Statement of Requirements – Foveaux Strait Commuter

I reckon a big following sea might worry the soul-case out of me, in that one, depending on what kind of skeg/keel is fitted, and just how much bulk there is well forward, hard to tell from the pics.

 

Folks thanks so much for the ideas and very worthwhile comments and insights for My SOR, as always it s so important to understand the compromises, and the debate is healthy !!

My initial ideas on filling the brief:
Firstly a little more on our local conditions, Richard Woods has been very helpful in guiding me on this, he hasn’t been down here but alerted me to the need to understand what designers might relate to . . . his thoughts were that Foveaux Strait might be something like crossing the Gulf Stream during a strong cold front, which he considered not as bad as conditions in a typical SW F5-7 wind in the English Channel. I have read a lot about sailing in the English channel, so I can relate to this. I have also been lucky enough to correspond with a Penobscot Sound Pilot and a Bay of Fundy designer who have added to my understanding of sea conditions.

Foveaux Strait is very exposed to the Southwest, so it nearly always has a significant swell of 1-3 meters (and much more but only fools would be out), if you add 20 knots of nor-west wind/tide chop on top, it makes for a confused sort of mess !! It is the sort of sea that requires very active helming, but that doesn’t really reward it very much, whatever you do there are going to be a lot of “bumps”, just as long as they are not “crashes”! Having said this, there are MANY CALM days in the strait to.

I started with a concept something like Bolger’s Chicago Coble (25’6” x6’, 2800 lbs Disp, 40 HP, 12 knots) open planning hull, aware that while it had some good ideas, a whole new design would be needed. I have long been aware of Ruel Parker’s work and a look at his “Commuter” series convinced me that my SOR was not totally outlandish – and at that point I adopted Michael Mason’s version “Eagle” or “Maritime 36” as the benchmark.

Tad Roberts “Wedgepoint 31” and Tom Lathrop’s “Blue Jacket 28” (along with many somewhat similar designs such as the Nexus “Salty” and Hyland “Marsh Hen”) also were in my thinking, along with Ross Lillistone’s “Three Brothers”. None of these designs offered the exact package of qualities required. I think that Tad Roberts designs are the best looking and best thought out boats ever, however I felt that I needed a little more homework. Hence this and its parallel thread on the other forum.

Since commencing the thread I have become aware of Richard Wood’s “Jazz 30” Cat, Dan Leech’s 8.25 Cat and ArtNautica’s “Fernie 21” and they all merit serious consideration, if only for the ideas they offer.

I am considering two options to further develop:

A design based on Michael Mason’s “Maritime 36” which I understand is an adaption of the Ruel Parker design “Commuter 36”. If the displacement was reduced to about 4500 lbs, and some adjustments made to the layout to better suit our wet climate/cold waters – being very mindful of weigh and its distribution, I think it could meet the essential elements of the SOR. Late in the the course of the thread I became aware of the "Seahawk", a concept developed by Laurie McGowan and Michael Schacht for the WoodenBoat "Sketchbook' (July-August 2014). The hull form of this design also merits serious consideration.

My preferred construction is wood/epoxy due the more pleasant interior finish but locally we have a high level of build capability in aluminium so I would like the option to have the build quoted in alloy as well.

I intend to ask Michael Mason (and Tad Roberts) for their ideas on the development of the “Maritime 36” concept, and will also run it past Dennis Harjamaa at Artnautica to see if there is any merit in morphing the Fernie 21 to the concept.

The second option is Richard Wood’s Jazz 30 Catamaran, this design would only require very minor adjustment to the deck layout to suit local conditions, and I would also like a second Cat design to consider hence I will talk with Dan about his Cat 825.

Thanks
Foster

 

That Leech 825 cat looks interesting, very interesting in fact. Especially if you keep loads modest. Could well do the job, but 2 x 40 might be a tad less than ideal. And I would insist on 25" shaft length.

 

A Few More Worthy Boats

Frank Pelin was a noted blue water designer in NZ he passed away a year or so ago There are literally hundreds of his boats on the water here .You often see youtube videos of pilot interceptor boats in storms .These are all deep vee planning hulls .Although quite a few are listed as displacement they still have this deep vee design









The red steel one is my favourite 40 ft steel 6lxb gardner diesel for 80k US
The ideal commuter

 

The red one is a displacement hull, surely ?

 

The 6lx gardner is a magnificent machine. Haven't seen any towing skiers though..

 

Many swore by them in the past, don't know if that still applies.

 

Yes they were popular but getting harder to come by now. 1st diesel to achieve 50 % efficiency. There is nothing more reassuring than the beat of a gardner at sea. Sorry to hijack the thread .

 

Ha - two of my favorite Stewart Is fishing boats had 6LX's, the "Seven Seas" and "Arun", both with 10's of thousands of hours on them.

Perlin did produce some very nice boats however I haven't seen any that "live" in that nice place of the slow plane with nice trim. I've spent a good part of the day looking at the local deep vee offerings, all in alloy, and whilst they are very nice, anything over 6.5 meters has at least 250 HP, and I don't think that's the way I want to go.

I did talk with Dan Leech today and we came to the conclusion that his Cat 825 would require a lot of modification to meet the requirement safely (and that's even if I could afford it, which I can't!).

 

Can you enlarge on that ? What did he think the shortcomings may be ?

 

In the description of the 825 cat, it mentions for use in lakes and harbours, ie it's not designed for offshore / open waters and the scantlings would not likely be adequate to meet standards / class rules for this operating environment. Thus it gets beefed up, weight goes up, and the powering requirement goes up and then it looks like all the other power cats out there... That's the restriction your faced with when using a professional designer, they have to stick to rather conservative design codes or face potential litigation...

 

Hmmm - maybe I didn't put the comments about the Leech as carefully as I should have.

I want a stripped out boat with minimal accommodations, if you remove much of the internal structure of a design like the 825 then you're removing the bits that keep it stiff and together - we agreed that it was not economic to redesign a stripped out version. There are a few other elements like bridge deck clearance that wouldn't really suit our sea conditions.

 

I thought the clearance sounded marginal at 500mm, and was also wondering if they have a wave-breaker down the guts, doesn't look like it from the pics. Still, it is not far off being suitable. It makes little sense to me that stripping out would make it heavier, though.

 

Regarding the Pelins some like the pelin topaz and Apollo are usually powered with 100-150hp and achieve 18-23 knots .We had a 29ft Pelin empress which was a deeper vee (gullwing ) with a 135hp which achieved 18 knots but it was built like a tank with 25mm ply double diagonal . The red Pelin I posted was a displacement type. But there is a certain comfort in a steel boat when it comes to impact resistance

 

This has been a most enjoyable and informative thread!
I have learned a lot about boat design considerations that I did not have any knowledge of.

It doesn't really apply to my project & current direction, but I have learned a good bit from it. Most enjoyable and interesting thread guys.

Cheers, Allen