Rudder or motor steering in small cargo boat?

Discussion in 'Stability' started by Tijs Eysermans, Mar 19, 2015.

  1. Tijs Eysermans
    Joined: Mar 2015
    Posts: 6
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    Location: Belgium

    Tijs Eysermans Junior Member

    Hello bloggers, I am a graduate student at KULeuven Belgium.

    For my thesis I am looking at what is best to use when steering a 6meter long cargo boat.
    What I was wondering, do any of you have experience with both systems? (a steerable motor or a rudder steering system).

    If you have, what are the difficulties with one in comparisson to the other? Which is better to use, or is easier to use when going forward or backwards?

    I need this imformation to verify these answers with what I find from simulations. This would help me an awfull lot!

    Thank you in advance! :)

    Tijs Eysermans
     
  2. PAR
    Joined: Nov 2003
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    Location: Eustis, FL

    PAR Yacht Designer/Builder

    Thrust vectoring is by far the best method the steer a boat, particularly at low speed. A rudder, regardless of type, with the possible exception of the "kitchen" variety, requires the flow over and around it, to manipulate the direction of the stern quarters, which at low speeds can be cumbersome to say the least and down right imposable to back down, on some hull forms/rudder configurations. If you're running any kind of accurate "simulations", you should have pretty clear answers already, about the differences and effectiveness of the various types.
     
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