pedal driven paddle wheel boat?

Well i have been on here before about pedal driven boats but i always come to the same problem they draft to much.I understand 18 inchs is not very deep but here where i live some of the shollows in these creeks you need to git by 6 inchs of water to git to the pool where all the fish are.Just so every one knows agian i can not paddle for any amount of time do to elbow so paddleing a kayak is out!So basic ideal is to take a small lets say 8 foot jon boat and attach a 2 foot round paddle wheel to the back driven by bike parts.So here are the ?s are there any ways of making the paddle wheel not so loud.Also what kind of speed could one expect to git out of such a boat i dont need to set anyrecords just git from here to ther say stay withen a 3 mile rage couldnt see going any farther than that.So let the ideals, comments, and criticism fly. thanks

 

This one works pretty well:
http://www.bwmarineproducts.com/commodore_pedal_boat.htm
Eight feet LOA, carries 550 lb, is stable with a 200 lb person standing on the corner, and can operate in less than six inches of water. It probably gets more use than any other boat on our lake. Speed is about three knots. There are other manufacturers building similar boats; the Contour has worked well for us and is nearly indestructible. I think you'd have a hard time beating these simple plastic things for your application; they're remarkably well thought out and very robust, and all the more sophisticated drives- pedal props, Hobie Mirage, etc.- need deeper water.

 

Just take the motor out of this design and lengthen the drive chain to a forwar pedal position. You could probably make that out of an inverted, sawn-off bicycle frame welded to a flat plate to mount to the bottom of the boat.

http://www.svensons.com/boat/?p=PaddelBoats/PaddlewheelBassBoat

 

my instincts are that closely spaced paddles will be quieter

but not as efficient.

Are you want to reduce noise to:

Not scare the fish?

For your own ears???

Not to alert the property owner?

Bike parts even including a chain should be fine and don't sweat the chain getting wet. I've got a mtn bike with fat tires I've ridden at the beach into salt water and sand 3' foot into the waves and no permanent damage to date.

I've toyed with making a bike part paddle-drive, but instead of a paddle wheel, and "paddle tread", hoping to improve efficiency with a longer horizontal power-stroke. I guess that also might reduce noise because of the better ratio of power-stroke to enter&exit. Should also work better in shallow water, and maybe even work good when the paddles were grounding out!

 

Love the paddle bass boat that is awsome!! Thanks for the suggestion of the pre made paddle boat but that would be to big and heavy i guess i should have said this is a one man fishing boat. As for why i dont want to make so much noise is for multiple reasons, my peace and quit and not to let evry fish in the world know i am coming.I was thinking a v shaped paddle or maybe even a reverse v with low spot in middle that way paddle enters water in a smaller splash.

 

Hmm how does one steer a paddle boat i am sure you use a rudder but where is it placed?

 

I can't find the source now, but I read that old-time paddle boats used about four rudders IN FRONT of the paddlewheel, with two more behind the paddlewheel.

I'm converting a little 8' speedboat into a sternwheeler with five paddles. Four seems too few, but too many paddles are said to churn up the water too much. There are many methods of "articulating" or feathering the paddles so that they enter the water upright instead of at an angle. Not only is performance of the boat improved by feathering the paddles, but it seems that they might be quieter than unfeathered paddles. (My current project is going to use unfeathered paddles for simplicity, so that I can get it into the water this summer and see how many of my ideas actually work.)

The method of articulating that makes most sense to me is the Buchanan Parallel Paddlewheel -- see my attachment for the basic details. You can find some old info reprinted at http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_n...books&field-keywords=human power boat patents and at http://www.lulu.com/product/paperba...gContext=search_results/search_shelf/center/2

 

How about modifying something like this:

http://www.waterbike.com/photos/index.html

Hope this helps.

Porta

 

Svensons.com is a fun place to poke around in for free plans. Here are some for a small pedal-driven, paddlewheel houseboat. It's all gussied up to look like a miniature riverboat, but it might give you some ideas. Interestingly enough, the rudder is at the bow in this boat.

http://www.svensons.com/boat/?p=PaddelBoats/Showboat

 

Thanks for all the ideals and that new web site of boat plans.I will be on there for ideals tonight. as it stands i have a 10 foot jon i am trying to git an 8 footer. Then i wish to install a 24 inch round paddle wheel behind it driven by me through a bike chain set up. Things i need to figure out gear set up,is 24 inch paddle wheel big enough,how many paddles,paddle angle,how far to put wheel from boat,steering?Wow after looking at the list i am in bad shape LOL

 

just steer with conventional rudder in the back, or use two shallow ones (one near each side to get "clear" flow over them). A simple linage to a tiller or even the handle bars on your bicycle frame would work for steering.

paddle wheels are not very efficient way to push a boat, even a simple lightweight one. I would suggest you find a way to rig a simple little prop (Like one off of an electric trolling outboard) to your bicycle pedal set-up. Perhaps a simple 90 deg drill attachment for drilling in tight quarters would make an inexpensive gear box to convert the chain motion to a propeller shaft motion.

A propeller would not only be more efficient, it would be more compact and much lighter than a paddle wheel set-up.

 

Thank you petros but i have snaped 2 90 deg drill attachments one being a snap-on so not due to cheap matierals.I like your ideals about steering i will look in to it.Also the big chalage here is draft not effcincy even though rick willinby (sorry if i spelled wrong) has paddle wheels at 90 % effcint.About 75% after drag but i must say he has not ran the numbers on my ideal!!Also trolling motor props are very poor for human power not a very good pitch they are ment to be turned very fast.Thanks agian for the ideals on steering.

 

This clip shows what a fixed prop can do if configured on a flex shaft in shallow water:

Go to post #54:

http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/inboards/prop-shaft-systems-24636-4.html

Rick has advanced the state of the art even further with his folding props that shed weed and also fold back in low draft situations. An angle grinder gearbox can hold up much better any drill attachment.

You seem to favor wheels in an amphibian situation, that's why I referenced the trike in my other post. You might google kinetic sculpture races which have paddle wheel contraptions that can go over just about any terrain of water, mud, sand and hard surface for ideas.

Hope this helps.

Porta

 

To get an 8ft boat near hull speed of say 3kts might take 30W of power. Applying 60W would increase speed by say 5% so not much point in applying more power. Most adult males can easily produce 100W for a reasonable period. So if you can come up with a propulsion system that is 30% efficient you are going to get near to the hull speed.

The conclusion is that propulsion efficiency is not a big factor in this design.

You will get 50% efficiency from a poorly designed paddlewheel. Problem is that you cannot avoid splashing and it will be noisy. Anything entering and leaving the water will be noisy.

A small prop about 6" in diameter might be worth looking into.

There may be some clever way of arranging the blades on a wheel so they enter and leave the water cleanly but a lot of effort.

There are other options that are worth considering where efficiency is not a priority. I thought about what I called a squeegee drive that contemplated a wheel with rollers mounted on the rim squeezing water through a large tube mounted in a curved surface in the bottom of the hull. Basically a positive displacement jet similar to a peristaltic pump. A variant was a squid drive. This relied on valves and a diaphragm pump. The squid drive is not intrinsically as efficient as the squeegee drive.

Rick

 

So if i understand you right rick a flat bottom boat 8 feet long 32 inchs wide the hull speed converts to almost 4 mph.So My next ? would be what is the avarge cruising speed of a kayak or canoe nothing built for speed just touring boats?