I don't want to rain on your parade, but I have found that the scratch built process does not save much money. After a few design failures, or ideas that don't work as well as hoped you end up paying almost as much. With that said, I am not discouraging you from doing it. if you are going to do it, do it for the love of scratch building. It is a very demanding hobby, and requires a lot of time and patients, but it is very rewarding. I am in the process of getting my first boat in the water. It is a Seawolf conversion with a scratch built WTC. it has been a great project, and the next one for me is going to be a scratchbuilt sub that I am going to start this winter.

Adam