carbon fiber pontoon, floating electric barge, floating office, uber workspace

So I've had a little extra time on my hands and decided to research boat building. Dangerous waste of time & money? Great way to occupy the mind? A way to build and lose fortune?

I guess I'm at a stopping point with it, so figured I would share a little.

My latest thought was to take standard carbon fiber sheets and bond them together to be the base for a multi hull pontoon, floating barge, or something similar. Granted, the base material cost is more expensive, but the construction cost savings should help. Most importantly....

The typical aluminum pontoons have a certain stigma which I was trying to avoid. The fiberglass pontoons are a step in the right direction. That's when I stumbled on the carbon fiber approach...

Of course the durability of carbon fiber should allow for all sorts of interesting motor configurations in the pontoon itself.

Here are some diagrams:

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/19CWaIXGgwecM4skYSYie8Vs8DdjfOb3kh7ZQnVRpmVo/edit?usp=sharing

It would be great to have a kit of some sort to build on as a foundation. Nice carbon fiber hulls, carbon fiber struts, etc. as building blocks for a lightweight DIY boat.

So you have the narrow square-ish pontoons, the v hull pontoons, the round pontoons. One piece platform?

Electric inboards, solar tops, batteries, gas outboards, --- whatever.

Here's my spreadsheet gathering materials, motors, etc.:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1efUVcxUwmztV684NyXaIaJXZ7-9UF_8zjFF5kC95lUQ/edit?usp=sharing

The original intention was to build a floating electric barge to work out of:

https://docs.google.com/presentatio...2DC3c2Fdmv68tw/edit#slide=id.gc7125842a_1_150

Cheers

 

Welcome to the forum.

Have you performed the hydrostatic prerequisites, to support your proposed masses? How about the dynamics aspect of the hull forms, to make efficiency match your propulsion?

 

Thanks Par --

I'm far from that capacity personally, thus why I published my information in the collaboration section.

 

Except where the desire is to spare no expense, paying for carbon and other expensive light materials for a floating office is a strange choice to me.

The pontoon form isn't especially seaworthy, so how do you plan to use it?
The only SOR I see for this would be if you want to travel on protected waters to somewhere shallow to anchor and work for the day every day and then go back and tie up.

Otherwise you'd be better buying a larger used boat that would be more seaworthy, more resalable, and more comfortable anytime it's not flat calm.
Or ignore the stigma of aluminum pontoons and choose them because they are cheap, it doesn't matter if you run aground because they're not aesthetically great anyway.

 

The durability of carbon fiber doesn't change the motor options at all.

It might allow you to create different better shapes than you can do in aluminum. It might allow you to save a half inch of draft over fiberglass. It might allow you to achieve a target speed with slightly less power required.

 

What everyone is trying to say is there's a fairly reliable way to develop a yacht design and you're not approaching it with some level of coordination. Essentially you start with a set of goals (the SOR) which are owner and intended use defined, then compare these to existing designs, possible some generic design ratios, then a GA (General Arrangement) is drawn up. Next up would be the lines and hydrostatics, followed by the engineering and construction drawings, continuing into propulsion, steering and other "details", such as plumbing, electrical, equipment and standards compliance(s) where required. Eventually, as you work around the "spiral" you'll have sufficient information to do accurate weight and construction estimates.

You can vary from this process if you like and many have, but you'll find you're chasing your tail on various things (repeatedly) without the understanding of how these things get accomplished (in a timely fashion). This isn't indigenous to yacht design, but is followed by most engineering disciplines. You currently (it would seem) to have several preconceived notions that aren't totally accurate, nor especially conducive to the typical home builder. Working with exotic materials, isn't something I recommend for the shade tree builder, mostly because the successful implementation of these materials, usually requires considerable environmental and application control, to get the benefits of these materials. Anything much less than this, means you're wasting goo and fabrics, which given their role and cost, seems self defeating.

So, lets start with what you want from this boat, its role for you, on the water, the general sea states it'll encounter, equipment it might have installed, work that may be performed aboard, general ride and comfort level expectations, target speeds, etc. From this, the focus of a design search, might be narrowed quite a bit or the need for a custom or semi custom design, might be realized. Lastly an "open source" yacht design has been done, but for your needs, I don't think you'll be happy with this approach (especially if you're in a hurry), even if it does save you the fee of a designer or NA. These fees would be but a small percentage, of the total outlay for a project like this and wouldn't be the wisest place, to cut cost corners.

 

Sheesh, one gives a bunch of ideas away in a supposed collaborative forum and just gets negative feedback. Odd....

Motor: based on my primitive wysiwyg math skills, using carbon fiber reduces 30% + of the weight. I ain't no physicist but my guess is when you put big propulsion behind small weight it goes fast. Correct me if I am wrong.

Hull: flat water, flat bottom boat, light weight, big power = go fast

Narrow multi hulls, wide breadth, = stability

Home: I never wanted to build one.

Solar: 6kw in 400 square feet .... Go long way without fossil fuels.

Plumbing: some decent ideas for composting toilets in the sheit

Throwing good money after bad: sorry I don't want to sit around listening to the waves slap against aluminum. (Plus stigma) Wood is pretty but high maintenance. Steel is heavy.

Engineering: Nice sales pitch. I thought we were collaborating?

 

You say them pontoon boat down in FL got a certain "stigma"? LOL.

Do pontoon boats attract rednecks like mobile homes attract tornadoes?

Carbon fiber? Around here the "tuners"(guys with Japanese cars with fart-can exhaust and wings, etc) will buy Carbon fiber hoods (to save weight) but they also have fake "wraps". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBRt4e0t_Sw

They also sell fake "body armor vests" that look like Body Armor but isn't. No, not that motorcycle crash protection armor..... faux bullet proof vest "body armor". Mostly sold to "outlaw bikers" (illegal for convicted felons to wear real body armor). Hey, what could possibly go wrong? (nothing! what would be "wrong" about a convicted felon obviously still up to no good being shot through his fake body armor?)

As far as cutting down the wave slap noise- I knew a guy who like to fish in an aluminum runabout, but hated the wave slap noise. So he got a bunch of plastic fake basket wave material and hung it all around when stopped and said it worked fine.

Try looking at Duck Hunting boat blind materials. Should have stuff meant to sit in water around the boat that will have the side effect of quieting those little slappy waves. http://www.cabelas.com/category/Waterfowl-Blinds-Concealment/104680980.uts

Only one drawback: The ONLY thing with more "stigma" and guaranteed to attract even more rednecks than a pontoon boat in Florida is a pontoon boat in Florida in duck hunting camo!

 

Exactly --

So here's my latest... rather incomplete, but a step in the right direction:

 

Since there was little-to-no interest in my google docs, I removed them from public view. If anyone has an interest, let me know.

 

I assume the claimed 30% weight reduction would be for the bare hull, not the total boat. What portion of the entire boat weight is the bare hull. If it is 20% then total boat weight would be reduced by 6%, not 30%.

 

Well said on the savings. Clearly can't make the glass, motors, batteries, & solar cells out of carbon fiber.

Motors: 72 lbs each @ 90kW each, for 180kW continuous (400kW total peak power).
http://www.yasamotors.com/products/yasa-750/

Prop & other propulsion gear: 30 lbs

Batteries: Homegrown, cell-based, 900 lbs for 100 KW

Tempered glass: 32,400 square inches of 1/8", double glaze, tempered glass = 730 lbs

Hulls: 24' x 3.5' x .5' (average dimension of each hull) = 252 square feet carbon fiber with ?? core. 2 lb / square? (I have no idea.. just guessing) 504lbs each

Fridge: 10 lbs

Head: 50 lbs (edited, forgot a 0)

http://www.homedepot.com/p/Sun-Mar-...-Toilet-System-in-Bone-CENTREX-1000/203503046

Electronics: 500 lbs

Solar panels: 500 lbs

Misc gear: 500 lbs

Looks about right for a 6% weight savings, not 30%.