Freeboard preferences...

Playing around with it some more this morning... I incorporated some of your suggestions. I widened the waterline beam, reduced the deadrise also, warped the bottom a little and widened the transom a bit more. Don't know if I like it as much (the transom...meh!) so I might massage it to find a happy medium. KM is up to 6.5 at 500 lbs displacement (shown waterline). As to rowing...So long as I can get it from point A to point B without having a heart attack or turning my lats into dishrags... 'S-OK. Seeing as my sum total rowing distance with oars in a boat and not a rowing machine is about 500 yards... I got some larnin to do in that respect too. I have a 50 lb thrust trolling motor that might get a work out though.

 

Your boat has the classic appearance that one might see on the Maine coast. Curvy sides, lot of curvacious rake at the stem. Thats pretty but you are giving away two and a half feet of waterline on a 15.5 foot boat. As drawn, it would appear to be a lap straker.

The flatter vee at the transom may help with RM a little but the transom will drag at a very low heel angle. If the boat is to be a lap strake or carvel construction, why use a vee bottom? You could almost as easily give her a rounded chine and modesty arced bottom. Reduce wet surface a little bit in doing so.

 

A few thoughts. I think you have a good plan in the works and I don't want to muddy things with too many suggestions. Instead, I'll just express some "thoughts" about certain things.

A V bottom puts displacement in a destabilizing location. It tends to encourage a boat to heel. This could be to your advantage...or not. I think that for rowing, and keeping a simple hull form, V will help reduce BWL and wetted surface. By encouraging a hull to heel, the lateral center of bouyance will shift to your advantage, when sailing, though it will make the boat feel unstable initially. A V can also lower CG in applicable situations.

For the most form stability, a flat bottom should raise your meta center very effectively. A rockered flat-panel the kisses the waterline fore and aft could work nicely and replace the garboard panels that you have now. I believe this would give you substantially more bearing aft for better power conversion when under sail. Wetted surface might suffer, but you may be able to work a narrower beam for a similar righting moment when compared to a V bottom. Working the turn of the bilge might present some complexities to deal with.

Most likely, I've not said any you don't already know. Thanks for putting your work up for comment and contribution.

 

I'm liking the direction you're going. Compare your last to the old snipe class. I think with a very carfully designed rig of about 115 sqft, she would work out fine. In fact, you could probably mount a Snipe mast about a 1.5 foot lower in your boat, trim a bit off the bottom of the main, and be in pretty good shape. There's about 30,000 Snipes out there, so you ought to be able to pick one up cheap.

 

Finally had some time to do a bit more massaging. Just a little tweaking here and there, mostly in fractions of an inch.

Newest...



Last one before...



I was working on a flat bottomed boat and still might build it as it would go together quickly enough (barring my usual delays and lethargy)

LOA 14'9"
Beam 5'3"

This is an older version but I am now considering a Gaff sloop with a centerboard rather than what is shown but I haven't drawn it yet.

 

Been massaging it some more...spent a few hours this morning tweaking it. Beam is up to 6 ft overall...although it is only a few inches more at the waterline. Getting to be a bit short and fat...kinda like me but I think it will sail relatively flat now. Heeled to 20 degrees it's cb only shifts a little aft and the shape doesn't distort all that much. Should be fairly well balanced hull wise. I should really quit playing with it and call it done so I can start making sawdust. I would like to use it next summer but I expect it will be significantly longer than that before it sees water. Now to decide if I want to glue-lap it or stitch it or combine the two.

 

Hi Lewis,

If you want something to just sail around on comfortably while eliminating most righting problems, why not consider a catamaran idea ? Even if you need to trailer it it is very easy on small boats to use a beam that widens on the water but trailer narrow enough.

And make the boat a bit longer too will you ? 4.5m is very short. The little tri I built was 5m500, and I was very sorry I didn't make it 8m and I wish it was a cat too because of the deck space. Enjoyed it a heck of a lot never the less.

It is just a suggestion, the aim was not to start another mono vs multi argument, I just mentioned from a practical viewpoint.

Even if you stick to the current hull I would suggest you make it longer.

 

Either everyone is so disgusted with my suggestion they stay away or Lewis is considering...

Eeeny meeny miney mow... Oh dear !...

 

Fanie,

My Mom always said, " If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all."

Thus my silence...............

I prefer the iterations in post #20.

 

Uh hu... and how is NY even remotely connected to Iowa ?

I thought the US quarantined NY long ago to prevent any further bad influence to reach the rest of the US

 

Sorry...neither. Just working too much and too lazy to make the fingers go tap tap. I am really not much of a multi hull person... they just don't scratch my itch very well.
This morning I took another look at the latest ( I like to leave something alone for a bit and come back to it later to see if I still think it is ok). Decided to get the same stability by lengthening it a couple of feet and reducing the beam by a couple of inches. Looks better to my eye now.



It is up to 18'3" now and narrowed a bit from 6' to 5'10". It looks narrower than that because of the additional length. Total depth is now 23" at the lowest point of the shear. This should give me enough of an "in" the boat feeling. With some side decks to it it should stay pretty dry even if I ever do bury the rail with it. Not that I am likely to be out in weather capable of putting it over but there is still that possibility of getting caught.

I've pretty much decided to build the bottom and first chine as stitch and glue then glue lap the other 2 strakes

 

I do the same... bugger-up is with boats there are so many variables and choices, you don't have to be a woman to change your mind twice a day !

I like that you made it longer, it looks better already, but 5m500 is still very short, you need to make it look good
Just for the hell of it, draw one that is too long See what gives.

What are your restrictive cryteria ?


One of my friends have a bass boat, 5m500, The problem is every time we go to some of the bigger inland waters, first bit of wind is a threat for making water when the swell comes up and you have to sit on the launch or go home. He's now ordered a 23' boat, this is between the elegant movement of larger boats and the small wake bobbers. I still think he should have gotten the 28'

He still wonders where he's going to keep it because it doesn't fit in his garage. His thinking was right never the less - some okes buy boats to fit in the garage, others to fit on the water.


Someone I know down by the coast once phoned me and asked what size boat should he get, just for local fishing... My advice was get the biggest boat you can handle alone.

I forgot about that, but some months later he called me up. He said he was out fishing and the weather turned out not as expected. He said that he followed my advice and was calling to thank me for suggesting a bigger boat. He said if it wasn't for that he doubt if he would have survived that day.

So there you have it. I know you're not from Texas, but bigger is better

 

Those are becoming my sentiments also. I moved here by choice.

 

You know what they say eh. An open mind an empty head...

 

I really didn't want to go beyond 17 ft so this is hyper extending it already. I don't have the resources or room to go any bigger right now. As it is...18'3" will tax my space to the max and probably require me to build a moveable building platform so I can run it out of the garage to work on and back in for dry storage. I have my 16 ft duck punt-ish in there now and it is a pain to get around the ends. I usually end up opening the big door instead.