Question

[FLexpat]

Originally Posted by Scott1115

1 - when I see guys removing the decking or the cap, the underlying wood looks like an old parkay floor. It looks like small squares of wood. Why did manufacturers use this instead of sheets of marine plywood?

That is end grain balsa; it is cut from balsa tree wood into squares with the grain aligned in the thin direction (~.375" in my deck) for compressive strength and glued together at the edges to form sheets. The boatboulder buys the sheets and trims them to the size needed for a particular layup. Balsa is very light (~2-5 lbs/ft3) and has lots of good properties when used that way.