> How much strength of the boat comes from the core material? How much from
> the fiberglass? How stiff must the core material be? How thick, since the
> fiberglass layers work better together at greater separations? Am I
> encroaching on any fiberglass/bamboo taboos? The mat material is very
> light, maybe fewer than two pounds per sheet, could I depend on an
> essentialy fiberglass boat with the mat giving form and visual texture to
> the glass? What about a "skin on frame" design, taking the
> strength from the frame, not the mat? I included a link to a picture of
> the mat used in a room dividing screen. The woven part in the background
> is the best view of what the mat looks like.

> All responses welcome.

> Ed Valley

Wow! What a wonderful bunch of ideas. Many f/g boats have no core so I don't think that it is a huge issue.

Lay the mat on the diagonal over the forms & some stringers, wet it out w/ cabinet makers glue to glue the interfaces and you have a shape that is probably stiff enough to take glassing. Getting a flat surface may be a problem w/ high resin/glass ratios. But neat. Definately some scope here.

-mike