designing a fast rowboat

Weir river race

Well, Saturday was yet another weir river race. Brother Dave severed the tips of three fingers on his left hand on his table saw. They were re-attatched and the prognosis is good for a complete recovery. His son, Jason, rowed in his place. 210 pounds of muscle but no rowing experience at all. He also was very shaken up about his Dads' accident as he was there working with him. Any way, we finished second out of 6 doubles but 23 minutes behind the "Red Baron". The day was beautiful with full sun and mild temperatures but conditions were still kind of tough: the wind was directly against us all the way and blowing at about 15 knots. Jason was dissapointed with our time, but I felt that we did good to finish where we did. He is very competitive and wanted to win. We rowed the Nordvind and he struggled with the oars as the position is very different from the dinghy he is used to rowing. The Nordfiord will be ready to re- launch in 2 weeks, we'll see how it goes with Jason as second member of the crew. Still lots of work to be done filling and fairing, but that can be done this winter in Daves' garage.

 

Get well soon, Brother Dave.

 

As Ad Hoc would say, you need to know the SOR for the boat and crew.
In Olympic rowing, hull shapes and dimensions, and the GMT, will vary depending on whether we are talking about Lightweight women (about 57kg and 1.8m) or heavyweight men (about 100kg and 2.0m): they all use the same weight boat which is a little unfair on lightweights and women.

Are you allowed sliding seats or sliding riggers in any of your competitions?

Leo.

 

- could unfair on the builders of the mens' boats!

 

We need a verb, Terry

 

2 be or not 2 be, that is the question. The answer is only 1 be ... oh keyboard, wherefore art thou ... once more into the delete key ... the internet is not about precision it's about instant mutilation of the language ...

 

I doubt that it is unfair on the builders of men's boats. It's not that hard to build carbon fibre shells with close to the minimum allowable weight, e.g. 14kg for a single scull.
However, a 50kg girl has to use the same weight shell as a 110kg man which seems a bit odd. In any case, it's a rule-based system and that's what you have to play with.

Cheers,
Leo.

 

still building

I laid up the second deck/bulkhead last night. Will glass them in this weekend. Nordfiord should be ready for a test row this sunday. Still needs a ton of work fairing and painting but that should be possible if we put some heat in my brothers garage. I'd like to have it looking good for the Snow Row in early March. I always get very nervous as the time approaches to test row a new boat. My older brother ( deceased now ) used the phrase "As nervous as a ***** in church" and that pretty much describes my state of nerves at the moment. One boat that we built seemed un-rowable at first, then with adjustments on seat height and placement as well as oarlock placement it became very rowable and a great, fast sea boat as well. I hope this launch has a little less drama.

 

Well we will all be thinking of you ! Hope it goes well. Any before and after pictures? - Nick

 

Sliding seats are alloved, oarlocks are fixed on the gunwile. Type: clinker-built boats, min thickness of plywood 6 mm. Sheerline profile all concave and sheerline plan all convex. Boat dimensions: LHmax 6.5 m, BHmax 1.35 m. Some measuring points for height, waterline width and inside volume. The boats usually weight about 40-45 kg's.

Terho

 

rowable

The re-built Nordfiord is ready for a test row. I installed the front and rear decks/ bulkheads Saturay. A quick test confirmed that they are watertight. Thwarts are in as well as oarlocks. Foot stretchers will be transfered from the older version of the boat just to get something to rest our feet on. Next Sunday it will go in the South River to see how it feels. Everything is up for grabs: foot stretchers, thwarts, and all the geometry involved in getting it comfortable to row. My GPS will give some idea of how good or bad it is. Nordvind pulls very easily up to 3.5 knots then bogs down entirely at about 5.5 knots. All we'll try for is an easy number. Hoping that it will be 4 / 4.5 knots. time will tell. Jason will be rowing with me so the results will be a bit inconclusive. Mixed feelings of dread and elation as the day nears. I'll be going on line at home soon, and will post some pictures of the whole process.

 

Terho, please see email I sent to you. I am interested in if you are the designer working with Ruud.

I'll be building a Finnish rowboat like above to be rowed in the races next year. I may also strip build a St Lawrence Skiff but that won't launch next summer. Just want to do some strip building documenting for a class I teach.

Drake is happy, we have been doing some rowing, not enough. I may be putting the boat up for sale to help finance the next project. I am looking for more speed, thus the Finnish boat and SLS.

Have races been well attended this year, Nordvind? Looking forward to your sea trials results.

 

races

Clint, The Essex River Race was well attended. Local races have been on the small side. Plymouth Bay Row was cancelled when the harbor master decided that it was too rough for us. It was windy and would have been a miserable row but the water conditions weren't bad with only an 18" chop. I think the race has been scheduled for Nov. 13th. I think that the Nordfiord may well be the boat to get us back into contention if we can both get well and healthy at the same time.

 

Bogging down at 5.5 sounds familiar to this 63 year old and 17' boat. I'm resigned to it but try to keep my minimum speed up when watching the gps.

 

Gps

Lord, don't I curse my GPS at times. trying to keep up an average speed in a race can be a killer. A small slip and the average drops, row like a dog and still never recover. It is a good tool, however, because of the real time information it provides. A change in your pull, ballast, course and currents are all instantly there to see as speed either increases or ( horrors ) decreases.