Good evening all,

I am a young guy from Denmark who has a background from the wind turbine industry where I have worked with the development of new wind turbine blades, the biggest being 75 meters long and weighing more than 20 tons.

Recently I mocved to Papua New Guinea to work for a Balsa company who supplies balsa to several of the wind turbine manufactures.

Every afternoon I see the local fishermen going out to fish in their traditional outrigger canoes. Each tribe has there own distinct design but all seem to be very seaworthy as we often see them far out to sea when we go trolling for Marlin.

Normally the canoes are made from big logs from the rainforest. But this makes them heavy and over time they will deteriorate. Therefore, I will try and make a couple of canoes out of whole balsa logs and glass fiber. So basically, I will get a carver to make a canoe out of one 3 meter long piece of balsa and then wrap it in glass fiber afterwards.  

I have already found a carver (Peter) and the first two logs have been drying for three weeks in the kiln.

I anticipate the following problems with the project: 

• Drying the balsa logs withoutcreating to many cracks. Normally when you dry the whole log it will crackalong the pith in the center of balsa log. This will make it difficult for thecarver to make a complete canoe out of one piece of wood.
• Wrapping the completed canoe inglass fiber without creating wrinkles when vacuum is applied. I still have notfigured out exactly how I am going to pack the glass fiber around the balsacore. Especially the inside will be difficult. I may need to find some kind ofspray glue that can hold it in place while I pack the glass fiber. 
• Resin infuse the cano withoutgetting dry spots and without drilling hundreds of holes through the balsacore.
• Getting resin to Papua is challengeas it is considered dangerous goods, and all internet shops seem to use airfreight.  

So I willbe using this forum to try and find some solutions to these challenges and maybe help others with theirs if I can 

 

 

Sounds like quite the adventure you got yourself into. But I'm not sure whether I should be jealous or not

Combining modern and traditional building techniques sure sounds like an interesting project.

> Drying the balsa logs withoutcreating to many cracks. Normally when you dry the whole log it will crackalong the pith in the center of balsa log. This will make it difficult for thecarver to make a complete canoe out of one piece of wood.

Have you considered other, both traditional and modern boatbuilding methods, like stitch and glue? Surely some sort of plywood is readily available in your corner of the world. While balsa is probably dirt cheap there and the cost of a whole tree not prohibitive, "removing everything that doesn't look like a canoe" from a whole tree sounds very wasteful. At least saw a few planks and glue them together, and then start producing the final shape. You can produce several canoes from one tree. There won't be any cracks in the wood either.

> Resin infuse the cano withoutgetting dry spots and without drilling hundreds of holes through the balsacore.

Why resin infusion? Wet layup is easier to teach to the locals and may be cheaper and easier. It's not like you need to beat any weight records, a kilo more weight won't matter much.

> Getting resin to Papua is challenge as it is considered dangerous goods, and all internet shops seem to use airfreight.

Try to source anything you need in Indonesia. You should be able to get resins and glass etc. there, and freight won't hurt nearly as much. Might still take some time until the stuff arrives at your place. I seem to remember that there aren't many roads in that country, and nearly everything is transported by aircraft?

Yes definitely an adventure, and I think you should be jealous

Wow... quite a project ... And welcome to another Dane on this forum.. with the same surname  no less...


I definitely think the hand layup of glassfibre is the way to go.. use a marine type epoxy (almost goes without saying ... ) that has built in UV filter

Fantastic results can be achieved, just take a look at the many strip-built, glass reinforced boats on various boat-/canoe/kayak building sites..

I have used balsa cores for making ultralight gunstocks for years, mainly with CF covering, but I have made one with tinted resin and very light weight (120 g/sqm) satin wowen glass cloth.

They were all made using hand layup, I was under the impression that Balsa is way too porous to allow you to do a straight on skin infusion ???

Good luck with the project!!

"Sapere Aude"... Dare to KNOW!

The written word is the only truly efficient vehicle for transmitting a complex concept from mind to mind...

103% of all people do not understand statistics...

Do not adjust our mind, theres a fault in reality :-)

i think you wasting your time ...

the reasons i say this

the grain of the balsa is running in the wrong direction
carbon on just one side of the canoe is going to make it so that it soaks the water on the inside

heard of 'polishing a turd' ? no matter how much you polish .. yup , its still a turd

if you wanted to do this and spend all that time and effort ... get the guy to carve out a plug and make a set of molds .....

then in your layup you can use balsa as a sandwich on the end grain

IMO ofcourse

I will not only cover one side of the canoe with glass fiber. Everything will be covered, so it will not soak water unless I make a hole in it.

im sorry to hear that

so the only thing the glass will be doing is making the balsa water proof ?

Even if the balsa grain isn't oriented optimally, it is still a sandwich and the glass will provide a lot of surface protection.

what's this about "grain direction" in Balsa ??    I have used balsa "planks" of about 1 cm thickness, and made a "sandwich" with  layers of Uni-dir CF in between.. then shaped the resulting "block" and finished with wrapping it in a couple of layers of CF twill weave..   The gunstocks I have made this way are extremely strong and light... I've had no problems at all...   Surely the outrigge canoe is just a much larger version of this, using see-through glass-fibre for cover instead...

Very sorry to hear about the death of your carver... does not seem to me a very good idea to sleep out on a road with a lethal risk of cars running over your head. ..

still... good luck with the project...

"Sapere Aude"... Dare to KNOW!

The written word is the only truly efficient vehicle for transmitting a complex concept from mind to mind...

103% of all people do not understand statistics...

Do not adjust our mind, theres a fault in reality :-)