Ebb -Originally Posted by ebb
60-65 cu/ft is what I am going for in the amount of foam alone.
Jim Baldwin is an extremely thorough person, one who I admire for many reasons. If you read his "IN SEARCH OF THE UNSINKABLE BOAT" article, his figures come out to ~.89 cu/ft of foam per 100 lbs displacement to keep his boat floating with decks awash. Add 10% to that (for ease, and safety, and perhaps differences in the amounts of materials which make up an Ariel vs a Triton), and you have 1 cu/ft per 100 lbs displacement. Thus, my ballpark figure of 60-65 cu/ft for an Ariel loaded with 1,000-1,500 lbs of stores and gear. I will also test this*.
Like Jim (and I have discussed this with him on the phone), I will have watertight lockers which will provide the additional flotation needed to keep the decks from being awash, ideally to actually float them slightly above the surface. The lockers will also serve to keep water from flooding into the boats interior, since they will directly cover probably well over 75% of the area of the hull which can be holed. They will serve as small sealed crash bulkheads, water which gets past the hull and enters them will be able to go no farther, or, if it does, at a vastly reduced rate of flow.
The way I am building in the interior of the boat also makes it so that any water which does get inside will be confined to a small narrow space until it is 3' deep or so. This will keep it from sloshing side to side, making the boat roll-y. With an interior which makes any water very noticeable and confines it to a large degree, and a high capacity bilge pump to get it out, I should be able to deal with all but total, unstoppable calamity.
If that happens, well, it must just be "My Time To Go", and there isn't much I can do about *that*.
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*Once I get it all built in, I will sink my boat.
Yes, you read that right. Out in the Bay, on a calm summer day and over a shallow sandbar, with a *very* high capacity pump to do both the filling and the emptying, I am going to see with my own eyes if and how she rides when full of water. That will be a fun and interesting day.
I'll measure and double- and triple-check everything beforehand, but if it all seems right, then that's the last logical step. And of course I'll post *those* pictures.
PS - "I agree, "My Old Man and The Sea" was a great book. I read it the summer after my father died. Bummer, that, and it made the tale even more poignant.
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