2bucks wrote:
The story goes that "families" would get boats from the yard to finish off. They put the decks together, made the cabinetry etc which is why there is such a wide disparity in quality from boat to boat. Some folks report pieces of packing crate uses as sub decking, others have nicely fitted plywood.
This is true.* There were (and maybe still are) a number of small, family-run boatyards on Taiwan.* From what I've been told by shipwrights in our area who have worked on a number of these boats, the main plants in Taiwan*would lay up the hulls and usually the basic deck and*cabin shells.* Then these components would be sent to one of the family yards for completion.* While the basic finishing processes were fairly standardized, what varied widely were the materials that were used, particularly as stiffeners in cabin structures that would not be visible from outside or inside the boat.* Some yards used quality marine ply, for example.* Other yards used cut-up packing crates and pallets.
Before anyone gasps in horror at the notion of using an old packing crate or pallet, they need to know how these things are usually made in Asia.* Packing crates are more often than not made out of very nice mahogany ply with mahogany framing.* The huge aircraft maintenance and rebuild comapny we just spent two months at in Xiamen, China, has a big wood shop where they build shipping crates and pallets for the parts they send out.* These things are gorgeous, all brand new mahogany.* Same deal over on Taiwan.
But--- the ply is not marine-grade which means the glue holding the plys together will break down if it stays wet for any period of time.
Where this can prove to be a problem in a boat like a CHB is that when a window starts to leak--- and every boat's windows will leak eventually---- the water can run down inside the cabin wall structure and soak the wood stiffeners and*strengthening panels *that the yard installed.* If the wood used was packing crate/pallet material, it will delaminate pretty quickly and it's just a matter of time before it gets soft as*rot sets in.* Not that stiffeners made of marine-quality ply won't eventually start to soften and rot over time if they get and stay wet, but they will resist this longer than the non-marine stuff.
So the "problem" with a number of the Taiwan trawlers, at least back in the 70s and 80s, was a lack of consistency.* CHB34 hull number 500 might have been completed by a yard that used high-quality materials for things like cabin sidewall stiffeners and so on, where CHB34 hull number 501 might have been completed by a yard that used cut up packing crates and pallets.* Which is why, it was explained to me when we started looking for our own trawler, that these types of boats need to be examined and surveyed very, very carefully.* Not because they are bad boats or poor designs, but to make sure that the boat in question is not sufferering from the consequences of less-than-ideal yard practices.
One of the greatest advantages of a Grand Banks boat is not so much the design--- it's a good one for this type of boat but there are plenty of others that are just as good if not better--- but that American Marine built all their boats, first wood and then glass, using the same, standardized processes and material quality on all of them.* All their boats were built by the parent company, first in Kowloon across from Hong Kong and then in their Singapore yard where they did all the glass boats starting in mid-1973, and today in the Singapore and Malaysia yards.
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-- Edited by Marin on Tuesday 2nd of June 2009 11:26:34 AM
