PDR newbie introduction and questions - TEXAS!

**kiue** · 12th March 2009, 08:19 AM

Hello all. A while back I seem to have caught the sailing bug after taking a basic keelboat class. I could tell because I immediately came home and did cruel and unusual things to my kayak and tried to sail it. When that worked(sortof) I started showing symptoms of gotta-build-a-boat syndrome.

I've never heard of a cure for this disease, so I figure I might as well try to infect the kids with it so I have someone to share my misery with. The PD looks like it might be easy enough for me to build, and looks like it would be great for the kids (no, really, it's for the kids! You believe me right?). I've been reading the PDR websites and forums trying to do my homework, and I bought the plans for the OZ PDRacer.

Warning: Possible silly questions to follow. While I can usually tell the difference between a hammer and a screwdriver, I'm mostly clueless about both sailing and woodworking. Also, I always try to do a search before asking in case anyone else has already asked the same thing, but the search thingy is not cooperating with me at the moment so I apologize for any silly/repeated questions. So...

1. Thinking optimistically, if I can spend a substantial amount of time working on it daily, roughly how long might it take a newbie like me to build a PD?

2. Also keeping my newbie-ness in mind, I'm wondering whether it would be better to splurge on decent materials (lumber, epoxy, etc.) in the first place or if it might be better to go really cheap first time around and build a "learner" boat to practice on first. Any opinions/experiences about this would be most appreciated.

3. Last question just for curiosity: I'm in the U.S., specifically the Gulf Coast area of Texas. Any neighbors on here by chance?

Any other advice about must know or must read stuff is appreciated as well.

**m2c1Iw** · 12th March 2009, 04:45 PM

G'day,
Michael will be along I'm sure with his words of wisdom but I reckon for a couple of hours a day it will take you 2 months there abouts, maybe......depends on how fussy you want to be.

The duck is great for a first time builder this I can say from experience it will teach you a lot of the basics and about epoxy and stuff. Michaels detailed plans are step by step plus you have all us know alls to stear you

I would therefore recommend buying quality materials because you will do such a great job first time around you will want it to last but do try and scrounge as much as possible in the puddle duck spirit.

Have fun and just do it and don't worry about making mistakes that is what the epoxy is for to hide the slip ups

Mike

**kiue** · 12th March 2009, 09:53 PM

Originally Posted by m2c1Iw

G'day,

Have fun and just do it and don't worry about making mistakes that is what the epoxy is for to hide the slip ups

Mike

Note to self... get plenty of extra epoxy... Ok, got it.

Hehe, that's perfect, the know alls are what I was looking for.

Thanks for the advice.

**Boatmik** · 13th March 2009, 09:39 AM

Howdy Kiue,

There are a number of puddle ducks in Texas, I think there are couple of OZ versions too somewhere.

The worldwide PDRacer site www.pdracer.com lists everyone geographically which is nice of them - see "local fleets" in the left column.

Mike's advice is spot on ... have fun and don't worry too much as the 'pox will fix most things.

If you want to update here with pics from time to time and write something about how it is going (or ask questions) ... we will be "all ears" ... or do I mean eyes!

Best wishes
Michael

**Boatmik** · 13th March 2009, 09:40 AM

oh .. I added texas to the thread title so others might see it.

MIK

**kiue** · 14th March 2009, 02:19 AM

Oh I forgot about that one, I'm glad you reminded me. I've seen that page before but forgot about it. Looks like it's been updated since I was last there. Also looks like there are more ducks around here than I thought.

I will try to make an album/journal of the process, minus phase one, which in my case is cleaning the junk out of the garage heh.

**koala** · 14th March 2009, 05:22 AM

Hi Kiue

You made a good decision to buy a OZ PDRacer plans.

For me as a first time builder made a huge difference in building and even with such detailed description in the plans thetre is still a lot of room to learn and as you grow in confidence to experiment

The time to build the Racer depends on how much you pay attention to details. I don't know how many hours others spent but it took med arround 120 building hours to the stage whe I just need to paint the boat, whait for the warmer weather and go

I if had a full week off work and just work on the duch I think I could lower those hours a lot more. If you work an hour here and there then it takes more time to set things up.

Hint: Have a look at some posts on the forum when people started building and when they finish. It won't tell you the man hours but roughly the elapsed time. Don't look at mine time span.

Avg'08 to Mar'09
But as we had winter in between I wasn't worried.

Cheers and all the best - it is a great fun building this boat, I hope it wiill be the same with sailing it.

**Papa** · 14th March 2009, 06:31 AM

Here is the Holy Grail of boat building in your area!

Give them a call!

http://www.duckworksbbs.com/about.htm

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