Concrete submarine

I guess if we didn't have enough problems on the High seas, now a bunch of concrete whales floating around.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22ZhDclIgi0&feature=related

 

Good idea. in fact you will find I suggested that is one of the few uses I could see this technology doing about some months ago.

"www.boatdesign.net/forums/boat-design/i-wonder-if-someone-can-invent-boat-24910.html"

http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/boat-design/i-wonder-if-someone-can-invent-boat-24910.html

I have investigated 'sea based real estate' many times over the years. It appears in Australia at least, that moored craft of any kind within sight of any reasonable town or other amenities has a lot of problem with local councils and state regulation. It will be interesting to see how you go in the US., but I was told it would be 'degree of difficulty 9 out of 10' by a government officer here in Australia.

Yeah - but HE has the requisite cover for *third party insurance*. When you can tell us the source, cost and cover details for just third party liability for a concrete sub, I will rest easier.

By the way, that also applies to leased 'mooring grounds'. For example, if I establish any type of maritime lease, required for 'permanent' infrastructure in state or commonwealth waters, you have to have third party insurance to $10million to indemnify the 'landlord' and relevant government departments.

To set up a "maritime city" or "maritime dwelling" in most modern countries, there is a huge "degree of difficulty".

But since Wellmer is selling the "houses", dont expect any real problems to be discussed in this thread. You will have to research that yourselves.

 

Yes, be my guest, but clean up the typos from my phone! LOL

Actually, i would not recomend diving into a huricane without actually diving below the huricanes surface waves which reach 60'-100'. That's a bit deep for a snorkel. LOL

Once your down there a simple dopler surface sonar can tell you how deep you are and how much wave action their is. Cheap (< $800) and real handy for knowing when it's safe to return to snorkle depth.

I agree your going to want a Visible & IR Camera, VHF & HF & Satelite antenna (GPS, AIS, Voice) on the snorkle. Simple light and cheap. But it will let you use AIS to see the big ships and them see you. Camera for the small guys. Garmin and others sell a single unit that integrates the GPS chart, AIS , VHF, RADAR and camera into a single $3000 device that also lets you integrate your computer and the large flat screen in the living room.

I agree! just trying to point out that you both targeted different fuctions which understandably resulted in different designs. FFF - Form Fits Function, change the function dramatically and the form must also change dramatically!

A Yacht is of course and expensive houseboat. LOL

There is already a company that makes one for Yachts!

Price for a houseboat is 2X hull (EU662/ton)
Price for a yacht is 4X-6X hull (EU1300 - EU2000/ton) = $500K US

But that includes all the fancy hybrid diesels, electronics and LOX air handlers.

That's pretty inexpensive for a transoceanic vessel capable of comfortable operation durring a huricane!

If you guys fit a submersible Yacht out here in the US under a US flag I might be able to offer some specific sugestions offline (No bad Guys).

 

RW, Maybe you could post where "HE" got his coverage?

Maybee submersible mobile homes? I wish the boat on the mooring next to me looked as good as Will's submersible house boat! The thing next to me looks like it should have been condemed 20 years ago but nobody seems to care. Complaints go ignored and no one can show me that it has ever passed a survey!

This fact makes me wonder who is going to care about a sub on the ball next to them.

I have even seen a concrete barge based house boat in SF bay on a trip there a few years ago. I would imagine that who ever insured it against damaging the boats and houseboats arround it would understand the liability of a 200 ton floating or semi-floating structure.

But that is just a guess.

Good post RW as usual.

 

We can only hope that those subs will be as good at avoiding ships as marine mamals! A whales sonar is so sophisticated they can identify a surface ship 60 miles away.

At San Ignacio we had a whale that regularly met the same tour boat after having been sited a considerable distance away! They liked being peted!

There is a reason that marine mamals and fish have lateral lines! It's not safe to be under the water without acoustic vision!

"Even those Pesky Dauphines." LOL

My two Cents.

 

I am not saying for Concrete sub, I am thinking of poor guy on his little boat hitting the concrete floating island a couple of feet underwater.

my .50 cents, inflation you know.

 

Assuming that the sub had it's snorkel up with legal daylight strobes on then I do not have much compashion for the boater who refuses to stand watch. He was dangerious to himself and others long before he started the engine!

Just the same as him hitting the breakwater, and that happens all the time!

Most larger ships are implimenting AIS, or at least the recieve only version to minimize collisions. The problem remains with the martini motor boater on autopilot. some day it will be mandatory that any vessil in US waters that is on autopilot transmit it's AIS and sound an alarm when other boats are within a 1 mile radius. TX AIS that integrate with your GPS Chartmap are down to <$800 now!

Yea, that means that you still have to stand watch while you enter or exit the harbour! LOL

 

Good call, PanAmMan - question the assumption! Thats the way to go.

The answer is, I wouldnt have the foggiest - all I know is that HE *has* cover. How do I know? because that is the mandatory rule for all clubs, associations, government authorities, corporations and the like since the big insurance "crunch" brought on after 9/11. The other reason I *know* he has insurance, is that unless HE is risking the 1.5 million up from his own pockets, is the other investors would insist on covering their arses real good.

I apologise to everyone to being so bloody "one trick" in my posts (especially Wellmer). Its not that I am particularly interested in insurance, I would much rather be talking about the "nuts and bolts" of the project.

In my experience, every project has a 'critical path" (god bless Buckminster Fuller. Nasa uses it for all their debacles, so it must be a good process!) Basically, before a project gets a go-ahead, you plot all the infintesimal thngs *you can think of*, that could make the project a no-go. When you have those answered, then "full steam ahead". Thats the point where you have to "manage the unknown" (the things you couldnt or didnt think of)

If a project is driven by a 'yellow hat", (the eternal optimist), then all the critical things get ignored, and eventually the whole thing falls in a glorious heap. (Maritime history is littered with such projects). The 'instigator' puts the blame on 'unseen factors, lack of competant help', and any other thing they can think of. The investors/purchasers are left wringing their hands in grief.

Now, not being able to dock at maritime facilities for repair or storage, being consigned to wander "lonely as a concrete whale", or stuck in some unsupervised mooring, doesnt sound appealing to me as an owner.

Losing my significant investment in an accident, or having my pants sued off for some "incident", that may or may not have been my fault, is the biggest "show stopper" I can think of as a potential investor.

Call me "picky", but thats what I think.

 

In R&D we always question the assumption not the man!

Risk path analysis is a recursive process from day one to end of life of the product! But I guarentee you that in this litigious world we almost never publicly publish our internal risk managment process and or data. The insurance companies that underwite our product development and product liability mandate the process and secur eall that data under attorney priviledge unless a very insistant judge gets involved. But no fishing expeditions.

if will Publicly discloses his risk managment process he will have much more dificulty getting insurance. it seems like an oxy ***** and it is moronic but it is part of the US, Austrailian and UK legal systems. The three systems differ primarily on who carries the finacial and judicial burden for bringing a charge of negligence.

it is however much more dificult to get insurance in the UK and AS than the US even though the US is the easiest to make the charge of negligence. The current atmosphere of risk avoidance will of course impact this relationship.

 

Under what class is sub being built??

 

common sense questions

As Wil has mentioned the floating houseboat, I will use that example as to common sense. As a surface boat owner, turned submarine owner, I will comply with all the rules governing mooring anchoring, or what have you.
The small boat coming into harbor,, especially at night has the responsibility to navigate and pay attention to the laws specifically aid out. Especially here in the States, all harbors are well marked for traveling in and out. If you do not have the basic knowledge of how a harbor is set up, you should not be there in the first place. Especially in San Francisco where the fog is a hazard common sense applies. If the boater concerned cannot see to navigate or does not have the proper equipment to operate, he should not be moving.
This is common sense, and the boat or sub at anchor/mooring has responsibilities as well.
Laws regarding anchoring requirements and mooring are clear as well. A yacht submarine, floating habitat or what have you will have to comply. If a small boat, or large boat wanders into an anchor/mooring area, it is his fault.
Floating habitats and water real estate are a new area in law, and many such as myself have seen the financial benefits to living on the water. In the future, this will become more of an issue when floating habitats, such as Wil's become more common and more people find they can live in an area such as San Franciso for pennies on the dollar. My last trip to the Bay convinced me that there is sufficient water real estate to make it work. A boat can get an overnight slip for a small fraction of what it would cost in a hotel on the water. Right on the Wharf, protected slips with electricity are available to boating tourists.
I recently posted an idea about an American co-op to get the idea going with special attention to quality control from those specialists that want to get involved. So far, I have heard nothing in response. I think it is a good idea to get more projects going. What say you?

 

So Steve, here is the quote you refer to.

Call me stupid, but I don't get it. I looked for a new thread from you on this, there is none. What other blogs are you refering to?
I think you're going to have to spoon feed me a bit more on this one, what are you talking about...?

Thanks, Tom

 

On the totally specific area of 'floating habitats', I dont believe it will ever happen anywhere near 1st world population centres. Thinking that there is lots of space, say near San Fran, is being very unrealistic. Having been involved with a yacht club trying to put new buildings on land it already owns (took 3 years and several million dollars just for approval), I have a real feel for the amount of anti "dont block my view I paid millions of dollars for" that exists in 90% of the coastline in say the US and Australia. I wouldnt like to try to put any substantial 'infrastructure' within 4 kilometres of a populated shoreline.

You may get a lot more success in 3rd world countries. There are several 'maritime habitat' projects going on arounds the world eg
www.spiralislanders.com

not to mention the established floating cities in Hong Kong, and the stilt houses all over Asia. Its being done wherever it *can* be done.

The big issue is pollution. It is an expensive operation to manage waste in a floating environment, and even more expensive managing reliable transport to land for supplies and such.( I have friends who were 'marooned' at an exposed marina for 3 days - they couldnt get off the boat and go to work.)

The 'cents in a dollar' dream of alternate living is not really possible near large population centres once you actually try it, or else it would be being done already on your average much cheaper surface based craft.

 

different forums

I have tried to get myspace and facebook forums setup. There are millions of discussions of myspace, and facebook is just getting going. It is my inexperience that has possibly caused the myspace from not drawing more attention?
But I did make a concrete submarine discussion and forum on the site. I had a hard time finding my own forum, as it does not cross reference.
Watson, you make some good points as to waste disposal, etc. It can be done, especially with the attitudes of the new Mayor, revitalization, self contained habitats. If I could moor a habitat, moving or otherwise near pier 39 for a reasonable price, I would figure out a way. There are waste removal boats, and a simple bladder could be pumped out while surfaced.
This is brainstorming, I like to think of every possibility and see what holds up.