Intro to building the 28 Foot Great Alaskan Boat

I have owned several boats over the years, with my first being a 21 foot Hydrasport Hydraskiff bay boat.  This was a great boat.  I caught a lot of fish over the years in it.  It had a 150hp Evinrude Ocean Runner motor, and I never had a lick of trouble out of any part of the boat.  But the boat had a tunnel hull, and boy did it pound!

My next boat was a 21 foot Nauticstar bay boat.  This was a sexy fishing machine with a 150 HP Yamaha four stroke.  A little underpowered, and the wiring was terrible on the boat.  Customer service was great, but I got tired of fixing broken things.  Then I started to get the offshore fishing bug!  This is a dangerous and expensive illness that strikes many fisherman.  Try to avoid this at all costs, but if you can't, like I couldn't...break out the checkbook.

Next up was a 22 foot Sea Hunt Triton Center Console with a Yamaha 250 Four stroke.  This boat caught a lot of fish and the quality was pretty good.  Wiring was not the worst I had ever seen, but still not top notch.  The biggest problem I started to realize, was that none of these boats had any real shade or protection from the elements.  Being a fair skinned fisherman living in Florida, I already get pre-cancerous lesions burned off my head and neck every year at the dermatologist.  When you are out on the open ocean, there is very little shade on a boat with a T-Top.  Basically between 11:26am and 12:43pm, if you stand directly under the T-Top you get some shade from the direct sun, however, you still get 100% of the reflected UV from the water.  When the weather kicks up a little, you end up taking 5 gallon buckets of seawater to the face every 10 seconds, your back is killing you and it ends up not very fun sometimes. Plus, behind the leaning post was so little fishing room is was ridiculous.  They design these boats to ride fast, not fish efficiently.

Well, I decided I needed a boat with more protection from the elements, a comfortable place to drive and relax, but still have a giant fishing area.  I started looking at 25-28 foot pilothouse style boats.  These boats from Parker, Judge, Steiger Craft and a few others are magnificent boats.  However, they run nearly $100, 000 new, and they will use around $200-300 in fuel each trip.  This on top of the boat payment, fuel bill for the tow vehicle (or maybe a new diesel tow vehicle), or perhaps even dry rack storage made me realize that I could not afford to boat like this.......very sad....

I really loved these boats above, but they are just out of my price range!

Then a post on TheHullTruth.com, basically asking for help in my boating dilemma (champagne boat on light beer budget) led an individual user named Pfithian mentioned to build a Tolman Jumbo.  I had NO IDEA what he was talking about, so I started looking around and realized, OMG, you can actually build a boat!  Then I stumbled upon Brian Dixon's site with the Great Alaskan boat, and I was sold.

I mean, imagine having a 28 foot boat, built exactly the way you want.  The boat weighing half or less of any of the other boats you had looked at, and getting upwards or 4 times better fuel mileage.  Getting twice the gas mileage towing it down the road.  And best of all, building it complete for about 1/4 the price of getting one of the other new factory boats.  Sounds to good to be true, I know.

So I told my family and friends, and they quickly laughed me out of the house, calling me Noah.  Someone told me "You cannot build a boat out of wood for the ocean", and I told him " I am glad no one told Christopher Columbus that!"  

So here I am....I have gotten my building area nearly ready, got my workshop setup, bought all my materials for the hull, and I am ready to go.  Let's see how this adventure turns out.

Picture of the Great Alaskan 28 Foot.  I bought a complete set of plans and comprehensive building manual from www.glacierboats.com :