Balsa Core Boats

This paranoia about balsa cores is a new thing, and totally spurious !

My boat has a balsa cored deck, this is pretty standard not some wild eccentric designers' whim.

No problem whatsoever if one has the brains to put sealant under fittings, which should be obvious with any method of construction.

I might be a bit wary of foam sandwich construction, I've read of this compressing and deforming under load, at chainplates for instance.
 
This paranoia about foam cores is a new thing, and totally spurious !

My boat has a foam cored deck, this is pretty standard not some wild eccentric designers' whim.

No problem whatsoever if one has the brains to put sealant under fittings, which should be obvious with any method of construction.

I might be a bit wary of balsa sandwich construction, I've read of this rotting and turning to mush under water ingress, at fittings for instance.
 
AngusMcDoon said:
This paranoia about foam cores is a new thing, and totally spurious !

My boat has a foam cored deck, this is pretty standard not some wild eccentric designers' whim.

No problem whatsoever if one has the brains to put sealant under fittings, which should be obvious with any method of construction.

I might be a bit wary of balsa sandwich construction, I've read of this rotting and turning to mush under water ingress, at fittings for instance.
Click to expand...

Okay Angus, :)

I was thinking of what I read about 'Sayula', the Swan 65 doing the Whitbread race; the load from the rig crushed bits, and I seem to remember they had trouble repairing it.

Admittedly a long time ago now, though one doesn't seem to hear of foam sandwich much nowadays ?
 
The paranoia about balsa cores might be a new thing because the age of the boats built that way is beginning to make problems manifest themselves.

If deck fittings are not properly fitted and not evryone knows or uses best practice, problems can occur. If whoever fitted the water inlets on my had at least painted around the edge of the hole with epoxy or similar water may not have got in and caused rot.
 
The basic issue isn't whether a core is balsa or foam, but how the boat is built to get light and stiff bits for sensible overall weight.

Gladys has balsa core decks. Have I gone around replacing everything and rebedding everything regardless? No. Have I repaired stuff when I have had to replace it or come across an issue? Yes. SO last year the mast step was rebuilt - that wasn't balsa BTW, it was a bit of 1/2" shuttering ply, so the minute any water got in there it was on a loser. I'd be prepared to bet that foam core boats won't have foam under the mast step

If you have sandwich decks of ANY sort, whenever you pierce the skins to secure fittings, you risk compressing the inner skin and outer skin closer and crushing the core. Over the years water will get in, and have some sort of effect so what's so difficult about doing a sensible engineering solution of drilling large holes, removing the core, filling with epoxy and then drilling the final fixing hole? It's a bit like only using Sikaflex on underwater fittings it's just something you do....
 
Bet this bloke's glad he didn't buy a balsa cored boat.

http://www.channelpilot.info/huzar.php

I think it's proof you can build a bad boat out of anything. The real trick is knowing exactly what it is you're buying. Surveying can only tell you so much (or in reality even less!). I think the builder's reputation is worth a lot and I would trust a balsa cored boat built by a good builder long before I trusted anything made by an unknown entity.
 
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