flat bottom hulls

Hey Love,
As I see it there are times when you want the bow to ride high like when quartering big waves from the stern. Racing down the face of a big one there's going to be a lot of drag on the bow when it starts to engage the next wave if it's being pushed down by all that lift at the stern. Your boat with it's "lifting strake" is a lot like the series of Dories called the Texas Dories designed by "capn Jim Orell" (or somethin like that). Those boats had a hook in the stern that acted like and probably made them run much like your boat. Don't know if "Capn" Jim was a NA or a 6 pack skipper and I never saw one of those hooked bottom Semi-Dories so I can only guess at how well they worked. Maybe someone else recalls and knows more.

Easy Rider

 

Those boats were designed by Mr. Bolger . You will find the same on many boats , Hunt's Whaler for one , and a few fiberglass semi dories . If the motor is placed in a well the sides act as trim tabs , but at the expense of the outboards advantage of articulation . Is good to have control over the flow of water , and the vectoring of prop thrust . But it depends on what the inherent qualities of the hull are ,I guess

 

Some thoughts while trying to think of a better reason not to get to work:

Historical note on canal boats mentioned earlier: some canals on the UK had spillways beside the locks: passenger-carrying canal boats were always in a hurry and would slide down these rather than wait for the lock to cycle.

I have mused about the value of soft bilges to a small otherwise flat-bottomed boat. If the main advantage is to prevent stress concentration as Rick noted earlier, then the use of chine logs with ply (my preferred method of construction) provides extra stiffness and strength to re-distribute that stress. So now I can stop trying to figure out how to incorporate soft bilges on my next boat, which was mainly for cosmetic reasons anyway. Since honesty is the best policy I’ll admit a flattie with hard chines is easier to build and looks fine if you don’t turn it over!

 

Hello Frank

One of the advantages of the strake, or tab is that you can tune it by bending the ends to precisely suit your needs. Every time i put a new enging on the skiff i have to retune it so that it augments the lift capacity of the anti-cav plate. When this is done properly, it allows you to keep the engine trimmed back farther for better fuel economy.

Another great advantage to the strake is that it supresses the movement of the hull while at rest. The drag of the hull having to wave the strake in the water knocks the hull out of sync with the swells--the hull constantly stops and then starts rocking, that stopping part really makes it nice to rest in as haru suggested.

here is a picture of 30 gallons nesting in the widest part of the hull, 1/3 hull length aft of the bow..

 

Easy Rider--Good point about following seas!

My favorite destinations generally have me running upswell to get there and down swell to get home (mercifully). So i set the hull up for max bow down on the way out and a light bow on the way back to prevent exactly what you discribed. I do this by swaping out empty 12 tanks--keeping the weight fwd on the way out and moving the empty tanks to the bow for the run home. It works great, that is one of the main reasons i chose to use portable tanks. (when i get too old to throw these 12 gallon tanks around , i may have to change that

I'd sure like to see a picture of your boat~

 

Hey Love,
When I was a bit younger I flew hang gliders weight shift but I haven't flown boats weight shift yet. Actually I'm one of those guys that can't stand a listing boat because people are careless where they sit. I guess your'e kinda dependent on onshore wind. It does sound like you burn a lot of fuel too. How far out do you go? I'm 70 and think a full 6 gallon tank is enough to move around ... you must be a really big strong dude. Just kidding w most/all the above.

Cheers
Easy Rider

 

Hello Easy Rider

I usually go for two nights at a time. My most common destination is a small cove on the back side of the farthest island off the California coast, San Nicolas Island, AKA The Island of the Blue Dolphins. It takes me 78nm to get there. My last trip was my 140th trip to that desolate island--230 nights anchored around that wind driven speck on the pacific. In 2009 i logged 1795nm, burned 431 gallons in 78 hours. I average around 160+nm per trip-- i take 54 gallons and i burn about 38-42 gallons per trip. I've taken one trip less than 60nm offshore in the last ten years. I don't like nearshore destinations--it's just too crowded.

i'm 52, but i have been working my whole life so i'm in pretty damn good shape, 'cept for a few aches and pain--but it's only pain so have no complaints

As far as body weight shift goes, i use body english constantly when running in seas. The hull is such that my weight makes a big difference in how the skiff impacts the swells, so i have learned to dance well with her as we skim across vast stretches of open seas

Here is a picture of an electrical system that has never let me down. When the conditions get rough, you don't ever want to have to wonder if everything is going to work, it just always does