Sunday, May 08, 2005

Question/Comment from a reader

The following is a comment from Squid, a member of the forum at www.bateau.com

The picture Squid's referring to is shown earlier in the blog, but you can click here for a direct link to the picture.



---Begin original comment---
[S]hure looks like a flat bottomed boat at the transome end. How do you think it will handle in the chop and wind. I know they have wind in Iowa. I am interested in building this boat but will wait till you have yours done and can tell me how it handles. Squid.
---End original comment---

This is a valid point, and one that I honestly hadn't considered. But even if I had, this boat actually belongs to my friend Greg, so I didn't have much input on which plans were actually purchased. I'm just the first mate. (Call me Gilligan.) Now that the point is brought up though, here's my take.

You're absolutely correct, this is a flat-bottomed boat. The result is that it will probably rock-n-roll a little more in choppy water, but I wouldn't worry about that a whole lot. It's going to be a big, heavy boat, so I suspect that it'll take quite a bit to make the boat roll excessively. As far as the wind goes, I don't think it'll be a huge factor. The rear transom isn't much different from your standard power boat, so I suspect the amount of surface area that the wind could catch is probably comparable to a standard displacement hull. The front transom is relatively small, so I don't see wind as a factor here either, and the same goes for the sides. Besides, it's not like we're rowing this big-ass boat. Greg's going to put in a couple of big motors to do the work for us.

In short, the only way I see wind being a factor is when the wind causes waves on the water, in which case the boat will probably rock a bit more than a displacement hulled boat.

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