Knome,
No need to apologize for the debate.I'm sure there has been some interest in reading the comments.I have to some extent,but I am a skeptic of number crunching and reference books.Don't get me wrong,I believe there is value in both.It's just that I've worked for years with a major corporation as kind of liason between engineering and maintenance.I can't tell you the number of times I've sat in meetings and listened to engineers explain why something wouldn't work because "the numbers didn't support it." After much debate,we sometimes went forward anyway and found that it did work. It's not that their numbers were wrong,it's just that sometimes they would miss certain aspects of an application because they simply weren't aware of it.On the other hand,I've heard tradesmen challenge the numbers,and they were wrong.When the two couldn't come to an agreement,my team leader usually left the decision up to me. When he did,I usually fell back to this scenario on how I would make my decision. If it was a totally new design,with no data to support it's capability, then I would rely on the engineers. If we weren't re-designing the wheel,I would rely on the tradesmen. In the case of ferro-cement boats,I think the "proof in the pudding" would fall to the tradesmen,which in this case is the owners of the boats.I mean after all, some CEO sitting behind the desk chewing the fat cigar has already made the tough decision some time back to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars to tool up a process to build these types of boats.At that time,I'm sure the decision was made based on the number crunching,and conferring with available experts concerning the technology. In essence, the boats were built and regardless of what the numbers or experts now say, the only thing we as sailors are concerned with is whether the boats are worth spending our hard earned money for them? For me to make that decision,I would want as much available input as possible from people that have actually owned and sailed the boats. Now,I am the one that must apologize for rattling on
