What has become almost a trope at this point, the selling point of a boat being built with “absolutely no wood.. all composite construction”… needs to be addressed. While looking over a friend’s boat with him today, we noticed a couple soft spots in the deck. While my friend explained confidently to me that there was no wood in this boat, the soft spots in the deck were unmistakable. Long story short, after cutting the deck open, the following pictures are what I found. Both coosa board and divinycell foam coring were indeed there, and were both completely saturated with water and total delamination of the deck skin had occurred.

The point here is simple: Poor construction is poor construction. While these closed cell foam composite materials may absorb water at a slower rate than plywood, they absolutely DO absorb water, and the result is the same. The key to long-lasting construction is prevention of water ingress, regardless of the material in question.

We’ve been going back and forth trying different ideas… I have been pretty demanding here and we still aren’t quite where we need to be. I’m big into sight fishing, and I’d like to make a tower an optional upgrade for this boat. It would be nice to be able to add it either from the factory or at a later time without having to reconfigure anything down below. Still looking at different options but here’s where we are now… A few tweaks to the console have been made as well.

First look today of what the leaning post/tackle station will look like. As with the hull, we took an ambitious approach.

With every type of boat hull design, there are compromises that have to be made. There is no such thing as a perfect hull design, or everyone would be using the same design. One thing you run into on the bow of a catamaran is the tunnel coming up towards the bow, and how to deal with the deck area.

Working on figuring out the layout of storage below deck. Having gone through this process, I’m seeing how it’s not as easy as some would think… It’s not just an open canvas, because you have structural elements of the boat to work around, bulkheads in this case. I am trying to see if it’s feasible at all to get the number 2 bulkhead moved aft some to allow for larger fish boxes.

Off track a bit here, but I wanted on record the entire process of Tailwalk Boats’ beginnings. The final design for the catamaran is not quite finished yet, and I’m using this time to try and finish the 1975 Mako that I started restoring a couple years ago. This boat has been a nightmare from start to finish.

Some progress with the design of the hull and testing.

Big decision to be made here.. do I go with the standard one piece hull mold, or do I take a risk and do a 3 piece sectioned mold? I am leaning towards the latter, just because it will allow for design characteristics that just aren’t possible with a one piece.. and make this a truly unique boat.

When I decided to chase this dream, I knew it would be difficult. The proverbial ‘bumps in the road’ were to be expected. What I wasn’t quite prepared for is just how bumpy that road has been. Like, I haven’t had a solid ‘win’ yet… not one. Family and friends think I’m crazy. Banks have laughed in my face. All I know to do is to keep pushing forward and play the odds, as it were. Surely I will catch a break at some point. If not, I guess I will just build the damn boat anyways.