How exclusive a club?

I was wondering how many amateurs design and build their own boat. I'm sure hundreds, if no thousands, of boat kits are sold. But a certain percentage of them never get launched. I know an even greater number of plans are sold, but probably even less of these get launched. I've designed my own boat and am near enough to completion that there is no question it will get finished this summer, if not this week. I've been telling people at work that more people have climbed Everest, but this forum makes me wonder. How many amateurs design a boat for themselves and then actually build it?

 

Perhaps more interesting would be how much any boat whether handmade or purchased is actually used. I have seen estimates that are as low as twice a year! That's a lot of wasted time and money for such occasional use....

Porta

 

Portacruise
There was an interesting statistic floated around Southern California years ago about boat usage in the typical marina.
1. The owners of 50% of the boats rarely if ever even came down to their boat and the boat never left the slip.
2. The owners of 25% of the boats would visit their boat a couple of times per year and the boat might leave the slip once or twice per year.
3. The owners if 15% of the boats regularly came down to their boat but the boat still rarely left the slip.
4 The remaining 10% of boats were actively used and left their slip several times per month.
Don't have a source that I can point too. This is just an old recollection.

There was a study done in Dana Point several years ago during the County's planning for redevelopment of the marina that recorded the types of boats that were actually being used in the harbor. The study found that the majority of the boats by a large percentage were small boats, i.e. canoes, dinghies, kayaks and small fishing boats. The study is probably available online but I didn't take the time to search for it.

Interesting.
Chuck

 

Define "amateur" and "design". Really. What do you think makes the line between a "professional" and an "amateur"? Is a fisherman with 20 years of experience an "amateur designer"? Is he a "designer" if there were no plans or calculations and it was built by eye? Is an old fisherman that builds skiffs on the beach for other fisherman a "professional"? Is a PE Naval Architect who designs nuclear submarines by day and builds a 3 sheet dory for his boys to play with in a pond an "amateur"?

Many, many different shades of grey here, and as Chuck and Porta pointed out, how many boats get used depends on where you are and what boats you are looking at. I would hazzard to say than in the 3rd world, most boats are built by people without formal education but with apporpriate knowledge for the vessels use. I would also hazzard to say that those vessels get used more than 1st world boats designed by degreed experts for mass consumption and stamped out by skilled workers in factories.

 

Why don't you call your state DMV and ask how many are registered as homebuilt? I would guess there are tens of thousands in Florida at any one time.

 

20 hours of use per year for the average pleasure craft under 30'. This number drops a tad each year.

Statistics are very misleading, mostly because of how big the USA is. Some areas have a much higher use percentage then others.

As a rule home built craft don't ever see a launching day. A very high percentage of home built, lay in a car port until the house is sold, then dragged to the land fill unfinished.

As to amateur designers, I'll take John's view in that this is way too broad or unrefined a question for anything more then supposition.

 

I'd define an amateur designer/builder the same way I'd define an amateur athlete. If you take money for it, you aren't an amateur. I'd define an amateur builder as one that doesn't build boats with the purpose of selling them for a profit. At one time, many fishermen built their own boats, but I doubt if many do today. It makes more sense to buy one. And I guess I'd call an amateur designer one who has never received money for designing boats.
I'm not interested in whether people use their boats, only if they actually designed and built a boat. This is a boat design forum, not a boat use forum. I'm a baker in a grocery store. I have no formal training in boat design. I've paddled many boats, did some reading, bought a CAD program and fooled around with it till I had the hang of it, designed a completely original design, not another one like it anywhere, and except for having someone cut the hull panels on a CNC router, I have done all the work myself and it is going to get finished. I've never even heard of someone doing that, but I live in Colorado. Now, how many bakers, accountants, auto mechanics, etc. have drawn up an original design, not a copy of someone else's design, and built that boat from scratch. I'd venture to say, not many, but how many is not many? And again, we aren't talking about people that have just built a boat, or people that have just designed a boat, only people who have designed a boat and then built that same boat themselves. Do you know anyone that doesn't work in the marine trades who has done that?

 

There's at least two in your club, I know another Baker that designed & built his own boat, although now he works in boat repair, seems Bakers like mixing up stuff!

 

If his baking job is like mine, it gets very repetative and, because bakers start so early, we are working alone quite a bit, so you have a lot of time to think. I do my best thinking at work.

 

...from observation in Brisbane, and previously in Sydney, it is a very small percentage that regularly use their boats, we do see here more home built than in Sydney, possibly because Brisbane is where the Sydney people end up in time, and with the end of their working days, start to play with the things they always dreamed of.....bad news mostly, many crappy stitch and glue and frightful designs...but always a source of entertainment.
I guess without some of the radical people there would be nothing to talk about on the net.....

 

...I remember one old Polish fella in Sydney, about 20 years ago, set his mainsail the wrong way around, spent many weeks sailing every day, guess he read a book one day and put the luff up the mast.......now that really had the tongues waggin.

 

The other definition is what do you call 'design', and how complex and big a boat.

eg
Under 16ft

Class A) - competently built, competent designs - of every 100 plans purchased, 25 buy the materials, 5 are finished and launched

Class B ) Competently assembled, 'self designed' rowing or sailing vessels , that actually look competent, and have documented long term usage.

Class C) Competently assembled, 'off the cuff' designed rowing/sailing vessels under 16ft - there are dozens of these in the forum, some look quite respectable, and all the owners report great performance

Class D) Incompetently assembled, 'off the cuff' (rough as guts) raft, tin or canvas canoes thrown in the water, badly finished, scrap plywood and timber, badly painted and tried out - there are hundreds reported in this forum, 20% made the water. Various reports of deaths over the years, and not many ongoing reports on the usage.

Then we can use these same categories for

Under 26ft -

Under 36 ft -

Over 36 ft - there are are a few larger vessels that have been documented in the Class C ( see "Naval Architects are a waste of Money"), a lot made in Ferro Concrete or Steel.

The list is endless, the permutations infinite.

To 'self design' depends whether you want to spend your hard earned money and valuable spare time for the joy of painfully gained experience.

You did do an apprenticeship in your trade I take it ? I recommend you build a few small, professionally designed craft first, before you try the hard stuff.

 

http://forum.woodenboat.com/showthr...have-designed-and-built-their-own-small-boats

So far there have been 86 replies to this thread.

 

Yup - looks about right - lots of Class C boats there, several Class B.

A few are admitting to Class D boats