Converting a list of desires into a physical boat-How to start?

That's a neat boat-I would want to make it a little taller from the deck to the rail, but I could probably add a short handrail and get to the level I like to have. Another one to ask if they have an aluminum conversion for the plans.

I do like the Sea Strike 16 and 18. And his plans are in the range I am comfortable with, I'll have to ask if there is an aluminum sheet version available.

I do like the shape of the Trial 19, too. 5083 isn't that much more costly than 5052 when you have to order the plates in anyway, and the cutting cost is the same.

The design/construction of my own boat is a personal goal-same reason I designed and built my own car, designed and built my own CNC mill, and I learned quite a lot building both of those things. Both are about the same level of complexity as a boat, which is why when the price of the plan I liked doubled, it was enough to consider doing it myself.

I have zero problems building from a set of plans-but building from a set of plans may or may not get me the boat I want to build-that's why I joined here and asked about designing it myself. If I can draw up a boat, get feedback from other builders, and find an existing design that can accommodate what I want, at a price I am comfortable paying for plans that may need modification to achieve what I want, I have no problem doing just that. But I need to know if I'm gonna modify plans, that I don't modify them into trash.

I've never had a "displacement hull" I think, all of my boats have had chines or have been flat bottomed with longitudinal strakes. I've had to repair damaged chines/edges on the two fiberglass boats I've had in the past-that was a big mess both times. Both were bought with rock or log damage, the first one I didn't know about when I bought it and the second I did.

Yes, Bluebell, I'm prepared to spend a few years doing this. I'm a career/tech teacher-for 3/4 of the year I work at the school, but I have 2.5 months of summer off that I run the fab shop in. That 2.5 months isn't enough to warrant keeping the fab shop open for business but I'm not going to give up the shop and tools, either. I'm not planning on drawing this up in a week and going straight to cutting out expensive sheet, I've made that mistake in the past and it's an easy way to spend a lot of money on "tuition fees". Another bonus of learning about boat design-I can present it as a possible career path my students could go into after high school.

The last two nights I've been doodling in Delftship to get a feel for the program, how to import/export shapes, and tweaking shapes to be developable. I've looked at a few different styles of construction, and the style I *think* I like the most doesn't show up much on the plans I can find for sale-but about half of all the photos/videos I see of commercially made boats seems to use this style: a one-piece keel bar that is either lasered/waterjet from plate and stood up on it's edge, or a flat bar that is rolled the hard way to make up the keel.

The plans for home builders seem to omit a keel bar altogether and just butt the edges of the lower panels together, tack welding as they go and seam welding after the shape is formed. Some have a straight bar that is bent to shape as the bow is pulled together and tack welded, which is the closest I've found to the preshaped keel bar. I assume this is because most people don't have the tools to roll a bit of bar stock the hard way, and don't want to pay for the large, relatively thick sheet to have one cut out. (a long thin bar with a curve like that at the end will cost a lot to get cut out, if that's all you're cutting from that thickness of plate!)

As soon as I figure out enough Delftship to post a picture, I can start emailing some of these designers you gents have shown me and asking "Can this set of plans do this?" and save some time.

 

Have a look at Elements of Boat Strength by Dave Gerr. Incredibly informative. And check out the Tx18 at bateau.com - a good pount of departure. And my build thread is a good lesson in humility (for me: Everyone else knew better)

 

Another flash in the pan inquiry.
I wonder if we'll ever see WolframM again.
Perhaps @DogCavalry gave him all he needed in post #17 above...

 

Nope, just busy getting ready for school to start. As I said, this will take a few years for me to get it done. Lesson planning and continuing education credits take up a lot of time.

 

Just looked up the welded properties of 5083. Amazing!

I think you might learn quite a bit by looking at existing designs. In Bolger's 30 Odd Boats, there are partial plans for 2 aluminum work boats and 1 steel work boat. Plus some other aluminum boats. These generally include offsets for the shape of the hull and some details about construction, in addition to more general views. Presumably, there are some metal designs in his other books and in books by other authors. You may be able to find them in your local library.

I imagine you might pick up some things from designs in other materials as well.

I've heard that Phil Bolger and Friends is still in operation, though Bolger himself has been gone for years. If I'm not mistaken, Susanne Altenberger is in charge now, and is a boat designer in her own right. They might have something you like, though I gather correspondence is not lightning fast, and I don't know how much the plans cost.

You can, in fact, get static stability information from Solidworks. At least if you've figured out where the center of gravity of the entire craft is. Just make a 3-D, solid model of the hull, specifying it at the density of water, tilt it just a little, slice off everything above the water, and use mass properties to find the "center of mass". You might have to adjust the depth of the hull a bit to maintain the same displacement. You might have to tilt it a bit fore or aft to make the "center of mass" line up fore and aft with the center of gravity. The horizontal distance between the two, times the weight, will be the righting moment.

A few years back, I tried to learn Freeship, but I guess I wasn't stubborn enough. I can use Solidworks well enough. I'm thinking about trying a different program called Hullform. There's another program I've actually used to design a boat, called Hulls. It's a bit limited, but will give you flat panels for building in plywood. Presumably, this works for metal as well.

I don't supposed you could post something or give a link about your scratch built car. That's kind of amazing.

BTW, if I drive north along the seashore, eventually I start seeing boats similar to the one you're describing. I don't know if this would be true where you live, but if so it might be educational to examine them closely.