat of paint would have made a big difference but anyhow. I got a good frind of mine that runs a machine shop and he has been a huge help in solving some issues I have seen but he helped seal the deal by selling me all material at cost and all i can say is man some folks try to make a living all at one time in one sale. I get the tubing tomorrow to start on the transom. I will keep posting back with the update to the build as time progresses. The one thing I am pondering now is being that the boat has no seats or anything in it at this point how am I gonna build a bench or pod type seat and fill it with foam for flotation purposes. I want some type of flotation in it just in case the unforseeable happens. and do i make it a bench  / livewell or just a pod to sit on ??????????


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## Rich M (Jul 24, 2011)

Think about dissimilar metals and how the ion transfer occurs.  It is likely from the bolt and not the copper in the wood.  If it was fromt he wood - it would be more widespread and not all grouped around the bolt hole.  Very common in aluminum, it gets worse if you have a short in your wiring and electric current is actually passint thru the metal.

I have a Lowe aluminum boat that has dissimilar corrosion happening from the RIVETS.  You'd think the boat manufacturers wouldn't use crappy rivets...I know I thought wrong.

An all aluminum transom or a pour in foam transom would be better anyway.


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## rockwalker (Dec 9, 2011)

Well I am nearly finished with my boat except the interior furniture. I have got the floor cut and in and all the other work done. I am at a crossroads here in that I want to put a coating on the floor and I am thinking about using the Herculiner or somehting like that. Anyone have good or bad experience suing this stuff??

This is for the floor and deck area only. Need something nonskid that has some traction on it.


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## rockwalker (Apr 22, 2012)

*Boat Build is in the final stages*

Well I got the floor in the decking in and the seat and gun box. Finally got all the transom work finised and only a few minor things to finish up. Got to install corner braces, transom stringers and get them all welded up. Gonna add a good high volume bilge pump and still have to brace up the front decks and get some paint on this bad boy and its gonna be bout finished up!!!!

she is all aluminum with stainless steel hardware no wood in ths boat no where. 


Also wouldnt ya know it just bought a motor about 2 weeks ago and then got a call on a 2 stroke yammy for a good deal as well and its just plain bad timing. Hope I can still get it. The 20 horse on it now pushes it about 26MPH i would like to know what the 25 horse long shaft would do for it.


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## king killer delete (Apr 22, 2012)

Looks great. keep us posted.


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## rockwalker (Apr 22, 2012)

I will. Hope to have the welding finished up in the next week or so. Due to the traveling thats been going on with work its taken a while to finish it up but once its done it should be there for a while.


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## RB8782 (Apr 22, 2012)

i used metal conduit piping to build my blind last year.  it was easy/cheap build and was my first "project" i did on my own.  it now rest on the bottom of lake eufaula after the wind caught it during some rough weather last season, it nearly took our heads off, full speed in the dark....RIP


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## king killer delete (Apr 22, 2012)

Send me a pm and I can tell you how to build a fold down blind that works great


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## MudDucker (Apr 23, 2012)

If you are going to use PT plywood, go by a garage that handles tractor trailers and see if you can get a couple of old tire tubes.  Cut those in strips and glue them on top of each rib.  Then attach plywood using stainless screws or rivets.  Makes it quieter and protects the metal from the pt chems.


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## mark29860 (Apr 23, 2012)

If you can find it someone had a post on here of killer elite building a boat blind there were pictures instructions and I believe a material list it didn't look that hard to build and to me looked as good as any store bought blind


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## duckhunter2010 (Apr 23, 2012)

if you need some help in the evenings, starting next monday i will be home for the summer and working at the UGA campus in Griffin and i'll be off at 5 everyday. i'm always looking for new people close to home to shoot the bull with and work on anything related to hunting. plus i will be working on my boat this summer as well so helpful connections can never hurt. shoot me a pm.


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## rockwalker (Dec 24, 2012)

*Finally got the boat finished up and......*

the boat made her first run in the Bayou Meto and my lack of driving skills beat her up a little but all in all she ran out good for me in the timber. Heading out Wednesday for another 3-4 days and gonna scratch some paint, add some dents and get more duck blood than human blood in it this time. We had a fuel line incident on the trip last time. Hope we hit it right this trip all the weather reports look promising.


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## BigSwole (Dec 24, 2012)

Boat looks good. Dents add character!!

Just pin it and hold on, 50% chance itll end ok!


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