Looking for Lumber

[FDeans]

I have called every lumber "store" in my area, and noone has or know how to get "select White pine" in 16 foot lengths. I am looking forward to starting my first boat, the Lumberyard skiff, if I can ever find the side pieces I need. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

[Bruce Hooke]

You may have to scarf two shorter boards together to get 16' lengths. Another option is to consider another wood. White Pine is nice stuff. It is light and if you use heartwood (even harder to find), it is reasonably rot resistant. However, you are a long ways from areas where White Pine is common in the forest and other woods that are more native to your area might be a reasonable substitute.

By the way, are you calling specialty lumber dealers (places that handle hardwoods & exotics) or just your local building supply type places? If the latter, you will quickly find that such places do not carry many of the woods that boatbuilders want. A good source for information on specialty lumber dealers is http://www.wdfinder.com

[Thorne]

You might also try posting in the new Getting Started forum hosted by WB -

http://gettingstartedinboats.wordpress.com/

Since it is focused currently on the Lumberyard Skiff, answers to your question should be a bit quicker -- and help other builders, too.

;0 )

Would cypress (the heartwood, not the soft butress part) be a good local wood for him to build this boat from?

[Thad]

Where you are I'd look for sawmills that cut cypress.

[seedtick]

Avoid "new" cypress or what we call growback. Look instead for old growth stuff, either as resawn/reclaimed beams or sinker logs. It'll cost you more but you'll have a boat to pass on to the grandkids.

[Thorne]

There was a recent thread on Cypress -- worth searching for. As I dimly recall, the heartwood was good for boatbuilding, but the "support buttresses" were called "swamp cypress" or "black cypress" and were NOT good wood for hulls.

Anybody know more about Southern cypress?

[seedtick]

Try this site, it has a bit of information

http://treetotem.com/tebaldcypress.htm

The old trees, 800 + years old, have more of the rot resistant cypress oil than the new growth trees.

[Carlsboats]

Caution re Cypress. The real stuff, of the variety that grows in the Louisiana bayous, is great for boats -- very rot resistant, swells up nicely. Used to be used on a lot of work boats. But I'm told that there is very little of it left anywhere, and what there is, is expensive. What is often sold as cypress is something else, not nearly as good.
Check this out with the wood experts before buying "cypress."

[Steve Lansdowne]

You learn a lot about wood characteristics when building wooden boats. Generally there are several options for any specific type of wood for a particular purpose, with cost and accessibility one factor. Folks from one area of the country plank with one wood that is not used in another area because it doesn't grow there. In some cases for a boat that only stays in the water when you're using it, the range of wood options is much greater. On the other hand, some woods are never to be used in certain applications because of certain characteristics. Don't get discouraged, just learn more about wood options in your area and relative costs of shipping wood from a far away location versus settling for something that grows closer to home. Ask other builders in your neck of the woods what woods they've used for certain applications and what kind of use and storage their boats have to get a better idea of your wood options. A final thing to consider is that some woods are called different things in different parts of the country, even though they have the same scientific name (e.g., some "cedars" are really "juniper").