15 year old Dalwhinnie and the Toyota Echo...

Hello...

I would like to to establish a loose 'multilogue' on the emerging esthetics of small craft design...

Lets face it, as humans we all have an inherent sense of proportion, we all can see the differences that exist between just a little too fat and just a little too thin, and as such we all feel and use a universal and evolutionary 'happy twinge' or levelling, when a balance of the above against function has been made - yes...

What...

Heck, take a look at all those old 1970's backyard trimarans and the more recent garbage can plastic roto molding technologies (gees) - not to mention the Toyota 4 door Echo (Yucko). In so many ways we have sold our inherent human understanding of beauty and esthetic to our own inventiveness and manufacturing processes...

Let us parellel this to our future robotic friends and helpers - what a nightmare - pray we remain true to our humanity and put ahead that which is constrained by human proportion and beauty...

Understanding that this is an individualistic pursuit - a fat man needs a slightly bigger Tux to get married in and a slightly larger SCUBA vest to go under, while 'Wally' needs the oppposite...


I guess I am trying to come to terms with the emerging and generalised design shift to the 'overall human soap bubble' - we all want to stand or sit in our fiber glass creations - (in NA terms) of length or displacement...

Does anyone get 'my drift' and/or can offer further explanation - or am I just a victim of the best Scotch on Planet Earth - when the aliens come back for the grand harvest we must offer them a nice 15 year old Dalwhinnie with their Human BBQ - we just might get out unscathed - my Scottish mother in law can out drink myself so it just might save us all...

Dalwhinnie single malt saves all humanity - print it....

Or we can blather on about Napoleans metric muckup legacy - no human scale - fine for chemists and nuclear physics - but have you seen the 'CAD muck metric' houses, cars, or anything that is being spit out of computers that are being driven by the 'new generation' - BAH...

Just remember - there is the Toyota 4 door Echo and there is the Dodge Charger - before the LSD set in...

What...

Sean Herron. - check out my Motor Sailor and give me your thoughts...

 

Take heart in the fact that there will always be custom builders like myself and many others that will still build beautiful traditionally styled craft for folks like yourself that still have an eye for beauty and functionality over the "bubble" craft and mass produced plastic blobs available today. Go against the grain!!!!

 

Sean -

...and add a link to your Motor Sailor design! (Did you work out a lifting keel option yet?).

Chris

 

Hello...

I think I left the motor sailor in the galleries - the lifting mechanisim is just a bronze jack screw and a UMHW lined dagger - no motors or hydraulics - although twin long stroke rams would look very cool...

Only trouble I see with this is the fact that the keel is dead plumb - not having a swept leading edge it might become a kelp collector - but then you can clean it by raising and lowering it - same for rudder blade...

My wife won't let this one go - every time I go play wiith something else - say some sexy sport boat - she asks after the motor sailor - I think she likes the idea of a pilothouse - a decent inboard - and knows I will only build a smallish boat...

Self tacking jib only - working sails - lazy Whisky man - high aspect...

Any way - I should go sailing today on the boat that I do have - otherwise it's just not worth it ....

Cheers...

SH.

 

OK, Sean -

Gotta take offense to the "garbage pail plastic rotomolding" line. Now there are a lotta crappy plastic yaks out there made this way, but a lot of rugged, durable, and shapely hulls built this way too. Own a Current Designs Squall made this way, and it has a nice shape that happens to perform well, too. Cost about 40% what a glass boat would cost, and has the same lines. And my partner actually gets to use it (while I screw around designing and building boats in wood and composite)

Horses for courses (and budgets), and all that. OK, so the bubble gum red finish isn't so swell, but I don't feel so bad when I scrape it over gravel.

Got a deck and accomadation plan for the motor sailor? How about the empty weight and designed displacement? Nice profile...

Chris Krumm

 

I had to google the Dalwhinnie to figure out where this is going..... Oh well, I guess I might as well give up my worldly aspirations.

Sean;

No offence to Chris but there is your answer, the "fault" has to be laid squarely at the feet (or on the head) of the consumer. Can't we blame corporate greed? Nope, afraid not, if folks didn't enslave themselves to the endless purchasing of throwaway goods, the corporations would be out of business. Or, more likely, producing something different.

But boats, like everything else, have ceased to be "boats", and have become mass produced consumer goods. Thirty years ago, if Chris wanted a small boat, he would go down the road to his local boat builder and buy a semi-stock offering that was also designed by the same guy. If he was lucky he might have a choice of several local builders. The boat wasn’t cheap, it would be a stretch to afford, but it was an heirloom that Chris would pass on to his grandchildren. It also needed yearly maintenance. If it needed repair Chris could take it to the original builder. The money Chris spent had a direct effect in his community, and he would be, in effect, a patron of the arts of boatbuilding and designing.

But today we will go to the nearest big-box store for some cheap running shoes, spot a little plastic boat and think, gee, the kids would like that. So you throw it on the plastic card, no sweat. Without any thought of what you are supporting, and what is being killed off through your actions. We want it immediately, price is the sole talking point, and we want to abuse the boat for a few years before we throw it away. We are patrons of huge conglomerates who happen to produce boats as well as a zillion other leisure products. What about the poor folks who work in the factory building these crappy things, or that this junk will never, "go away".

This morning I was looking at the latest issue of Yachting, on the cover is a new 50' Searay. This thing looks like it's from another planet, is a marvel of wizardry, and costs over a million dollars. A MILLION DOLLARS!!! To go out on the bay with your family. She has twin 640 HP engines and at a 2100 RPM cruise (27.9 knots) she burns approximately 50 gallons of fuel per hour!!!!

Is this necessary? How much fun can you have? I can put you in smaller boat; say 40', built of wood by a local builder, for a quarter of the million. But you will have to wait 6 months for the boat to be built, you will have to make some decisions, and sort out your own financing. The wooden boat will be equipped with a single engine of about 300 HP, will burn a quarter the fuel of the Searay, and cruise at 17-18 knots.

What will this Searay be worth in 20 years? The wooden boat will be worth slightly more than she cost to build. But the bank will tell you a wooden boat is a poor investment, the marina won't take wooden boats because they sink, and you have to maintain the thing. Well, by the way, you'll have to do a hell of a lot of maintenance on the Searay over 20 years.

I would suggest the Searay might be worth half its original purchase price in 10 years, which may be optimistic. What about the fact that we are running out of oil? What does that mean for the value of these things? Do the folks who buy these "boats" think the manufacturers are producing them for the good of the general public? Just like the little plastic dinghy, they are produced to make money for corporation stockholders, no other reason. And they are produced at the cost of boating; its history, craftsmanship, and art, as we know it.

Hang in there, Tad

 

Clarity....

Hello...

Two things have seemed to come out of this - materials and design...

I for one am not for or against any process of manufacturing or any use of new materials - but I am dead against using anything because it is easy and cheap - yes a roto molded kayak that uses molds derived from classic forms is every bit as good - thats the kicker with me - classic form or at the very least human proportion...

And the funny thing is I am a guy who thinks I can make a good looking 22 footer with standing head room - hmmm....

I also would like a clear cast acrylic hull just to freak out the ones who don't quite take to the heeling and pitch poling - hmmm....

I would even go so far as to get really drunk one weekend and bolt and goop a perspex P51 canopy to the bottom of something and getting some high powered underwater lamps - but that is just crazy...

I think it was Ludwig Meiss Van De Rohe who was qouted 'form follows function' - such a cliche in all the design schools these days that are sitting kids in front of 3D computer programs before teaching them any history of design - bah...

Any way - I am going to go snorkelling today and scrape some barnacles off my keel...

SH

 

meiss

meiss said "less is more". corbusier said "form follows function". both are very appropriate!

 

My hammock - my mistake...

Hello...

Well so much for my design history - guess I really signed on for the art girls in black stockings...

I do love my Corbusier lounge - it is my hammock - wish I had a couple of Barcelona chairs so I could get rid of my tatty sofa...

Keel is clean - went around Passage Island and back in 5 hours - amazing how much better anything points upwind when not dragging little stuck on critters...

SH.