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Israelis put Gabriels on Dvora class patrol boats (21,6m long or some 70ft) in the 1970s, later license-produced in Taiwan as Hai Ou (about 50 craft). But that's much after the age of Elco PT's.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dvora_clas ... atrol_boat

Also remember that after the war was won, quite a number of PT boats were just beached, dragged ashore, and set afire.

Cheaper than bringing them back.

That's how "valuable" they were considered post-war.

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Dvora class were aluminum made craft, while the Elco boat were wood.

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Thank you Kim for the crest

"Never fear to try on something new. Remember that the Titanic was built by professionals, and the Ark by an amateur"

For the question about FACs what time period are you looking at because there are an abundance of different types from different post war errors
the La Combattante of France and its Israeli, Greek, and German versions were very popular and successful if you are looking at late 60s early 70s and even into the 80s

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Projects:
Zealandia AU
John Company AU
References and feedback is always welcome!

For the question about FACs what time period are you looking at because there are an abundance of different types from different post war eras
the La Combattante of France and its Israeli, Greek, and German versions were very popular and successful if you are looking at late 60s early 70s and even into the 80s

_________________
Projects:
Zealandia AU
John Company AU
References and feedback is always welcome!

Yes, I know that. Did I wrote that they were wooden? Just that they were small, had missiles and were much later than Elcos.

Yeah, I guess it's worthwhile talking about why being made of wood is a big issue.

Wood is actually a great material to make airplanes out of (as long as you maintain them properly). Wood's a great material to make buildings out of. And wood's actually a great material to make cars out of (see "woody" bodies). And it's a good material to make luxury powerboats out of, and sailing ships when metallurgy technology sucked. But it's not a great material to make warships out of, or even small boats designed for combat.

The big issue is that wood by itself is a maintenance hog. It's fine when it's used to frame a small structure and stands in one place (and is protected by gallons of chemicals and centimeters of drywall, brick and plastic) but once regular exposure to the elements and stress comes into play, it starts to look not so great. Actually the tensile strength of wood is pretty good, comparable to aluminum or so I hear. In fact it's almost too much like aluminum in that its tensile strength fades with use - the fibers get worn down and it cracks and breaks. So if you have a wooden airplane or powerboat, you have to inspect it regularly. Not a big issue when you're a wealthy guy who probably uses such toys on occasion anyway. If you're the Navy operating on a budget, and you use these things every day in situations where these things are shot at and shooting at other things, not so much.

Also wood by itself is expensive - Thiel already covered that especially in regards to the mahogany. The reason why these things were built out of wood wasn't because it's cheaper than aluminum (it is, but honestly not by much) but because this was at a time in the history of the United States and the world as a whole when advanced metallurgy (beyond just forging iron and especially steel) was just emerging out of its infancy and there weren't a lot of consumer goods manufacturers who used metals (i.e., furniture makers, site contractors etc) and the large industrial manufacturers who could do it simply weren't enough in the numbers around, especially when they were building destroyers, tanks and bombers at the same time. So the "little guys" had to make the small boats and they made them out of wood because they simply couldn't make them out of metal. And later on as the war progressed they did learn how to make them out of metal, and you started seeing metal boats - though most were still made of wood because a lot of people just didn't have the time to stop and learn and set up the means to make metal boats.

Really, that's what it boils down to - an issue of time, not actual resource cost. If it was strictly a resource cost in the long run, they would've taken the time to set up aluminum production. It's why the DeHavilland Mosquito came about - because they needed airplanes now and they didn't have the time to expand the production facilities to make more of what they already had. And it's why it was built out of plywood, because it meant piano makers and coffin makers could make them, and specifically out of a glued plywood composite, because it allowed said people to put together an airplane without trying to come up with a complicated, cockamamie-way of actually putting one together, but instead now any idiot can literally glue one together. And it was just a happy coincidence that the Mosquito turned out to be a high-performance aircraft that allowed it to be produced until even after the war was over instead of being superseded by metal types (and incidentally, it's that composite-glue construction, not the plywood material by itself, that made the Mosquito lightweight).

So, there you go. Though a very large number of new or near-new boats were burned because, as Colo said, it was cheaper than bringing them back home, most boats were disposed of because the wood was so weakened it could not be recycled into any meaningful structural use, and due to their chemical treatments were not suitable for recycling into anything else, not even as home-use kindling. Even near-new boats likely would've been extremely stressed. So it's very unlikely that any boats would've survived into the 50s despite Chris-Crafts and Waco biplanes from the 30s still surviving today.

As for what boats you should use, if you want an actual combat vessel there's no beating the Combattine series, and if you want a smaller patrol vessel I actually like the US Cyclones.

EDIT: and here's a whole thread on small boats: http://shipbucket.com/forums/viewtopic. ... 9&start=40

Excellent points Klag. Plus, you have to factor in the additional fire hazard a wood hull is going to create when you try to fire a hot-launch anti-ship missile from it.

And I agree, if you want a fast, small combat boat that's a good missile platform, the various versions of the Combattante class boats are pretty much the epitome of that role. That's why they're in use by so many navies.

The one major exception to the no wooden boats part of the above posts was one very specialized task - minesweepers. Even into the 1950s and 60s there were proposals for Aluminum framed, wood hulled, and bronze plated ships with wooden superstructures for the smallest magnetic signature around.

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𝐌𝐀𝐓𝐇𝐍𝐄𝐓- 𝑻𝒐 𝑪𝒐𝒈𝒊𝒕𝒂𝒕𝒆 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒕𝒐 𝑺𝒐𝒍𝒗𝒆

There isn't much of a fire hazard if you properly design your boat, but your point still stands.