My Bo-Jest Project after 6 months

My Bo-Jest Project after 6 months

Posted by Ken on Jul 29th 2015

Started building my Bo-Jest boat in January 2015. I work on it 2 to 3 hours a day about  3 or 4 days a week. I am currently fairing the bottom and preparing for my final coat of epoxy resin and paint.

I was going to use a Yanmar SB8 diesel inboard engine but I found a Volvo Penta MD7B last week with more than double the HP at a very good price so I bought it. I have the skeg fitted with a stern bearing and will be ready soon to flip the hull and install the engine.

This boat is covered with biaxial glass cloth and regular glass cloth. The bow section has up to 7 layers of 4 to 7 oz. glass cloth and 15 oz biaxial cloth and a single layer of mat over 1/4 plywood. I elected to use more fiberglass and not double plank the bow section ( <8' ). overall I think this is much stronger that a single layer of cloth over 1/2" double 1/4" planking.  It takes longer to do but is a lot less painful for one person to do than matting, gluing and  screwing double planking plywood.  The sides are double overlapped fiberglass with triple and quadruple coverage at all the seams.  I am on Grand Lake and it has many rocks and I want to protect the hull as best I can.

The hull will weigh a little more but I will reduce overall weight of the cabin by using a foam and oak wood veneer fiberglass encapsulated process that I have used in the past.

DSC00003 DSC00004 DSC00005 DSC00006 DSC00007 IM002881 IM002882 IM002884 IM002885 IM002886 IM002887 IM002888 IM002890 IM002897 IM002898 IM002900 IM002901 IM002903 IM002932 IM002933 IM002934 IM002935 IM002936