bdann

There's a show on the Discovery Channel called "Time Warp", they do a series of experiments or demonstrations and capture it all in super slow motion. On one of the recent episodes they demonstrated this saw and the designer did use his finger in one of the demonstrations...it was almost hard to watch. Not even a nick on his finger, pretty neat.

my only rationale is I think it will be fun to build and it is cheap.

Yea, the designer says it differs from other "one sheet" designs in that this one has a lot more freeboard than is typical. It has 16" at the bow and 13" at the transom, which seems like a lot for such a tiny boat. He accomplishes this by making the transom from a 1x12 instead of ply, which frees up more of the ply for the rest of the hull. "cheating" I guess if you care about that sort of thing, i don't. I'm going to build one, like you said, if I don't like it I'm not out much.

Anyone here ever build one of these or see one in person? Just curious what your impression is/was... Here's the link to the (free) plans: http://www.pdracer.com/plans/harley-8.pdf

I'll definitely do that. Not much to report from the weekend, just cleaning up some details before the sides go on. (oh and we took care of the beer bottle orientation on the foredeck.)

I've been mostly lurking here for several months, using the search feature, just soaking up information. I've wanted a sailboat for years. Last spring my friend Grant suggested that perhaps we build a boat, something we'd discussed before, but never very seriously. I started doing a little research and stumbled on Phil Gowans weekender web site and knew THAT was the boat I wanted to build. I ordered the plans in April, Grant and I made the first cuts in May, and have been slowly working since then. I had never done any woodworking before this project. In fact, the only saw I owned before starting was a chainsaw! That is one of the reasons the Weekender appealed to me, the fairly straightforward construction process...and the fact that it can be built on a relatively small budget. Not a completely current photo, but here's the boat after dry fitting the deck and bulkheads: Presently all these pieces are permanently attached. Thus far we have been pretty lucky and haven't majorly screwed anything up (that we know of). I had to recut one of the deck pieces after cutting it on the wrong angle, but other than that everything has gone smoothly (though slowly). Oh we did install the forward bulkhead backwards, even though I had clearly marked it forward and aft...caught it before the glue dried thankfully! ....more to come.

For what its worth... My Weekender has a plywood keel. Plywood wasn't our first choice, but we want to build this boat without breaking the bank and use it as a learning experience. The cost of suitable 1x12 stock was many times what the plywood cost and we elected to go this route. If one of the things we learn from this project is, "Don't use plywood for the keel"...then so be it. Here is a photo: I put stringers the full length to attach the hull bottom too in order to avoid putting screws down through the end grain of the ply. In hindsight, this probably wasn't necessary, as driving the screws down at an angle would have held and I could have added a filet on each side later if I'd wanted. Lesson learned I guess.

Mike, Good to hear that Stevensons is about to get rolling again. I received my Weekender plans back in March or April and have been slowly working on the boat with my build partner since sometime in May. I'm in Rowlett, TX, on Lake Ray Hubbard, which is a pretty big sailing lake in Texas...but not at all close to Boerne. Perhaps a Galveston Bay area mess-about is in order for some time down the road.

Yea...my wife is still a little skeptical of the whole thing, however she came out to the garage while I was working on my Weekender last night and commented, "that looks like a boat"... Yep! That's the idea! The funniest look I've gotten so far was from a West Marine employee when I was looking for some glue. He asked what I needed it for and I say I'm building a boat. He's like, "a what?"...uh, a boat! He just shrugged his shoulders and shook his head as if what I was suggesting was impossible!

I ordered plans via Paypal in March. The Paypal address for them at the time was "mail at stevproj.com". Now, if they say the business is shuttered for now, and they are not selling plans...I don't think I'd be sending them money and expecting the plans anytime soon. I also would not be sending Shannon money directly if she says she does not work for the Stevensons any longer.

After another phone call to our supplier (Wood World in Dallas), as it turns out they can after all order 3/8" marine ply. I guess it just matters who you talk too! I plan on posting photos of our build progress (once we actually make some!)...stay tuned.

pardon my ignorance, but what is "MDO"? That place in Ft Worth is likely where we'll end up going.

We are in Dallas. I have a suspicion our supplier just doesn't want to special order anything in small quantities, and rather than telling us that, has told us he can't get it. Thanks for the advice, we'll be sourcing 3/8" elsewhere (not sure where yet...).

Hi all, My buddy and I are knee deep in our weekender project and we've run into a bit of a snag. Our local supplier of marine plywood doesn't stock 3/8" ply, and they told us their supplier wouldn't carry a "weird" size like that. So my question is, would it be a major blunder to substitute 1/2" ply for the 3/8"? Thanks, Brian

My plans+dvd shipped on Tuesday and I received them yesterday. Good service from Stevenson and quick replies to my e-mail. Now time to get started building! ;D

Hello. I ordered the weekender plans + DVD today. I promptly received an e-mail from Shannon Stevenson letting me know that the DVDs are on backorder until March 31st and that they would refund my money if I did not want to wait. No reason not to wait of course, so I am. I'll post an update when I get them. ...just wanted to let you all know that they are at least monitoring the Paypal orders. -Brian