"Jacques Mertens" wrote in message ...
Because of resistance to puncture, isotropic properties and stiffness.
Foam sandwich doesn't work for small boats. To get sufficient resistance to
puncture, the skins must have a minimum thickness. For mechanical reasons,
we should use tri or quadriaxial while with plywood only biaxial is needed.
A sandwich panel made that way would be heavier than a plywood-epoxy-glass
sandwich.
Once you get around 27', foam sandwich becomes a valid choice. With
vacuum-bagging and aramids, we could build smaller units, donw to 20' but
the cost would be very high.

PS: about poplar, there are no fasteners in our boats . . .

I know.. I am building one of your boats now... but of course, I will
be using no poplar
Scotty 8-)


--
Jacques
http://www.bateau.com

"Backyard Renegade" wrote in message

Why not make the panels of foam and skins, like vacume bagging?
Scotty