Cruising Cat Width

[D'ARTOIS]

O yes, don't forget to bring a chainsaw.......

[stewi]

Oh, the tree is still there?

[D'ARTOIS]

Who knows: some more pictures, watch the narrow bridge and lock at the Castelnaudary area.......

[stewi]

I was looking for a picture of a 40 foot sailboat under full sails in front of the Dom in Cologne at the Rhine river.
You get the same picture all day. At the end of the day the boat motors the few meters back into the harbor.

[D'ARTOIS]

Ok, here we have one of the larger canals of France the Rhine-Rhone Canal, the other picture is where the Rhine Rhone canal streams into the Saone: look at the narrow lock at the right....

[D'ARTOIS]

Only very few rivers in France are navigable, look at our beautiful Dordogne river, she looks navigable but she isn't..... many gravelbanks form large barriers, even with an inflatable you cannot go far. I lost two props in 15 minutes when I tried.....only a canoe will do......In the winter she can straem fast and many currents make the river dangerous, even for the few fishermen....

This is the village of Beynac, where I use to spend a lot of time.........

[JonathanCole]

The past several posts by Yipster, D'Artois and Stewi have brought up important issues for designing a catamaran for the European inland waterways.

Is there a route from north (Neckar River, Germany) to south (Mediterranean) that does not require passage through small locks and low bridges, or is it unavoidable?

Several maximum height and beam figures have been mentioned. Is there a way to get it exact taking into account the maximum beam? How about maximum draft?

Yipster mentioned the Noordersoft program. Will that provide all these pieces of information? All of this information is necessary to design the best vessel for the purpose.

Yipster wrote:
was allready thinking bout under powering and with your healthy "Displacing a large houseboat of say 14 ft x 60 ft requires something like 6 to 7 bhp per ton displacement" its back at bout 100 hp.

And Artois:
The Rhone streams with tremendous power down to the Med. You won't be capable going upstream with your electrical powered houseboat Downstream is easy, but upstream isn't.

The Rhone runs with about 10 km/h, the currents are heavy and with insuficient power it is even dangerous.

Of course a solar electric catamaran would have to have backup power for the situation where onboard solar generation and storage are insufficient. I had planned on a 6 Kw generator. Also, its not that big a deal to carry a 150 HP auxiliary outboard if necessary. The idea is to minimize operating costs, not to create a dangerous vessel due to insufficient power for the conditions.

[stewi]

If you think about the geographics in Europe than there are the alps, which have to be crossed, when you go from North to South. The Rhine originates in the alps and flows North the Rhone South. There are other rivers which feed these rivers, like Neckar and Mosel the Rhine and Saone the Rhone.
Only a few century old canals connect these rivers.
There was never a commercial interest to ship goods, coal, for example from Duisburg to the Mediterranean. All the commercial traffic supported only the industry of one country,also, because Europe was never connected politically.
All the canals in France are centuries old and in the meantime all commercial transportation go either on highway or around the Atlantic Netherland,France, Portugal and Spain.
We are actually very fortunate that these waterways are kept open, although it doesn't pay off. Traveling on these rivers and canals is history and nature in its purest form.
There are certainly more detailed information of width and depth, but how closed do you want to get to the maximum dimension? D'Artois even more than I trying to tell you, what is practical.
After all, I expect you are doing it for fun and don't want to proof a point that your boat fits in a lock by an inch or so.

P.S. going down a river sounds like fun. However, you have to use the motor and even increase the speed, otherwise you can't steer the boat. The Rhone has some underwater obstacles, broken (bombed?) bridges, which are marked, but going at this speed with commercial traffic is like going on the highway in the wrong direction and requires all your attention.
I was doing this with a long keel sail boat, 10 ton displacement and 40 hp. Turning into a river arm in Avignon for example is quite an adventure. I made it, but I would not do it again in this type of a boat.

[D'ARTOIS]

I spent all of my youth on the borders of the Rhine river, where my grandfather had a villa close to Witlaer, between Duisburg and Duesseldorf.

The Rhine river is no toy water: it is one of the busiest waterways of Europe and navib=gable from Rotterdam to Basel, Switzerland.

Jonathan's question: " is there an alternative waterway through Germany to the Med? " the answer is simple: no

If we take Amsterdam as a starting point, and avoiding the dangerous Amsterdam-Rijn kanaal, we can take either de Maas or de Scelde connection to go through the Seine toward the Rhone river or we take the other side, de Maas and go through the Saone towards the Rhone.

The Rhone river will be always your last stretch before ending at Port St. Louis, in the Med. Sea; a mere 600 km. (going down is easier han going up)

For the above mentioned routes, the max. clearance is approx. 3.20 meter and the max. draught will be somewhere between 1.60 and 1.80 mtr - depending on the level of the water and season.

Practically all bridges in France are rock solid so don't count on any that opens.

The maximum allowed width in the main canals and waterways of the north is 5 mtrs - that's as far as the locks in France can go.
As far as length goes, anything up to 25 mtrs is ok. The Rhine-Rhone connection can accept larger beams and longer ships.

Canal du Midi runs from Bordeaux through part of the Gironde via Toulouse to Béziers, Med. Sea;
It is one of the most beautiful little waterways of France, a delight to navigate, provided you are not in a hurry.
Number of locks: approx 225;
Head clearance: (don't go to the max.) 2.60 - officially 2.70 mtr;
Draft: 1.60 (advisable: 1.40);

General rule: every boat going to the Atlantic side have priority;

Very briefly are these the outlines for a possible passage.

Note: For the Rhine river counts a series of special regulations. There are a few bottlenecks, the most dificult and dangerous at Koblenz and the locks to the Rhine-Rhone canal can be a hooror for the inexperienced skipper.
This is the NOT ADVISABLE route for foreigners!!!!!
Better go from Roterdam-Paris-Dijon-Lyon to the south of France.

[D'ARTOIS]

FYI Jonathan, I have amassed the route to France on a bigger scale than Yipster has showed us, so you may clearly see where the bottlenecks are....

[JonathanCole]

Brien, Stephan,

Thank you very much for your input. The maps are really good and very legible. Thanks, D'Artois! It is extremely helpful.

So to navigate the north to south route comfortably in both directions (I have plenty of time) what would be the ideal boat parameters? The important thing is to maximize a horizontal roof for the mounting of solar panels. I know the form of the converted Dutch houseboat/barges and that these can be had relatively inexpensively (compared to building a new boat), but I have a couple of problems with this style. First, they are extremely heavy which means high energy required to drive them. Second they have a fairly deep draft compared to a lighter boat. Third, I prefer not to live under the water, but on top of it, as in a power cat/pontoon boat.

Is it agreed then that 2.7 meters is the height limit (above the water) and 4 meters the beam limit (does that include side hull protection?)? D'Artois mentioned that up to 25 meters length is workable. That seems pretty long to make tight turns. But that still gives me my 100 sq. metres for solar roof. But 25 meter cat hulls? I guess at that length they could be super slim, maybe 20:1 L/B ratio. Should be very efficient. I wonder about the 2.7 metre height limit. I am about 1.80 metres, so that leaves .9 meters combined for the thickness of the deck (.25 metres?), the thickness of the roof (.15 m?)and the space between the water and the underside of the deck (.5 m?). Is .5 meters enough clearance for the Rhine/Rhone conditions or will the waves pound on the underside?

[D'ARTOIS]

I think Jonathan that here we have to establish the basic parameters of the boat you require - it might be in some cases a bit contradictory.
First of all we have to cope with the Rhine-regulations and what sort of craft besides the professional barges, is allowed to navigate this river. What those regulations are, I am not completely aware of, but I can find out easily.

Basically we have to design a vessel that can navigate the main european inland waterways, according to regulations and according to physical cirumstances as the narrow locks and bridges of the French inland waterways.

Therefore we need to know where you want to go and if that includes the Canal du Midi - absolutely the most exiting and tranquil waterway in France, we have to see what can pass.
Your limits are less tight in case you skip the CdM parameters/requirements.

The barge would be certainly the best option, but you have clearly stated that such is no option - so we restrict ourselves to the double hull, either the true cat hull or the pontoon hull.

Only Rhine and Rhone will require optimal power - the rest of the inland waterways are reasonable navigable w/o the necessity of a large engine and/or power supply.

The first answer I need is Jonathan, if you desire to navigate the CdM?

[yipster]

when getting serious i strongly suggest buying the pc program navigo to get a better idea of european inland waterways. also get some pilot guides. rhine (and other) regulations in water almanak 1+2 you have to have aboard. checked and it was the rhine-rhone canal that was open for my 2.70 height, no way however to upload the dozens of pages filled with info and charts. had frends that did paris via belgium mentioning that route had even more locks. all those things you can check in navigo. the new version charts are showing river dimensions better now but have forexample no berths shown in marina's like on navisailor/tsunami navigation software. this i was discussing the other day, bitmap charts may be implemented anyday but getting vertor mapping for inland waterways appered to be a problem. anyone with a good thought for a handy program from some nice guy's ( not me ) let them know that i be interested to update my europe version

[masrapido]

Originally Posted by Inquisitor

I just have a few hours of research for electriciz-ing a cruising sailboat. Note: Not constant duty! Could someone discuss the issues with brush/brushless. Some mess, some maintenance… but
$32,000 US for brushless…

The brushed one I was looking was 89% efficient for 9HP for $500.

apologies, that was meant to be 2 000 000 chilean pesos, which would be +/- $3175 us dollars.

[FAST FRED]

One problem I have had with very light weight cruising multihulls is tie ups.

Some days you tie up along side an 80ft tug .

Some days the 80ft Tug ties up to YOU!

Beware!

FAST FRED