Hogfish Maximus - 44ish sailing sharpie?

Thanks Chris. You and your information are an inspiration to us all. Well done.

 

Hogfish Maximus sailing videos

There are videos of Hogfish Maximus sailing on YouTube now listed as Chris Morejohn sailing Hogfish Maximus.
They were taken and posted by friends sailing on a 44' Trintella as we sail together in the Caribbean. The winds were bowing about 20 knots. The dogs you hear are their terriers.
This shows what a flat bottom sailboat looks like in 6' seas or so.

 

Here is a direct URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1JpuqVKm9M

Does Hogfish Maximus pound more compared to a similarly-sized non-sharpie?

Do you have any estimation of how HFM pounds, with its (sometimes) immersed forefoot, compared to a Bolger Advanced Sharpie-39 (Loose Moose II), which has a narrow transom bow which sweeps up out of the water?

Thanks to you and your friend for posting the video.

 

A good question, but somewhat academic I think. This video shows a rockered flat bottom (square boat if you like), at its absolute best, heeled and with good way on. Per Bolgers statements, the chine edge acts as a blade, slicing into each wave, with little pounding.
Last year I crossed the Atlantic on a cruise liner, passing through a storm such that the flat(ish) bow quarters pounded such that the whole ship audibly shuddered.
A few months ago I sailed through a 50kt storm off Oregon in a suburb Perry designed Chio Lee 44, and it too pounded occasionally when the waves were just wrong. So the answer is, even sailed properly all boats pound occasionally, and I doubt a definiable or objective answer can be given. Subjective, yes, but that is in the opinion of the builder/owner. Note; light displacement boats, sleds especially, really pound when driven to windward, besides gentlemen do NOT sail to windward. It seems to me that heavier boats need lots of rake and flair to the bow so the bow lifts to a wave. Lighter boats, like Hogfish, do not need such a dramatic dD/dVv (rate of change of displacement over rate of vertical velocity) to keep the bow above water. Both need the stern lines 'balanced' to whatever bow section is chosen.

 

More videos of Hogfish Maximus sailing:

This one is taken to windward of HFM, but the seas are much calmer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UG13Mwb49_c

Making slow progress
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUVWpU9xOIw

Quite a distance from HFM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pnW5ZUuZzw

Almost looks like the bowsprit could go under if the waves got much steeper
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1YZJfkQsgc

 

Hogfish Maximus sailing

Hello sailor Alan, and imaginary ,
The HFM weighs 32,000 lbs, and is 38' long on deck. The Trintella 44' ketch that we have been saing in company with weighs more, has twice the sail area, 675 sq ft verse their 1,150 sq ft. They have a 7'4" draft with 13,000 lbs of lead.
We both have the same heeling angle, they carry the same reefed sails as we do but the Trintella is 6' longer and a very fast sailor. They always beat us by 45 minutes or more on a 35-40 miles sail to wind ward. Reaching they are very fast hitting 9-10 knts to our 7-9 knts.
Lots of boats pound. The worst pounding boat I owned was a very sharp bowed Morgan 34 sloop. I've sailed on over 100 boat designs . It all depends on how the boat is built . The HFMS has a 2" thick hull so is very quiet. She pounds , in only certain short seas but it's no big deal. The bow sprit is for the chute and so far has never gone under but if it did it's no big deal. I can remove it in 3 minutes.
From sailing Bolgers boats I feel they are way lighter in construction design and with their bows already above the water before sailing they will pound a lot. The loose moose sailed down wind across the Atlantic. I would love to race one about but they just are not about in deep water. Go to my blog and look at the dozens of other shallow draft designs out here sailing. I will be post more videos on you tube. I can't figure out how to do it here on my iPad. I'am in Grenada now and will be sailing up to Antigua for the summer so will have more to post.

 

Chris,
Would you mind commenting on how you made your centerboard and rudder.

Is the centerboard heavily ballasted to give HFM extra stability? How do you raise and lower it? How do you handle an impact against the centerboard when it is extended? Do you have any problems with mud or stones jamming between the centerboard and the case?

How did you make the pivot joint for your kick-up rudder? Is the rudder partially balanced? What sort of a wind vane do you use, and is it connected to the rudder, or does it use an auxiliary rudder?

 

Thanks for your comments Alan. I can understand why a heeled sharpie will cut the water better and pound less, but I'm less clear about why having "good way on" will smooth the ride. It seems to me that the faster you go the further a bow can extend out of a wave, the harder you hit on the backside of the next wave.

I'm still working on the 'gentleman' aspect, so want to keep my windward options open.

I sort of intuitively understand your 'dD/dVv' idea, but wondered if it was an actual formula that boat designers use? If so, how would you do the calculations, and what would 'good' and 'bad' numbers look like?

Can you give any guidance on how to match stern lines to bow sections?

 

Going a few pages back, click on ‘‘ ’’ in the quotes to see the post in context.

Here's a Lunstroo Skipjack 34, a steel 1m to about 1.8m draft centerboarder, inspired by the US Skipjacks, but more seaworthy than the originals I think. Looks like a nice boat, but I'm afraid the heavy steel build will give here a low ballast ratio. She was for over an year on the market I think, the asking price dropped from € 34,000 to € 29,500, don't know for how much she was sold. (The Dutch text is on many points more comprehensive and says she uses beach legs to dry out.)

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Below another one (link - link - link) where it says she has 9,500 kg displacement and 1,500 kg lead ballast. But I assume the steel keel and bottom are extra heavy for ballast reasons, so I don't know the real ballast ratio.

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They've recently replaced the concrete ballast by lead, I hope the lead is better secured than can be seen in this picture . .

 

Imaginary Number,

For the desire for a steel bottom, Botter Bössel has a steel bottom and laminated oak topsides. Maybe this is also an option for a HFM style sharpie, with plywood topsides instead of laminated oak of course. I'm sorry all info is in Dutch.

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Below a sketch of the joint between the 12 mm steel bottom + laminated oak topsides 3 x 13.3 mm.​

More pictures, all clickable: The Build --- The Boat

Botter Bössel on local TV . . .​

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Theo Lansink built a 12-meter sailboat in his back yard.​

The builder has Botter Bössel now for sale due to age reasons, of himself, not the boat.​

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P.S. - For comparison: the 1912 built MK 63, a traditional fisherman Botter of the Zuiderzee.

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From tree to Botter, displays the traditional build of an solid oak Botter.​

 

I have a modified sharpie, a Herreshoff Meadowlark. I will say here that we seldom pound, really no more than the keel boats I have sailed over more than 50 years of sailing. The Meadowlark has an immersed forefoot. The relatively light displacement well spread out over the length of the boat, and a fine bow means we fight the sea less than a comparable keelboat. We go to windward more comfortably than most comparably sized boats. Not quite as close as a sloop...We are a ketch / schooner. The geometry is not optimum for performance...very good however for cruising.
I have been an admirer of Chris Morejohn's Maximus boats since I became aware of them. These shallow body ballasted boats are pretty darn capable.

 

Angélique, thanks for posting photos of these Dutch shoal-draft boats. I am particularly amazed by the steel-wood hull joint of the Botter Bössel. (BTW, what does Botter Bössel mean? Google translates it as Butter Bössel.)

Are composite steel/wood hulls common in the Netherlands? I would have thought that keeping the joint watertight and the wood in good shape would be a challenge, especially with the differing thermal coefficients of expansion. Do you know what type of sealant is used? SABA-KIT+MTB doesn't mean much to me.

I'm thinking the oak corner piece is essential for keeping the wood planking firmly in the steel pocket. But I wonder why they didn't allow the inner two layers of oak to extend into the pocket, and the just butt the outer layer of oak against the steel? Seems to me that method would be stronger than assuming the glue joint between the angle and the inner layer of plank would hold?

Do you know how seaworthy these types of boat were? Are they mostly for sheltered water use, or can they also be used in the open oceans?

 

gilberj, thanks for mentioning Herreshoff's Meadowlark. I hadn't heard of them before so looked them up. A very capable boat.

 

Botter ^{(sort of translation)} is the name of the kind of boat, I don't know the etymology of the word, this etymology source ^{(sort of translation)} gives too many explanations.

See it like ‘‘Smack’’ is the kind name for Smacks, fishermen Botters have a fish well like the Well Smacks.

( Boter -with one ‘‘t’’- in Dutch = Butter in English )​

‘‘ Bössel ’’ is a word in Tweants dialect of the Twenthe region where the builder/owner lives, it means something like ‘‘ kwajongen ~ rakker ’’ in Dutch, which could be translated to something like ‘‘ varmint ~ rascal ’’ in English I think.

As far as I know this one is unique.

In the sketch, below the 60x60x6 angled steel profile, it says ‘‘ SABA Sealer MTB ’’ which is aligned/underlined to the words ‘‘ SABA-KIT+MTB ’’ in the luting layer.

-- Here some specs: SABA Sealer MBT --- SABA Sealer MB-T -- (PDF's in Dutch) -- Note: I'll guess ‘‘ MTB ’’ in the sketch is a slip for ‘‘ MBT ’’ --

BTW, one of the things in the small handwriting in the sketch is the calculation that the 5 mm thick luting layer requires 12.5 liters of the SABA Sealer MBT for the total of ± 20 m wood-steel joint around bottom. Can't read all the other things because it's not complete displayed.

In the link above the sketch the builder gives an explanation about the joint, but there is a lot of jargon of which I don't know the right English words, so I can't give a good translation. The Dutch magazine Spiegel der Zeilvaart had earlier this year 2 times an article about Bössel in which the joint was discussed in more detail, but there was also too much jargon for me to give a good translated resume in English.

Botters were used mostly for fishing on the former Zuiderzee, but they were also used for coastal fishing on the North Sea.

 

Apologies for a blunt bowed boat like a Botter on this Sharpie thread, the objective was to bring the wood-steel joint of Bössel to attention, which perhaps also might be an option on a Sharpie for those who believe in it.