NEVER GIVE IN !

[ebb]

One of the line of boats on the west side of the yard literally bit the dust last week. I noticed something was up when the scavengers mysteriously appeared like yellow-jackets on a drumstick at a picnic.

While not in bad shape at all, the long deep keeled Columbia 27 had been sitting there all the time 338 has been there - waiting for its projects to begin again. Gone.

There are too many other abandoned dreams in the yard. Four or five have gone thru lien sales and been chain sawed and crushed. Each has been worthy of rebuilding, but now they insult the landfill. I hooked up the extension cord and joined the other vulchurs with my tired Makita sawsall with the dull demolition blade that kept vibrating out of the tool. I violated the molded cockpit coaming with the same kind of impersonal purpose you see liposuction surgeons sweep the fat out of middle-aged bellys.

I got the four bronze jam cleats. passing up the South Coast winches and cast bronze brackets, and gave $20 to the harbor master. Haven't recovered. Good ale didn't help. When I came back a few days later, the boat had never been there, and another project was in its place. Haven't looked at the cleats still frozen to chunks of fibreglass and plywood.


Another Solstice. Happy Solstice everybody !
The days are getting longer again. Listen to your Commanders and Ariels as they whisper to you of projects and petting long forgotten.

"Never give in, Never give in,
never, never, never, never -
in nothing, great or small,
large or petty - never give in
except to convictions of honor
or good sense." W. Churchill

Harrow 10/29/41 (address in its entirety):D

[marymandara]

It's funny you mention this, Ebb...

We had a fellow consign an entire Cascade 29 worth of pars with us last summer...while I do not think that the C-29 is a particularly spiffy boat, I hated to see the inevitable Demo job happen...ended up selling the bare hull to a guy who really wanted one for 50 bucks. Hopefully he does something with her and does not give up, but...

Last night Jess and I noticed a new and distubing feature of an old woody that is sitting on a bunk next to our building. She's a full-bore rotbox, beyond the scope of all but the most dedicated and loving of talented persons, but there is something really noble about her in her honest simplicity...plywood hull with carvel-planked mahogany bottom, very spartan, galvy hardware. A real shame, someone built the little gal with a lot of skill and love from inside, and she has that feel of having been well-used and well-loved at one point. (There's a beautiful H-28 ketck next to my building that's well on the way to the point of this one, too.)...so, the alarming feature? Suddenly all of the shrouds and stays are dead slack, and with each puff of wind--it was fairly still, but it has been pretty windy all week and is now--the keel-stepped mast waffles and wavers in the breeze. Hmmm...the forward pads of the bunk are right parallel with the mast, and they are suddenly pushing up concave into the hull. Something has finally let go, the hull has racked, and the mast dropped down. I am off in a bit to hand in the bid to do the demo. It will truly be with more than a small bit of sadness that I crush her up. At the least, I will take the time to do her mainly by cutting so I can save everything that someone else's boat may use, little as it is...kinda like she had an organ-donor card, y'know?

It's always sad to see a good boat die. Even this simple little thing...no one builds boats with that kind of care anymore--at least not small, simple boats.

Save 'em.

Dave

[Tony G]

Dave
I nearly bought this one last spring. If I hadn't bought an old derilect of an Ensign the year before I surely would have. Hinckley pilot 35 hull number 1. Yeah. talked to the folks at Southwest Harbour and gleaned a little info. The first seven were made of wood, and I wanter her really bad. But, no survey in the last eight or ten years and out of the water for about twenty I think. It's sad but I'm sure she went to the landfill.

[marymandara]

That's the trouble, you know, is that we can't save 'em all.

Some people in this world might be interested in making a hobby or a business out of collecting project boats until they can find homes, but it isn't me...or most people for that matter.

My thought, though, is this:
Ebb is on the right track. If you see a boat on its' way to going "crunch", snag any and every part off of her that you can afford to. Sometimes it's a matter of handing the Demo guy a 20 so he'll wait an hour while you cut like mad. Sometimes, it's free.

Take everything that is unusual or usable, or cool that you can, even if you do not need it. Give it to someone who does, or consign it at the seajunk store, sell it on e-bay or ship it out here and I'll do that for you...it doesn't matter, but what is important is to get the parts to those who need them for another boat. It's not for nothing, that way...and you may pick up a few bucks to compensate for your time and sawzall blades. We've gotten some pretty nice notes from a couple of fellows who have bought parts from us just to say that they appreciated being able to find this-or-that at all, or that they loved the little interior locker vent with the hand-carved, pierced motif and that they were amazed anyone had bothered to get it out before the boat went away.

The ones that really kill me are things like the H-28 ketch I mentioned...the thing sat in the harbor for a couple of years with a pump cycling every few hours to keep it afloat, until the port stuck a pay-up-or-else sign and a coincidental we-don't-want-it-sinking-here-so-get-it-outta-here sign as well. Guy who owns her lives in the midwest. She ended up in the yard where we are after that, and there she sits, slowly rotting away to the point of no return...she's pretty close now. I don't think the fellow has even seen the boat in who knows how long--belonged to uncle Fred or whoever...Fred's pushing up daisies and left the boat to the fellow owns it, who thinks he has the Queen Mary and won't sell her to anyone for any sum (and people have indeed inquired). It will be a big surprise the day the yard has to call him and say that the boat is structurally failing to the point of being a hazard in the yard, and would he like to arrange for transport elsewhere (Hmmm...how WILL the boat look after the hydraulic trailer is done with her?) or pay X money for demolition and disposal.

The hardware, though...is outstanding.<G>(rrrRRReeeEEEnnNNGGG---Ding-ding-Ding....)

Dave

[tpalmer]

What is it about old boats, old cars...even an old house that draws some of us into the abyss. I can't drive by an old boat on a trailer (with flat tires and pine needles all over it) without thinking about checking it out. Is there a diamond-in- the- rough under the tarp?

I have an old rental house which the last tenants trashed. I decided to refinish the floors. There was something about turning a scarred stained floor into thing of beauty. Of coarse I made mistakes and it wasn't perfect. But after finishing the floors I was able to raise the rent and had to turn people away who got mad because I rented it to someone else.

[ebb]

It's loveliness increases, it will never
Pass into nothingness..." Keats, Endymion

You study the lines of these 25 to 35 footers clamped in their stands. The poor Columbia really wasn't as cute as the Ariel, not as well proportioned as an H-28, I'm sure.

Somehow you hope the attractive ones are favored and will go on forever giving an eyeful of joy - and give the skipper a magic transcendence from the gloom bekoning on the shore.

I can see it may have been better to be attacked by marina sharks and crunched by orcas than to pass passive and wounded into nothingness for lack of a bit of love and attention.

A pretty boat is as good an invention of the human spirit we'll ever have. It is a weird excess to abandon a boat. You won't get a seat in that big clam shack in the sky for that insult. And I'm thinking I'll not be happy with those jam cleats off a damned unlucky little ship.

[marymandara]

On those jam cleats?

I think you should likely find you are pleased...if not, I don't know it would be because of where they came from.

Actually, I think it's good luck to use something of a dead boat--that way it was saved and although the main of the boat is gone, some part of her still carries ahead...sort of the organ-donor idea.

Jessie is keeping a diary of where we got what...and from whom, and with spaces for where we put it in the boat. Takes it all real serious, hull numbers, boat names, the works.

We have a few bits from Cascade 29 hull#8, AVALON, a factory magazine rack from Commander #280 ( still living), some bit or other from Pearson 30 #368, WINDSWEPT aboard whom I grew up( I do hope windy is still living, too)...parts from Triton #100, who is becoming Tim Lackey's Triton Daysailor, Parts from various other Tritons--all cataloged, of course--a couple of very special bits from CPete, parts from Tony G's DREAM WEAVER, a pair of winches from an ill-fated little Ranger 23 named BOHICA that I rebuilt years ago and sold only to get the 'opportunity' to pull salvage from her later, some goods from an ill-fated Pearson 26, and a set of bunkboards, head door and latch, and framed mirror from a sadly doomed 71-year-old seiner named Kathy Ann---and are large enough (the bunk boards) to yield all of my interior trim for the main salon. Oh...a teak TP holder from a very sad story of a Catalina 30-something that broke anchor in a windstorm last year and blew across the bay before breaking up on the beach. By the time we got there all the other vultures had picked her clean...but we got the TP holder! Every time I...well, I'll think of a Catalina!<GGGG>

Dave

[ebb]

I see your point of view. Keeping a log of ressurected bits is unique in itself and honors the fallen. I'll do the same.

This is, afterall, the age of recycling. Most of the boat stuff is dragged over to a marine flea market - income for the scavenger, and the lucky buyer gets a treasure.

It is just that one moment the boat was a possibility and the next just a carcass. Little 338 sits there in that yard anxiously waiting for me. The harbor master is a dangerous man. Miss my rent and 338 would be rubble, quick as flicking a switch.

November/December, the end of the year, brings the cold. It brings the rain. The hills are green once more. It's renewal time, of breathing in again. Solstice is an inevitable planetary switch. Sometimes it seems there is too much death around, far too easy. And the passing of all boats and all of us inevitable.

But the jam cleats will live on.

It is interesting to hear that the Catalina had a factory installed ToothPick holder, in teak too. All us scavengers should keep a supply of toothpicks!

[drm901]

For those that don't know, there is a newsletter (and web site) that offers the boat yard a chance to get a few $$ back, and save a great old boat. http://www.by-the-sea.com/ has the on-line version of the long running newsletter. If you see an old Bone Yard Boats.

And if you are looking for a classic boat for nearly nothing (and sometimes free), consider rescuing one for your self. I hope to do that when I get to retirement age.

[marymandara]

Well, the log of ressurected bits was Junior's idea, but I like it.

My proudest score are actually special secret bits from CPete, followed by the mahogany from Kathy Ann and the cool stuff from Tony G., (Psst...I got da goods from Tony G. Lessgo<G>), and of course the Borregard hatch if it should become available.

Since we are way into left field here, I'll tell you about Kathy Ann.
In a lot of ways, I think Alberg's honest little boats (he was once quoted as saying he wouldn't design anything he wouldn't personally go out in adverse weather aboard!) have a lot more in common spiritually with a workboat than a yacht...so you see why I care so much about some stuff off a fishboat.

Kathy Ann was a sixty-odd-foot seiner built in the late 1920's or thereabouts. The yard owner looked with sadness at the hulk the day the environmental salvage folks pulled the barge alongside the wharf with the stinking and waterlogged hulk on deck. Apparently she'd been kept perfect, well-maintained, neat as a pin for many years. Indeed, she had been a graceful boat, all 60-odd feet of her...then the owner died, his kids took to working her, and did nothing to repair or maintain for 5 or 6 years. There were gaping rotten chunks of sheerline with splashzone kind of mashed on in...that's just one detail but should convey the situation. The guys had been out to fish one night, moving thru fairly shallow water. Tapped a rock under her bottom, and when she flexed the transom blew straight off. Boat went down so fast they couldn't even get into the gumby suits before they all had to swim for it. They were close enough to shore they all made it--barely.

The entire interior of the boat was the most lovely african mahogany...so was all the exterior trim, albeit covered under 10 miles of brown paint. I'll not begrudge the brown paint as I strip it off the crapper door, it's the onlly reason the door is savable.
The lockset and hinges are wonderful bits of bronze, equally paint encrusted. It did have some sweet louvers, but someone broke them out to get the door open once the boat was raised...not too hard to repair, though.

The whole galley was solid mahogany...cupboard doors, drawer fronts, dinette table. All of it was ruined by the flood of diesel and battery acid that came up from the engine hole and stripped off the varnish, from the salt water she sat in for a few weeks, from the fact that no one got at it with fresh to even try for a save as she sat by the seawall at a crazy angle with a zillion jacks propping her and caution tape festooned around. I'd have loved to have saved the table to re-make into ours...thinking about all of the many meals that had been shared there, with laughter, bickering, trepidation (is this gonna be our last?), all the finances the skipper must have sweated seated there alone, etc...the business of running a boat. Too Bad.

Amazingly, the brown paint saved the door. 'Twas a smallish, low-bridgfe kind of door, so all I have to do is trim it down and it's a Triton head door. Amazing.

The mirror on the bulkhead, I almost missed...but the silvering had not been corroded (protective film of diesel) and the water must have washed thru in some way that saved the varnish from the acid when all those 8-D's ralphed out. I couldn't get the two little nails that held it to let go without mangling the frame, so I skilsawed out the bulkhead around it!

The bunk boards down in the folks'l were things of pure beauty. a small bit of them along the bottom edge was gotten to, but they had been varnished so well and so many times over the years that they made it. Think about what must have gone thru the mens' heads a few nights when the weather was bad...it's probably not too different than what goes thru the head of a guy in a Triton in a bad stretch of ocean who knows that there is no one remotely close to help if it all goes south and that the fate of everyone aboard is pretty much up to the boat. They're about 1-3/4xx 8"x 8'! Outstanding.

The foreman of the Demo crew was more than happy to let me go aboard with the requisite two boatbags of destructiveness to get what I'd like...he was glad some of her could be saved, too.

My thought is that the spirit which is present in an old boat is a combination of the natural forces she lives right in--the heartbeat of the earth--and the little bits of spiritual detritis left behind by those who've worked, played and lived aboard her...so that she genuinely has a life of her own, so long as she lives. Somehow, a little bit of Kathy Ann and a teeny bit of all the men who bravely worked her will now go with us, and I like that a lot.

She went down really fast when they got to her with the excavator...the usual drill, to pump out the bilge, remove batteries, engines, and tanks...let the vultures get what they'd like and remove the big stuff like the aluminum drum and the mast that folks bid to get...then the excavator moved in, and that was it. We stopped work when I heard the excavator fire up, and we all went out to watch. Jess looked like she would cry, truthfully, and after a bit I had to turn and walk away. In an hour, she was a pile of broken wood and mangled junk, and in two days she was a memory, save for a rusty and ruined 6-71 that will never run again sitting up on timbers by the seawall.

Since I am rambling....

There's another sad one that came up yesterday, a 30-foot wood sloop in the yard. Another of those with little in the way of nice parts to yield and not much money to be made upon her...it's mainly galvanized and mainly junk. I actually met an older fellow last summer who had driven by and seen our Triton from the road who had once owned her...then traded her off to by a Triton way back when. Used to run several fishboats out of here until the fisheries all got so bleak and he moved to Maine to run a few lobsterboats he bought. Nice guy.
The fellow who worked on her so hard in the yard for so long...got too old and sick to keep going. His disability check couldn't keep up with everything and the yard fees piled up. Enthusiastic and talented young 20-something finish carpenter showed up and was given the boat in exchange for paying off the yard. Never paid it all off, and as he worked away he found more and more work to do...near every frame rotten for the upper 8" or so, and that was the beginning. We saw less and less of him after a while...this is the way with rotting old wooden boats. I'll be salvaging off of her in January by the look of it.

This little Monk-looking boat I have to do away with here. Again, she was simple and honest...someone obviously had the dough to build her/have her built, but spent his limited funds on good-grade materials and just fitted her out with galvanized hardware. (Seems like such common-sense judgement has gone the way of those people, doesn't it?)
Down below, even though she is bleak , wet and abandoned, you can tell someone cared. Someone sailed the crap out of her, treated her with love and respect. No doubt he went on from our world and someone bought or inherited with best of intentions and zero understanding...and there she went, slowly dying herself. Simple, honest, noble little boat...plywood topsides and decks with carvel-planked mahogany bottom and an incredible solid mahogany house. Not one but two huge galvanized gas tanks in a 24-foot boat---someone went places in her, I'd think.
Nice little iron cookstove below, I'm sure that she was snug, cheery and dry. All over now. She had a graceful, shallow, well-turned bilge and keel and a belly of iron pigs...she looks sweet, not like the fancy and admittedly more handsome H-28 which looks great until you get to the big squared-off concrete ballast pig that reminds of a fine-looking woman who became a big surprise when the underwires and corset went away.
I'd be sad in ways to hack on the H-28 (which I imagine I will someday), but all that chromed bronze would pay for a new mainsail for me. This little boat I speak of is one I look at with a much deeper sorrow for some reason.

We are seeing a similar thing happen with old 'glass boats now, aren't we? What really sticks in my craw is that in comparison to a hammered-out woody, there is nothing THAT hard or THAT costly about doing even a complete rebuild on a smaller 'glass boat! I think it is sad commentary on the folks who get into such a project that they get discouraged and walk away from something so much easier than what their grandfathers would have regarded--in terms of labor effort--as periodic boat maintenance.

The Ariel we all talked about that got done in...yikes. Needless.
I really worry about the Commanders out there...not a lot of people under 70 can see a Commander as what it is--it doesn't look "right" to what they've been conditioned to see. That's a real shame. For every one Ariel that goes, how many Commanders go? Spooky.Sad.

Dave

[Hull376]

I now know what you captains in cold weather cruising grounds do when you can't sail this time of year. You type! And then type some more! Xmas cruising is just getting going down here! So I'll stop typing!

[ebb]

Capt Dave,
Well spoke. Good to have a 'human face' put on the yard, which is a pretty rough place. 338 is perched on the side of a marina with a high percentage of live-aboards. Some odd job, some kibbitz, some work on engines, some tour the projects and will stop with a bon mot of their experience or a bit of news.

And the yard is the best setting for the parting. [There's some gruesome romance in driving onto a rocky leeward shore!] The noise draws the crowd of onlookers, mourners perhaps, retirees glad it isn't them, yet.

C'pete's photos of his Commander should grace the the cover of Good Old Boat. Raising the awareness of a wider audience might help save these babes. What better family day sailer can be conceived? Merely a matter of exposure. A couple of articles could make them as rare and sought after as a 50's MBZ convertable.

And there is one hell of a support group!:D

[tpalmer]

drm901,

Thanks for the lead on the web site www.by-the-sea.com. while reading it found another web site which had an interesting quote www.smallcraftadvisor.com in a review about a Flicka,

"You know the drill, drinks 6, eats 4, sails 3, sleeps 2, singlehands 1, help available for bottom painting 0." Jack & Penny Harding, Rapport 1984"

TP

[marymandara]

One interesting fact about the Ariel/Commander is that they are pretty much exactly 1/4 the size of a Triton and as best I can tell the lamination schedule is pretty much the same. The spars are the same section...Pound-for-pound, a Commander is about 4 times the butch of a Triton!

Besides being an excellent family daysailor, I think the Commander is an excellent boat for singlehanded distance work. I am of course biased, but I think the Commander actually offers the ability to carry more gear more easily than the Ariel if configured properly.

Most important, if a person shops smart, they could have a fully-rebuilt, fully-found, nothing lacking, full suit of brand new sails (if they sew them up themselves from sailrite kits) Commander ready to go anywhere a la Zoltan for well under 10K...more like 6500.00...including the cost of the boat! Maybe less, depending on the cost. Into this figure I am factoring paint, bottom job, deck recore, interior, water tankage, self-steering (WindScout), standing rig, running rig, the works. If one did not shop frugally, of course, they would spend plenty more...but you get the idea. It is very do-able. There should be at least 100 Commanders with a young person on each one out exploring themselves and the world! It is a very rare thing, a boat that can do this...so I really worry what becomes of them. Someday I'd like to find one for Jessie.

Dave

PS--I make a large part of my living on Ebay, so in these last few shipping days before Xmas I have to stay close to the computer until my shipping cutoff time...then go freeze in the shop all night.<G>

[commanderpete]

From the Feb. 1999 Good Old Boat Newsletter, by Bill Sandifer.



Boatless blues: Bill Sandifer needs help (Understanding? Compassion? An analyst?)


I've sold my good old boat. It's not funny. This is a traumatic event in the life of a sailor. Others, not so sympathetic, ask, "Well, if it's so bad, why did you do it?" The usual reasons apply such as, bigger, more headroom, more water capacity, diesel engine, and so forth, but that does not tell the whole story.

We had owned our boat, a Pearson Ariel, for nine years. Over the nine-year period, I had rebuilt every part of the boat except the hull: decks, hatches, cabintop, and maststep. All mechanical and electrical systems were rebuilt or replaced. In short, all the projects were completed and nothing was left to be done. Now, I enjoy sailing very much, but I also enjoy the satisfaction of starting and completing a project. There are only so many projects to be done on a 26-foot boat before they are all complete. My wife's answer to why we sold the boat was that there were "no projects left to do."

We had rationalized selling the boat and looked forward to finding a little larger one, but we were unprepared for the emotional impact of being boatless. Genie, (boat's name is The Genie B) cried, I felt hollow, as if I had sold my child, which in a way I had. The panic that ensued was dampened only by the application of some fine wine each evening. Once we calmed down, we discussed our feelings:



The boat sailed like a dream and always took care of us as we took care of her.
The nightly strolls down to the dock come rain, wind, cold, or fog were a highlight of the evening. It was akin to "tucking our child in for the night."
The confidence we felt in knowing all parts of the boat and knowing they were strong and tight was a great reward.
The grace and beauty of the hull lines and deck lifted our spirits.
The peace of leaving the world behind under a cloud of sail can only be understood by children and sailors (same thing sometimes, I think).
Selling a boat means parting with an object that borders on the animate. The subconscious in all of us bonds to those things we love in ways not clearly understood and when a change occurs, it is a revelation that feelings you thought you had rationalized come up to overwhelm you.

If there were any advice to the sailor in this situation, it would be to carefully evaluate your feelings before you put the boat on the block. In many ways, the feelings we develop between our boats and our psyches are stronger with a good old boat than with a new boat.

A totally new boat is clean and shiny and has yet to develop character. It usually lacks nothing and requires nothing from us other than physical operation. We may curse and swear at the trials and tribulations of good old boat ownership, but in truth, the satisfaction that we get from restoring or improving some aspect of our boat creates a bond between our boats and ourselves. We need each other in subtle and diverse ways. Everyone has the need to be needed. We have children, pets, classic cars, collections, sports teams, social groups, church friends, and acquaintances. All these people, things, and activities contribute to our feelings of satisfaction, belonging, and being needed.

I don't think it is stretching creditability to say the empty nest syndrome of children grown and moved away can similarly be applied to the boatless syndrome of all sailors. Our boats reflect our self-image. I'm a river, marsh, and gunkhole person. Others are racing people, coastal cruisers, day sailors, and bluewater voyagers. People, in their own ways, see reflections of themselves in the boat they own or are owned by. It is important to recognize the truth. In the words of Pogo, "We have met the enemy and he is us."

Some people say a person sometimes looks like his pet. Well, I've a strange looking multi-colored Australian Shepherd dog, so I'd rather be compared to my boat. Our boats are an integral part of us and our lives. It's good advice to tread lightly before we sell them. The only consolation in the sale of my good old boat is the joy and understanding with which the new owner anticipates his life with my good old boat.

Having sold my good old boat, and suffered the ills of boatlessness, the only cure is to buy another good old boat. We have, after two weeks, recovered from the trauma and selected four boats to consider. All were built by the same builder and to the same design. Two are sloop-rigged and two are ketch-rigged. Three are diesel-powered, one has no engine, and all have the larger tanks, full headroom (for a 6-ft person) and increased space we desired. The inspection trips will start shortly.

Will we be successful in our quest? I think so. Just to be on the safe side, one of the four boats I will be looking at has, to quote my wife, "been calling to me." It's the one without an engine, of course, and needs lots of TLC. It's strong and brave, but it needs me. Or maybe I need it. See what I mean? Success in this quest is guaranteed only if the next boat can make me feel needed. I can almost hear these boats talking about me now.
Bill Sandifer
Diamondhead, Miss.

Almost from the beginning Bill's been a regular writer for Good Old Boat. Among other things, he has regaled us with stories of deck delamination, tank projects, buying used sails, and using fuel and water filters. Most of the projects he's discussed were done on his Pearson Ariel. Being boatless may slow him down for awhile, but expect to hear more from Bill as soon as he's got his next fixer-upper. Frankly, we're not sure why anyone would put himself through all that. Did he REALLY say he came to the end of his project list? We didn't think that was possible on a good old boat!

[ebb]

Ariel MAYBE 3/4 the size of a Triton.
certainly not 1/4.

[marymandara]

Just to be clear, I am in no way making some sort of Jr. HS locker-room "Mine's Bigger" statement or comparison here...remember, If I hadn't HAD to get a larger boat I'd still be LIVING on a Commander.

Now, I'm making that punt based on interior hull volume and surface area...and it's a punt. There is an old rule of thumb (sort of like the general rule of thumb about 1.34 x Sq. Root WL=theoretical max. hullspeed) that with boats of similar design a 1-1/2' increase in overall length doubles the internal hull volume. The Ariel and Triton hulls are pretty similar, although the Ariel is actually much finer in the bow section and flatter along the run of the bottom. (Triton is much fuller--OK, it's FAT--forward of the beam) Since the Ariel/Commander hull is 25', 7" overall, and the Triton 28', 6"...you see where I am going based on a 2', 11" difference. Also, having worked in, on, under both I can very much buy into it!<G>

Toby and Wayne had DECISION hauled out in the same yard as our Triton, and while we did not have the boats directly alongside each other, the difference in actual size was amazing.

In terms of surface area, if we judged by bottom paint consumed I think we are actually looking at somewhere between 3-3 1/2 times below the waterline.

I originally figured on 2X in terms of time, expense, materials...and found I had vastly underestimated. Of course, once one finds that they have done so, if they are me they have just gotten so aggrevated about it all they do not bother keeping scientific track of things after making each one of those discoveries...lest they admit it to a wife once named (and fittingly so) Del Toro! (lol!)

If anyone has a gutted A/C hull, it would be fun to try and convince Tim Lackey to fill up his Triton Daysailor hull (currently dead bare and empty) with packing P-nuts, then do same to the Ariel...and compare how many x-gallon trash bags of P-nuts went in. 'Course, that's a lot of $$$ in p-nuts. Anyone run a large shipping department nearby Tim's place in Maine and/or also have access to a gutted Ariel or Commander nearby? I'm serious, here! As long as Tim didn't have to clean 'em all out and pick 'em up from all over his shop floor, he might just go for it for all I know. For that matter, mine is still empty enough that if anyone wants to come up with enough p-nuts near me, I'LL fill up MY hull, if they are willing to help get 'em all in--and more importantly--back out(!). It would really be interesting to know for sure, and might make me feel better about how long some of this is taking!

FWIW, a good friend of mine sails and lives aboard a Pearson Renegade, which is much shallower in the bilge than an Alberg boat, and much fuller in beam section above the waterline...it's large for a 27-foot boat, much larger than my friend's Albin-Vega 27, for example (and rafted next to the Vega, DECISION was pretty small). Having spent a good amount of time on the Renegade, and having rafted a Commander to it on several occasions, I'll say this: If you cut off the keels and rudders, you could actually put the Vega INSIDE the Renegade hull. If you put the Commander inside there, it would RATTLE. Jay did have his boat on the hard right next to mine...and while it is much fuller in some sectional aspects, the Renegade is notably smaller than the Triton.

At one point I really wished for a spiffy deal on a 30 foot Pearson Coaster. Boats are rare as hen's teeth. Looked pretty hard for one, and only after ending up with the Triton I met a fellow who had just gotten a fully-equipped and well-kept Coaster out of someone's back yard for less than 4 grand...and less than 100 miles away from me! That weighed on me quite a bit from time to time until the day last summer that I was taking all of the bottom paint off our boat with a 6" DA and an 8" vertical polisher...under a boat completely sealed to the ground with heavy visquene and duct tape...in a Tyvek suit...in the sun...on an 80-degree day. At that point I decided that I was very glad the boat wasn't ONE SQUARE INCH BIGGER!

Seriously, bring on those p-nuts! As soon as I get out all of the vertical bracing I had to stick in to hold shape while recoring, the remains of the interior will all go away in short order and I think it would be fun to actually do.

Dave

[Mike Goodwin]

IF the Ariel was 1/4 the size of the Triton , it would displace 1732lbs , not 5120.
The Ariel is more like 3/4 the size of the Triton or 73% to be exact.

[marymandara]

Oh No!
This box packed by weight, not by volume. Some settling of the contents may occur!

[ebb]

Captains.
BACK OFF! Looking at the lines of a boat (take my favorite page in the Manual, pg 144) there is enough information there of the shape and the volume of the A/C. to start a website. NO? There's no formula for that?

You mean in this computer age there is no program that will instantly give the volume with all that information? Sure there is! Who's got it? For actual estimated volume you subtract the hull thickness, an estimate of the volume of plywood, cockpit, and the ballast. BAM! Triton vs A/C No arguement. Just beer, no peanuts.

Displacement is a problem here, Suppose I add a 1000 lbs of lead under the cabin sole - which isn't going to take up that much volume. You might end up with almost the same three dimensional space inside but the displacement would be 6200 lbs, whatever. Right? Talking about party room, not how low in the water the vessel is.

Happy New Year!

[marymandara]

But Ebbbbb.....

I wanna fill up my Triton hull with p-nuts. Then your Ariel! More fun that way!

Dave

[mrgnstrn]

I think I got lost in the shuffle. Is the question at hand the volume of the boat below the waterline, or the volume of the boat upto the top of the cabin top?
the former is pretty easy (64lbs h2o/cuft.)
so ~6000/64 = 93.75 cuft. below the waterline. and i think this is somewhere on the lines drawing.

[marymandara]

Internal volume of the hull up to the deck clamp, was where I was going with it...but then that also leaves the question of whether the old rule of thumb in question is including the entire belowdecks volume in "...the internal volume of the hull is doubled..."

Dave

[glissando]

If you can find accurate information regarding the prismatic coefficient of either--or both--designs, you can easily figure the relative volume to an extent that will quelch this pointless debate.

However, I've not seen this figure for these boats, so have no idea. FWIW, interior volume is typically affected more by increases in beam than length. With only a 3" difference in beam between the A/C and Triton, we're not looking at an exponential difference in volume.

[ebb]

The pointlessness of this thread generates pointless remarks.:

An attempt to find the prismatic coefficient for the A/C

Cp = displacement / 64 / midship area X LWL
5280 / 64 / 7 X 18.5
82.5 / 129.5 = .637

I read that the ideal should be around .56
What they're doing is dividing the real volume of the hull under water by the volume of the prism that is rectangular at the waterline and pointy at the lowest point in the water. A box sitting in the water rates the number 1. The smaller the number the faster the boat, .48 to .65 (D. Dix) So what this boy came up with seems too stodgy for a hull that sometimes exceeds other formulas designating hull speed.

7 square feet I came up with for the midship section below the waterline.
by guesstimating off the lines from the Manual. It is a T shaped area that looks vaguely like a wine glass where the stem joins the bowl, with thw bowl cut off and no foot. 'Prismatic' refers to the vaguely inverted trianglar shape of this section.

[ If you seriously wanted the area of this piece for the formula above, you'ld blow up the lines to scale, inch per foot is easiest, then you'ld cut the section out, cut it into pieces and assemble it onto one inch squares. This would be square foot area in scale. I didn't go this far. That would be pointless.]

For example, if I measure across the section at the waterline, I get approx 6 7/8s inches. or 6' 10 1/2". When I measure up to the waterline from the bottom of the keel, I get 3 3/4s of an inch or 3' 9". Give or take the thickness of a line, and the distortion from the copying process.

Cp does not produce any numbers related to real volume, it suggests relationship between displacement, waterline beam, and how pointy the ends of the boat are. Cp is a number used to compare boat shapes. The high number is rather disappointing and my name isn't Carl.:confused:

[ebb]

and methods to solve the volume question.

In the lists of formulas and lessons "in artistry & proportion" to be learnt at a yacht design school, there is a lesson on "Use of Space" but nothing on the actual volune of a craft. If there is a method of predicting where the waterline will be in a design using weight of ballast and materials, then there must be a simular equation for just how much force it would take to immerse the vessel up to it's sheer, and for that matter over it's coach roof.

MuNaughton has an interesting lesson in "Interesting the Visual Portion of Brain with Proper Use of Strengthening and Loosening Curves" which sounds like a literal can of worms - both subjectively and pychologically.

Perhaps there could be a lesson in comparative volumes and their comfort ratios in offshore cruising, or day racing.

But I woke up this morning thinking about Capt Dave's packing peanuts method of volume determination. Ping pong balls would be more accurate because you could come up with a number for the spaces between closely packed spheres. Some may think that comparing the volumes of an Ariel and a Triton to be apples and oranges - one could tailor the method to where you are in the States.

In Maine you might use potatoes or sardines.
On the West Coast, cell phones or grapes.
In the Mid West you'ld use beer cans.

By far the simplest method is to sink the boats and measure how long it would take for them to drain in gallons per minute out a thruhull of known circumference. No brainer.

[commanderpete]

"Needs TLC"








http://www.fultoncomputer.com/cwbb/woodstruck.jpg

[willie]

You guys are great!! Snowing hard here, and not much else to do. I was thinking of horse turds here on the farm for measuring volume. I'm still back figuring out how weight relates to displacement.
Happy Holidays!:p

[ebb]

- but certainly the weight of a boat is its displacement. Boat displaces a volume of water whose weight is the same as the boat's.

Well, I did as I suggested because I knew none of you really cared what the Cp is. You rotters. Me neither, but I again woke in the middle of the night and had to do something about it. I traced the underwater athwartship portion, cut it up, pasted it onto 1" squares, came up with 8.25 square feet.
5280 (displacement) divided by 64 = 82.5 cu ft (volume of displacement)

8.25 (area of displacement in maximum cross section) times the waterline = a 'prismatic' shaped volume
which is divided into the actual volume of displacement.

The answer is .54

You will visualize the prismatic displacement if you take the maximum beam mid section at the waterline and place it at both ends of the waterline, at the bow and under the stern. It's a rectangular shape that has the same three-dimensional shape of the midsection from bow to stern. It is a volume that is only real to create the Cp. number.

Imagine a large pingpong ball. When put in the water it sinks in 1 foot and has an 18.5 foot waterline. Float another sphere of different material, it sinks in 2 feet and has an 18.5 foot waterline. Now float a third sphere that has a different diameter and floats at 3.5 feet with an 18.5 foot waterline. The prismatical shape of the spheres would all be squares (on the water surface with a U-shaped quanset hut roof like volume going from one end of the waterline to the other. Each sphere has a different displacement and a different prismatic volume. Guess which sphere will push thru the water easiest. Corse I could have toll you without all this rigamarol, It's the first and biggest sphere. It would have the smallest Cp value. [What would be the athwartsphere area at the WL of the third and smallest sphere - how like or unlike the Ariel? shape doesn't matter!]

But there is something strange here. I got more square area the second time (8.25 vs 7) and I guarantee it's pretty accurate, why did the larger area generate a smaller Cp? Supposedly, the further away from 1 the faster the boat. ???

I've had some dealings with a N.A. recently. Maybe I'll ask him. This is it for me on this eye glazer. .54 Cp sounds pretty good to me for a sailboat that has half of it's weight in lead! And any of this high-fallutin math have a form ula for the ingredible sexy underwater shape of these boats? Whatever.




As the prince said to Cinderella, "Hope the shoe fits!"

[willie]

Hey Ebb, just fyi, got a new shoe coming from a guy that had an ad in 'good old boat', parting out a Vanguard. The shoe looks identical, although it's in much better condition! And the vanguard wasn't designed by Carl. Must have just been a Pearson thing?
Anyway, thank's for offering yours, this should work great.