Customer Reviews

Lofting

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Lofting -- the process of transferring the information on paper plan to the real thing, is the one of most confusing and intimidating aspects of boatbuilding. This book sets out to explain it in some detail. Unfortunately the the author gets sidetracked by details and in trying to include all aspects of lofting glosses over some of the fundamentals. It was helpful to me since I had learned the basics from other books, but if you want to learn lofting with no prior knowledge this is not the book for you. There was no discussion of planking and spiling (what I was looking for). The illustrations are helpful, but there could be more. It is not spiral bound as described -- it is a conventially bound paperback which doesn't like to stay open.

I'm certain that a knowledgeable structural or mechanical engineer would find this book accessible and helpful. As a novice boatbuilder whose experience is limited to cedar-strip canoes, I found it completely baffling in both important senses. It did not explain to me how to transfer a boat plan to a form, and it did not explain how to construct the boat. Mostl;y, this is due to my unfamiliarity with the technical language and/or the fact that the author makes some pretty broad assumptions about the knowledge the reader has coming into the book.

This is NOT a book for the novice boat-builder.

If you know nothing about boat building and lofting when you pick this up, it will be a very hard read. I went to school for Mechanical Engineering about a million years ago, knew nothing about boats, and gave up figuring out lofting from this book. The author assumes you know a lot about the subject up front. I read 98% of my technical book purchases from cover to cover. This one was one of the 2%.

For anyone starting out in boat building, this book provides basic instruction that helps the reader understand the process of lofting, or drawing the lines and plans for boats. Read this book with pencil, paper and ruler in hand to get the most out of it. Using this book, I was able to loft plans for a dinghy. The experience helped me to understand the plans for a more complex sailboat. Having read this book, I would like to see a follow-up that spends more time on more complex lofting techniques.

For the amateur boat builder there are few other books (no other books?) written for the novice to understanding and begin the process of turning sheets of line drawings into full size boat construction patterns. That said, I found the author's excessive use of boat builder's language somewhat egocentric. The nomenclature learning curve makes understanding this book something like learning algebra directly from Archimedes -- was that Latin or Greek?

I always wanted to know what lofting is all about. Well, now I know. The book is very interesting and explanatory. Although I found some illustrations confusing, I think that it covers the subject in a significant depth. Recomended. I even think of lofting my next boat.

i have only flipped through this book so im not going to say much about whats in it.
i just wanted to say that my book came with the spiral binding....maybe some of them do not?? it seems that way,according to one other guy ....

this title came up so darn often ,no matter where i was reading,,or the website,,,when it came to "LOFTING they always came back to this book. from some of the referrals i read,,,i trust them,,and eventually give this a read.