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Wayne.B

On Fri, 16 May 2008 07:57:02 -0700 (PDT), wrote:

On May 16, 10:49*am, Wayne.B wrote:
On Thu, 15 May 2008 05:19:04 -0700 (PDT), wrote:
The ordinary hovercraft I built was registered as a boat just because
the laws were vague and it kept me from getting harassed! I agree it
would be fun to have the winged one and mess with people! I'll tell
you, the guy that started and owns Universal Hovercraft is a real nice
guy. When I built mine many years ago, you could just call him for
advice.

What were the largest seas you were able to operate in, and was it
difficult to dock and undock in a breeze?

They are a handful until you learn and understand some things! They'll
go through some waves, but kind of run into them as opposed to over
them because they are riding on air, until the hit the wave! I've been
on Tampa Bay with mine in some decent chop no problems. I used to take
it out and actually trout fish off of it in the bay and got caught in
a pre-thunderstorm wind that churned up the bay pretty good. You don't
have to be up to go forward, you can run it like a boat, which is what
I done to get back to the ramp. To dock, I'd always get it off of lift
and dock it like you'd dock an airboat. If you're up on lift, there's
just not enough drag to manuver well. Like, if you are running along
at a good clip, and want to stop there are two ways. You can either
get off of lift, or you can turn 180 degrees (like half a donut!) and
gas it to stop forward momentum.

Interesting, thanks. We average about a 1 ft chop here on the
Caloosahatchie River and Pine Island Sound, much less than Tampa Bay
in my estimation which can get pretty rough on a windy day. I'm
thinking that the one with wings should do better in a chop but it
would also be more awkward to dock and store. With the wings you
could always lift up and over a large wake which would be an
advantage.