: Hi Bill - I was going to use 8.9 oz nylon and goop from the skinboat school
: to cover mine. But I'm thinking a lighter skin makes a lot of sense for a
: hull that is narrow and has no openings - is the 4 oz dacron the stuff
: from Geodesic/Airolite boats? Do you think it would work with Zar
: oil-based exterior polyurethane?

: This week I'm epoxying all the ply pieces and am going to assemble the whole
: thing with screws (no glue) and a temp skin to see if all this nonsense
: has a chance of working. I'm going to post a link to some photos of my
: build so far on the main index.

: Carl

Hi Carl,

It's the same stuff that the Aerolite people use, it's non-certified aircraft dacron. I get mine from Aircraft Spruce, best price I've found and excellent service. You can heat shrink it with a household iron.

Zar should work fine as a finish, have to brush it well on the first coat since the fabric has a "hard" finish, not very porous, so important to get the first coat brushed into the weave so the outer layers of the poly don't just sit on the surface.

I do wonder if the stringers sitting on the surface of your frames and only held with screws will be strong enough to keep everything straight. I've just followed Tom Yost's advice and that seems to work well. Tom's done a bunch of reasearch obviously and knows what works

Bill H.