Steel, wood or aluminum

Mambo42 · Dec 20, 2025 at 9:19 PM

Capt Ralph said: ↑

These are not all glued together boats.
Screwed/bolted and glued is the better description.

Installed by the factory or by previous owners; every fastener is a maintenance issue.
Every fastener goes into/thru wood.
Boats flex. Fasteners, wood, glass cloth and epoxy flex at different rates.
Then ship happens.

My latest example was the transom of a CM boat. Where the trim tabs were attached.
During a bottom paint job, it was noticed some of these mounting screw heads looked poor.
When one was removed, water poured out over night.
It may not have been the fault of the trim tab screws, the wood coring was also missing from around the haws openings a bit above above the tabs also.
Thru the years (rain) water came into the transom and took most of it out.

As a young and stupid kid, my first boat was a wooden ChrisCraft.
I didn't get into trouble as the other young kids did, I was busy working on my boat.
I learned the hard way, ole wooden boats are pretty but very maintenance intensive.
But I at least was able to notice wood failures quickly unlike wood covered by glass and epoxy.

Just stay aweigh from wood.
Wood hulls, Wood decks, Wood trim, Cold Molded (CM) wood covered in epoxy, wood stringers and your wife's wood base-ball bat.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the explanation, this is the type of information that gives me insight of why I should not get into a wooden boat. It is not my idea of fun to spend a fortune each year on maintenance of the wood and I don't have the expertise to do it myself.

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Steel, wood or aluminum

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