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Regarding fasteners, I never bothered with stainless steel screws etc. and have never had corrosion problems. Part of the reason is that I could not get all the fittings I wanted in stainless - the scopes are a mixture of what I could find.
But, I don't live next to the coast like you do - so maybe get what you can in stainless.
Also, I generally painted/varnished the wooden components before I bolted/screwed everything together as that was easier for me - don't know if a bit of varnish sticks to and protects zinc-plated bolts like wood.
I usually spend a lot of time getting the weight/distance maths right in these ultralight scopes because the balance depends a lot on the size of the altitude bearings. The greater the radius of the bearings the more the scope is bottom heavy and visa versa. I get the weights from the internet re. the wood, poles, optics, focuser, spider, telrad etc. I then calculate the amount of wood, aluminium etc. and do a best guess, fudging the scope to be a little bottom heavy as in "The Dobsonian Telescope".
The advantage of the type of Highe design I used is that I could slide the side bearings up or down a bit to fine tune balance, though sometimes the bigger variations have the side bearings fixed to the mirror box. You can also stuff counterweight in the poles or on a sliding counterweight on the outside of a pole in this design.
But it is better to get it as close as possible first
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