French style trawlers and bulbs?

Discussion in 'Boat Design' started by comfisherman, May 15, 2021.

  1. comfisherman
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    comfisherman Senior Member

    Seems like the fishing fleets of the world are all trying to shove 10 pounds of sugar into a 5 pound sack.

    Seems like the trend in France and some of the Scottish trawlers are for these huge bulbs that extend well above the waterline.

    Is this for maximizing waterline?

    Does it seem to work?

    Seems like the novi guys just do a vertical bow and maximize waterline. Would this be a better alternative?

    Seems like they are selling a few in eastern canada.

    This forum has a lot of global reach, anyone have any ties to these kinds of vessels?
     

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  2. bajansailor
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    bajansailor Marine Surveyor

    I shall follow the replies here with interest, as I don't have any answers to your questions.
    Re the first photo, it looks almost like they started with an 'X' bow coming up from the waterline, and then changed their minds half way up to return to a more 'conventional' bow.

    The second photo seems to have a Pantocarene type of bow which are very popular on pilot vessels -
    ORC 121 Fast Patrol Craft - Goodchild Marine http://www.goodchildmarine.co.uk/boats/orc-121

    Re the third photo, it almost look like the bulb at the front was an afterthought - as if they found that she didn't have enough buoyancy in the bow when she was launched, and they had to add some more.
     
  3. comfisherman
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    comfisherman Senior Member

    Your observations are similar to mine.

    From what I'm able to gather, the first vessel leaves light and fills up with large volumes and returns meters lower on the waterline.

    Second is built in eastern canada, it turned up about 3 years after the original launch and press. It was finished to a rather low standard and aged poorly. Seems to be fairly common of boats from the region. If memory serves me it operated much slower than expected and had been rigged with a large stabilizer.

    Third appears to have had a smaller bulb and was retrofit much larger to mimic the first.


    The novi boats have a vertical bow stem to maximize everything in a short oal, often wonder if these more complex bows actually help.
     
  4. Ilan Voyager
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    Ilan Voyager Senior Member

    It's the good old pantocarene, in french carène à rostre, invented by Didier Marchand in 1995, almost 30 years... His NA office is working since 1988 and is specialized in working boats.
    Some data:
    It's no a classic bulb limited for a narrow range of speeds nor a fashion gimmick. It's a very carefully thought design that works in dynamics, and the bow is just a part of the global design. The bow is just the visible part.
    Personally I love it and I had extremely good echoes from my acquaintances in Brittany.
    It's changes the behavior of fast boats in rough sea, but also of semi displacement fishing boats. The boat stays in at 3 to 5 degrees and does not bury the bow. So the vertical accelerations are minimized and the roll almost imperceptible.
    - All weather pilot boats an example. You can see the dynamic behavior of this australian built boat in the video. Look at it carefully.

    The pilots of various harbors in France are very happy, so happy that they have bought a big bunch of boats since 15 years, with the police, customs . Pantocarene has sold the design in Australia and several countries.
    - All weather, insubmersible, self righting rescue boat for the SNSM here is the boat. You can admire the superb lines as the boat is the self righting tested.


    Pantocarene has sold the design in GB, Australia and several countries. Maritime Journal | Pantocarene Naval Architects https://www.maritimejournal.com/directory-entries/pantocarene_naval_architects.

    All professional customers who know what is a very good boat, and who invest for 30 years. These guys buy tools for working every day, not fancy boats for Florida or for the Adriatic happy few in the best days of summer.
     
    Last edited: May 16, 2021
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  5. Ilan Voyager
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    Ilan Voyager Senior Member

    Behavior of the pilot boat in rather rough weather. Compare with the ordinary planing boats able of 30 knots. Note the very little spray and the constant attitude. Note also the steadiness of the track, seeming impervious to the effect of the waves. I bet that the Australian pilots are happy.
     
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  6. comfisherman
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    comfisherman Senior Member

    Clearly being adopted in brittany, granted those videos seem pretty similar to all the pilot boat adds I've seen.

    The boats I've posted with exception of the navale Atlantiqe vessel in the middle picture are clearly in the displacement zone of craft. The middle boat was sold as a semi displacement craft but in practice clearly ran at hull speed. And is advertised as such on a brokerage website. Guessing by the addition of the large foil stabilizer, its not a flawless seakeeping design.

    While I'd prefer to not be dismissive of the pilot boats, I've known a few over the years. Cannot remember any who didn't love each and every new pilot boat they got, regardless of design. To me it was a testament of how fast the quality of engines, hulls, suspension seats, and other ergonomics were progressing.

    Looks like the French Canadian builders have built a few displacement style boats of the basic design. Considering the boat building boom 12-20 in that region it accounts for very few total boats built.

    The trefjar boats in Norway seem to be of a similar design but still err on the planing or at least semi planing side of the equation. Even the new boats from them have ditched the extreme bulb and boat for what amounts to a vertical bowstem ala the novi boat style.


    My interest lies more in the end of the spectrum of the displacement, or boats with highly variable displacement boats.
    like this one
    Ferarri-style trawler design for French owners - FiskerForum

    One of my current boats loads more weight than it weights, it drops the hull down in the water substantially. Boasts end up being virtually designed around one sea state or the other. Sadly my fisheries are split 2 low volume fisheries, 2 high volume. Its not practical to have 4 specific boats. The big question is, does this design lend itself to solving the question better than the vertical stem found in the novi style vessels.
     

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  7. Ilan Voyager
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    Ilan Voyager Senior Member

    comfisherman It seems that you are looking for a boat able to sail safely with very different loads from light to very heavy. There are many variables, from size, the habitual sea state, the worst sea state, ice or not, method of fishing, distance to the fishing places, etc..., to the wanted speed. The range of the variables is extremely broad, and you have not given a lot of clues.

    We are here in a mainly yachting forum, with none NA in commercial fishing, and just a very few NA and NE in working boats, so probably you won't find any usable answer.

    The best way is to contact several NA working in this field with a complete list of your desiderata (the famous SOR) and to have under hand a good shipyard working in the material you want...
    I'll just give a prudent general opinion about the boats I know or have had echoes.

    Commentig the boat Ferrari, built like a tank: 63 metric tons for 11.98m (40 feet only) and very wide 6m (20 feet) it has only a capacity of catch of 5.6 metric tons, less than 1/10 of the total displacement. I'm surprised it's a lot of boat for a rather small load...A lot of fishing boats of this size are around 12 to 20 tons for a load above 5 tons. So I have to searched further, as I wanted the confirmation of a possible explanation.
    With such a displacement it uses a 715 HP engine with a 1.70 m of diameter propeller, finally that it's not a lot of power for such a displacement and windage. I guess that the speed is somewhere 9 knots when looking at the water lines.
    It must be able to come back to Saint Brieuc with 50 mph of wind and a tide current of 6 knots in the nose, a rather common occurrence in the Channel, so the engine is a full of torque and power one and I bet that the almost 6 feet propeller has a variable pitch. It's common in Brittany to put twice the necessary power for the speed to be sure that the boat can come back in adverse conditions. The current tides range from 3 to 8 knots and there are 100 days in the year with winds above force 7. When the wind is contrary to the tide current, the sea can become pretty bad.
    Probably in Alaska you do know these conditions adding the ice.
    I know that the fishing place is not an easy one but it's maybe the most heavy 40 feet fishing boat with the biggest engine I've ever seen. It's a "categorie 3", so it must stay within 100 miles of an harbor, it can sail in the Channel, Irish Sea, and parts of North Sea.
    The page from the NA with a complete set of pics. I found the explanation; that looks like a a boat for fishing mainly shells as scallops. A high value low density catch which must be kept alive, so a bit of ice is out of question. Probably it's kept in a kind of Portuguese tank used for high value fishes you want to keep 3 days fresher than alive (with very cold sea water) or sprayed with aerated cold sea water less heavy. A dead scallop, or a bad looking sea bass has no value.
    All that is very heavy and that explains the low weight of the catch and partly the enormous displacement.
    Chalutier-coquillier de 12m pour l'armement Eouzan (division 227) - Pierre Delion/ Architecture Navale https://www.archi-delion.com/fr/bateaux-professionnels/P51_chalutier-12m.html
    I've seen the Internet site of the owner.
    Armement Eouzan Travadon - Armateur à Saint Brieuc (Bretagne) http://armement-eouzan-travadon.fr/
    The last update was in 2015, and shows a little pic of the very recognizable boat in construction under the name Scuderia.
    Very probably this boat is not suitable for you.

    And we are very far of the Pantocarene style of boats.
    Address 4 r Louis de Broglie, 56000 VANNES Phone 02 97 48 23 69
    So you can ask...
    However this NA designs also fishing boats. Some are built in composite in Canada
    ATLANTIC BOAT BUILDERS https://atlnaval.com/index_en.html
    ROBITAILLE 45 C | ATLANTIC BOAT BUILDERS http://www.atlnaval.com/robitaille45c_en.html


    A 40 composite feet fishing boat in France
    Chantiers Sibiril. Le Mendiant de la mer, mis à l'eau https://www.letelegramme.fr/ar/viewarticle1024.php?aaaammjj=20081016&article=3990097&type=ar
    Pantocarene fishing boat made in GRP by Sibiril in France
    http://sibiril-technologies.com/sites/sibiril/files/Articles/sibiril_fiche_rorcal.pdf

    Maybe these infos may give you a beginning of answer.

    I can't say anything about the Norwegian boats, but the Norwegian NA do know their job, so their bows are not gimmick. The best is to search and to ask directly to the NA about the suitability for your needs.
     
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  8. comfisherman
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    comfisherman Senior Member

    Didn't realize the Ferrari named boat was a scalloper, that figures as not much else out of the ocean pays well enough for perpetual upgrade without significant govt meddling. 715 out of a c12 cat is an interesting power choice for a boat that weights that much. 12 liter at 715 is a lot of rpm, seems like a c18 with some grunt at 715hp and lower rpm would be a better choice. Granted my idea of tide and wind is likely different than that off of Brittany.

    I realize this is more geared toward recreation, or at least a small microcosm of the recreation world. With that said not much else exists in the space of discussion of purely boat design.

    The pantocarene bow boats would probably excel in a longline type fishery especially a lower volume one. The Cleopatra line from Iceland seems to fill that role rather well, some years ago an owner was at a show for an unrelated deck gear and he was happy with it. Sadly we fish for a small % of the price they fish on, their fishery is high value low volume, ours is the opposite.

    My SOR is a big vague somewhat out of necessity. The us is following Canada and by extension the EU in limiting entry on what is left of open access and even some closed access fisheries. The favorite tool is length. Sadly this necessitates shorter sub par designs. As 18 year old I had a great debate with a NA and boatbuilder that was a peer of my grandfathers, the early extreme beam short boats had just been introduced. He described them accurately as hydrodynamic abominations, ugly as sin and an assault to the senses most specifically common sense. Its been a few years short of 20 since that conversation, and He was right but they still built 30 of them, and they have replaced in large part vessels double in length. Everything is a tradeoff of "least worst", I'd like a 60 x 14 skinny and fast long liner, but regulation means it will be 40x20.

    My first time on a 74x21 foot squid seiner was an eye opener, it was so fast and rode so nice. But the reality is the Alaska limit boats are 58x28-32' wide, pack 100,000 pounds more. They also are allowed in many more fisheries due to length.

    My SOR is simply this, I've recently sold my 54 foot multipurpose boat with a 16 foot beam. Would like to replace it with something along the lines of the 12m Ferrari boat. We fish some fisheries in light condition (small gear fish hold with some amount of ice) other fisheries we operate in tanked down mode (fish holds flooded and chilled with refrigerated sea water). Its a Neanderthal method of chilling fish, but the one the processors have settled on (got to love dragging around all that water).

    My goal is to find the least worst hull design, with a length to beam ratio like I'll need "best" is out "least worst" is in.

    These are my current examples to study in addition to the previously mentioned hull forms.
    The Canadians seem to give up and just build bigger versions of an 80 year old design, something we do as well.
    ShipSpotting.com [​IMG] © frode adolfsen
    ShipSpotting.com [​IMG] © frode adolfsen

    Princess Paisley | West Head Boat Builders
     
  9. bajansailor
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    bajansailor Marine Surveyor

    @comfisherman would it be feasible to build a catamaran instead, or would this not then allow you to have the required deadweight?

    Those boats above are even more tubby than shoe boxes! And with an L/B ratio of 2 or less - that is getting into cat territory....... but of course they can carry a LOT more than a cat of the same length.
     
  10. comfisherman
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    comfisherman Senior Member

    Sadly it's all about the volume, even more than deck space.

    Looking at some of the drydock pictures of the Norwegian stubby boats, you see all manner of fin and foil in an attempt to slow the motion of the boat down.

    In more than 20 years working and now buildint boats, it's never a good design when that much appendage is required.
     
  11. bajansailor
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    bajansailor Marine Surveyor

  12. clmanges
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    clmanges Senior Member

    Wow, those things look like some bad photoshop jokes. But hey, at least that one has form stability! Was #1 on the SOR "Must not roll under any circumstances"?

    Honestly, they look like someone took a full-sized ship and cut the aft 80% off it. What's next, a perfect cube?
     
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  13. comfisherman
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    comfisherman Senior Member

    Watched an hr long video on it a few years back. My Google fu is weak or I'd post a link.
    I know its tongue and cheek but..... the eastern canadians have 40 footers pushing 30 foot beams..... so I'd hazard a guess that eventually the answer will be a yes.

    Trinav | TriNav Marine Brokerage - International Shipbrokers, Boat Brokers, Marine Brokers, Canada
     
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