~60' Pontoon Boat

I am in complete agreement.

 

You can buy a 1970's /80's vintage 34' Mainship trawler with a single diesel for $20-30K. I bough mine for 25K about 15 years ago, ran all over the Keys and the Bahamas for 11 years, and sold it a few years ago for close to what I paid.
I thought it was one of the best values in boating, certainly the best value I've ever had.

And about electric power, its not that "we" don't like it, its the reality that the technology/cost/value/function just isn't there yet for most boaters.

 

50ft house for $30,000 in the sf delta. Buy it today, problem solved.

It would be great to have a discussion not on getting you a boat,
but ways to design an inexpensive boat, one that uses renewable resources.
The $85k electric outboard is a joke, and only one with more dollars then sense would buy it, and there ARE people like that, plenty of them, they hire people like PAR.
One can buy an 80hp electric motor for $1,000.

 

That would be great, I am all for that.

Speaking of expensive fancy boats, found this today while doing research.

 

BTW, jroger, if what you want is renewable resources why not producer gas?

True, any PG conversion will reduce your performance and fuel efficiency (relative to unleaded) on the miles per BTU front (can't really say gallon) but the fuel costs, your miles per dollar if you will, would be much improved.

Coal gives better results than wood chips but wood chips are definitely renewable (and not food), and if you happen know anyone at your department of transportation (they are always clearing out brush around here) maybe you could swing a deal like my uncle has for mulch (he sometimes seems to be slowly filling in some bottom land below his house, one truck load at a time, otherwise I have absolutely no idea where it all goes ... hyperspace loop maybe?).

 

What comes out of the exhaust pipe of your gas producer and it's heater? IIRC wood gas generators are pretty dirty as far as particulate emissions. How about the emissions from burning said gas, clean or dirty, high carbon or low?
Just because a fuel is cheap it does not necessarily follow that it is clean or that it does not do harm to the environment, in fact quite the opposite re: coal.

 

If the system is set up properly I believe the vast majority of all ash ends up in the pan, and does not come out at the exhaust. Producer gas can be, depending on the design and execution, clean.

Especially compared to just burning coal in a furnace.

EDIT: you may notice that I did not place emphasis on coal, but wood chips. One of these is renewable even if you won't go as far on a bag as you would on the other. Also, I didn't mention wood charcoal, which is renewable and also better than wood chips in terms of performance, because someone still has to make it out of wood chips somewhere. Seems an unnecessary step for me.

Finally, if it was me I would run a small ORC bottom cycle engine to power a generator off of my heat exchanger to cool down the gas and recover some of that lost heat. I kinda like what I've read about HFE7000 for a working fluid for ORC because, though pricey per gallon: it would have super-atmospheric pressure at the condenser (only need to worry about leaks and not contamination); is considered non-toxic and non-volatile; actually can have a wider range of temperatures at the sorts of pressures a small reciprocating engine would allow than water does.

 

Any links to more info about emissions? Wood and coal are just about the dirtiest and most dangerous fuels out there. Wood particulates in the form of smoke are particularly deadly as they are the very worst size to harm human lungs.

Coal and wood CAN be clean, all you need is tens of thousands of dollars worth of scrubbers to clean the emissions, but that sort of defeats the purpose of being a cheap fuel. Part of the problem is that most alternative fuel advocates tend to just look at the direct cost to the user and ignore the indirect costs such as health and environmental impacts. Somebody has to pay for them eventually and that really should be part of the costs of using a particular fuel. As an example due to the cost to the healthcare system of respiratory damage caused by particulate inhalation of wood smoke from home heating many locales have been forced to go to alternate burn days or even banning wood stoves completely in certain conditions.

 

Found something interesting in regards to combustion engines, biodiesel hybrid motor.

This site seems like a great source of relevant information

The more I research this the less pontoons seem like a good idea. I am now reading up on barges, this one in particular looks great.

 

Sweet looking Houseboat there Nimble, great boat for poking around protected water or living aboard.

Roger, do you want a multi-year project or do you want to go boating?

 

This one … http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/boat-design/river-boat-progress-45973-3.html#post679427

 

Electric motors are great.

Batteries, on the other hand, have a long way to go....

 

The lithium batteries torqueedo makes look far superior to acid batteries but their price is hard to justify.

I have totally changed my thoughts on this project and am now researching ferrocement and geopolymer hull techniques. I realized the pontoons, while acceptable in a river, would never be suitable for SF bay with its constant swell from large ships and strong tides/winds.

Does anyone know of pre-existing plans for houseboat style hulls made from ferrocement techniques? I have glanced over the FOA documents from the US navy and these are intriguing, they demonstrate the technique clearly enough.

I plan on picking up a copy of 'Ferro-cement Boats' from hartley to learn more but it would be helpful to hear from others who have more experience.

Thanks everyone for your interest in my "schemes".

 

Ferrocement while possible is a terrible material for a boat. The steel unless perfectly encapsulated rusts, and the concrete is too brittle to handle the impact loads common in marinas. There are a few ferro boats that are ok, but as a whole they are not worth the time.

Frankly I just can't see what you are looking for in a new boat build. There are hundreds of used boats that seem to fit what you want, for a fraction the cost of a new build. Even including the cost of any necessary updating or refit they would come out much cheaper than what you are talking about doing.

Can you lease explain what it is you feel can't be satisfied from a used boat, or a design already on the market?