Thomas,

FWIW (very little), a friend of mine took on such a project in 1982. He and
his SO worked on the boat for about a year. At the time he was employed at
an Army marina/hobby shop and had access to all tools and equipment and was
able to work on his project on-site during the lunch hour etc. When he
finished the project the boat was pretty nice. He subsquently sailed down
to the Keys where he lived aboard and sailed until he sold the boat and
started work on another project boat.

At the time he finished the project he told me it was about four times as
much work and expense as he had estimated when he began. He told me he
would never again try to restore a ferrocement boat and that he believed it
would have been cheaper, faster and easier to start from scratch with a new
armature.

This guy was a gifted craftsman with years of experience.

YMMV.

Butch
"Red Cloud®" wrote in message
...
On 31 Jul 2005 22:46:47 -0800, (Thomas D.
Ireland)
wrote:


I am thinking that I might be interested in a Ketch or Cruiser
restoration project. I would like one about 45' on deck. If any has one
for sale in the Pacific NW I might be interested to hear from you. If
anyone has any experience with a restoration of this type I would be
interested to hear your horror stories etc.
I have looked at several web sites (ferrocement.org, etc) as well as
looked at several book titles on the subject but have found that books and
the real world are two entirely different things. I would like to get a
diversity of resources that I can refer to. If anyone can offer any ideas
I would appreciate it. I run out of ideas from time to time.
I have limited construction experience and have had some training with
shop tools and equipment and may be able to offer some ideas to someone
who might need some help so I would like to hear from those people as
well. I also have some cadet experience and may also be able to help with
some of those issues as well. Hope to hear from y'all soon!

Tom

Just for openers, you'll find it extremely difficult or completely
impossible to
get insurance or financing of any kind for a ferro cement boat.

rusty redcloud