If I could build a boat..

[mikemenza]

Just throwing it out there..

Been thinking about the perfect boat. My favorite big boat would be a sport cruiser.. not a flybridge.. Wellcraft 42 or Searay 40 or so. The lay out is great, aft cockpit, easy water access, nice sit down helm.Very usable interior, Tunneled hulls. Sadly they are fuel pigs.

So, what if you called a big sport cruiser, a trawler and under powered it
with a couple of small diesels? Generally, they had twin 330hp mercs on gas.and did a mere 16 to 18 knots..
Any guesses how many hp to push it around well enough current wouldn't be an issue ? Maybe 8 or 10 knots on flat water..
Since it's the perfect boat, it needs batteries and solar..

What would happen if an X sized keel mast was stepped into this type of hull? There are as many 27 or 30 foot rigs and sails around to cut upon, as are there big sport cruisers with out power..
Think it'll sail? Fall over? Move at 4 knots?

Build a new wide back sailing hull with a sport cruiser top and interior..

[LoudMusic]

I think that likely they don't have the proper infrastructure to mount the standing rigging in appropriate locations and you'd end up with a lot of compromise in design and a boat that sails like a pig and motors like a slug.

[siamese]

So, you're talking about taking a planing hull, under-powering it, adding a keel, and a mast?

The short answer is, it won't work. It'll float, but will perform poorly in every way.

[Jim Cate]

If I could build a boat..

Perhaps it's a good thing that you can't... going against the accumulated wisdom of centuries of ship design and building is a risky biz, most particularly in the hands of an ignorant builder!

There are good reasons that boats look as they do.

Jim

[double u]

...you'd only just get it out of the shed yopu built it in, then a huge mob would gang together & burn the abomination at the stake!

[Kristoff21]

planing hull, under-powering it, adding a keel, and a mast?

I think you've just described a Volvo Ocean Race boat.....

[Sailordave65]

What you should do is take this sailboat Hull I have here and add your mast rigging etc. it’s a 55 foot ferro cement boat and it’s looking for a new home.

[fatherchronica]

Pretty harsh responses to a guy just thinking. I once saw a quintmaran in, I think, Oakland that was about 60 or 70 feet long with multiple decks sporting big domed skylights. No one apparently poo pooed that guys dream. This was about 40 years ago, and unless they developed that parking lot you may be able to go see it today. Around that same time I wanted to be a yacht designer. I was young and a new homeowner, father and boat owner, and couldn't afford Westlawn, but there was a new cutrate kid on the block, Yacht Design Institute, with several famous designers, including Ted Brewer on staff. My first design, the DS 31 was to be constructed of cold molded wood over a core with curved Nomex interior surfaces to be integral to the structure. Brewer personally assured me that my hull had merit but my scantlings and materials had no place in the nautical world, particularly Nomex honeycomb, which I had bought a little bit of from the Lockheed Skunkworks scrap pile to play with on the advice of an aerospace engineer friend. Then I designed a 45 foot sled , they would call it now, using the basic idea of a pointy wind surfer hull as my inspiration. I was told by Brewer again in a scathing letter that I had no talent for yacht design as he knew it. I quit ordering more chapters lessons at that point. I stillhave some old friends who when they introduce me to their maritime buddies tell them that I designed Open class hulls 20 years before they became common place. Small reward, but I did eventually design and build my 12' nesting sailing dinghy that rows and motors like a champ. Even Kon Tiki was someone's dream, and proved something whatever that turned out to be, to at least Thor Heyerdahl.