On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 00:55:35 -0000, "
wrote:

Why put up with a boat that has a designed-in flaw of being more stable
upside-down than rightside-up?

All big ships are that way. None of them ever came back from a
capsize. I take that back, some submarines are big ships, and they are
self righting. Of course, they prefer to be submerged under extreme
conditions. WWII German subs used to get totally submerged by waves,
when on the surface. Lookouts had to hold their breath for a good
thirty seconds. The diesels continued to run, and ears would hurt.

Casady

* Richard Casady wrote, On 8/20/2007 9:09 AM:
On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 07:56:50 -0400, Jeff wrote:

any storm that would capsize a cruising cat.

Perhaps you are underestimating to ability of a fool to do the wrong
thing at the wrong time. All the big ships will capsize, and not come
back.

Do you have a point? Are you claiming that in the history of the
world, no ship has ever survived a voyage? Of course not. The issue
is not one of possibilities, its one of probabilities.

I've never claimed its impossible to flip a cat; I've only claimed it
doesn't happen that often. And when it does, it usually turns out to
be human error, in the form of carrying way too much sail. Moreover,
the loss of life is generally low.

The self righting vessels are actually rare. During a wartime
crossing the Queen Mary came within a degree or so of going over. Wave
took out the wheelhouse windows, ninety feet above sea level. Nothing
except a submarine is immune to big waves. Of course, those things
routinely recover from sinking. I heard that ten thousand shipping
containers are lost, during storms, every year. Hit one of those with
many small craft, and you may not be concerned with capsizing.

This is another risk where cats have a large advantage - there are
numerous cases of cats surviving major damage that would sink a
monohull in minutes.

On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 13:20:50 -0000, "
wrote:

Why put up with a boat that has a designed-in flaw of being more
stable
upside-down than rightside-up?

That is nearly everything. All the ships and most smaller boats.
Subs are stable, but they mostly submerge and avoid the issue of wave
induced capsize.

Why do some manufacturers of cats claim unsinkability ?

Probably because they are.Many very small boats are. I have never
seen[1] an outboard boat that didn't have flotation. We had an sixteen
foot inboard that would sink like a rock if you flooded it, but that
is another story. All big ships sink easily and some big ship is
proving it, somewhere, most of the time. Cruise ship went down not too
long ago. Foam is cheap.
Subs are close to immune to wave caused flooding especially when down
deep. You can put holes in them, however.
The unsinkable stuff can pound on rocks until the foam is in tiny
pieces. Metal lasts a bit longer than wood under those conditions, not
that it matter in the least.

What is the big deal about sinking? Many subs do it every day with no
lasting ill effects.

1. Under twenty feet. I think it is legally required, actually. I dont
know about the larger, and triple 250's will push something big. The
biggest ones probably do sink. I am from Iowa, lakes only, waves under
four feet. They have a few ballasted sailboats that will sink. The
monohulls. We do have 35 MPH sailboats. Class A scows. 38 foot
unsinkable monohulls. Those guys like our 20 foot deep 5700 acre lake,
for the Nationals, because when[not if] they capsize there isn't space
for them to go all the way over. Masts are forty feet tall. Scows
sometimes go over and are righted without any flooding. Not so
uncommon for small planing type sailboats.

Casady

On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 09:59:15 -0400, Jeff wrote:


Perhaps you are underestimating to ability of a fool to do the wrong
thing at the wrong time. All the big ships will capsize, and not come
back.

Do you have a point?

There actually are two, the really obvious ones.

it usually turns out to be human error,

See above, about fools. Then there are good sailors who rarely make
mistakes. Sometimes one is all it takes There was the guy on the
messdeck of a big ship, in a bad storm. He opened the backing plate on
a porthole, was so horrified by what he saw that he failed to properly
secure the port. and about fifteen tons of water entered. The water
got to the engine room, drowned lots of electrics and the ship
evertually sank when it lost all engine power.

The self righting vessels are actually rare. During a wartime
crossing the Queen Mary came within a degree or so of going over. Wave
took out the wheelhouse windows, ninety feet above sea level. Nothing
except a submarine is immune to big waves. Of course, those things
routinely recover from sinking. I heard that ten thousand shipping
containers are lost, during storms, every year. Hit one of those with
many small craft, and you may not be concerned with capsizing.

This is another risk where cats have a large advantage - there are
numerous cases of cats surviving major damage that would sink a
monohull in minute

Some favor a watertight bulkhead forward on monohulls, with cargo
containers in mind. Those things can even mess up a screw on a big
ship.

"Richard Casady" wrote in message
...


Some favor a watertight bulkhead forward on monohulls, with cargo
containers in mind. Those things can even mess up a screw on a big
ship.


It is my considered opinion that all containers should be made so that they
will sink if they go aglub.

"KLC Lewis" wrote in message
news

"Richard Casady" wrote in message
...


Some favor a watertight bulkhead forward on monohulls, with cargo
containers in mind. Those things can even mess up a screw on a big
ship.


It is my considered opinion that all containers should be made so that
they will sink if they go aglub.

And I think for every container that is lost overboard the captain of
the ship should be held responsible and fined 1000 dollars. I bet that
would put a stop to it. Why is it over in China or Japan the top guy has
the blame placed on him and gets shot or has to commit suicide when he
screws up royally but in the good ole USA the top guy, no matter how
badly he screws up, always manages to blame it on an underling who then
takes the fall?

Wilbur Hubbard

On Sat, 18 Aug 2007 19:01:10 -0400, "Wilbur Hubbard"
wrote:



Actually, I'm doing just the opposite. I'm currently having a yacht
built that is stout enough to survive the worst hurricane ever imagined
and the worst seas it can produce. It consists of a 90 foot steel hull
on the outside, then comes three feet of floatation foam, then comes an
inside steel hull. Between the two steel hulls are ribs welded to each
hull. Inside the inside hull there's a gimbaled and padded accommodation
that sleeps six. It has four, watertight, transverse steel bulkheads and
it's heavily ballasted with moderately deep fin/bulb keel. There's
three, free-standing masts that telescope so in the retracted position
they only protrude 20 feet above the deck. The hatches are all like
submarine hatches, sealed and able to hold pressure. It has air tanks so
it can be sealed up for up to 12 hours. It has an apparatus that can
draw in outside air when it's sealed up. Of course it is self-righting
to the max.

The plan is for the ultimate survival sailing adventure. Purposely sail
out and put the vessel in the path of a hurricane and then ride it out
in safety. Clients would have bragging rights. "I sailed Hurricane
Dennis when it was Cat 5."

What do you think?

I think you should name it Titanic


Ironhorse, AH#130, HSB#96, SENS BS#187
2001 Ultraclassic with Sidecar
96 Custom bucket of bolts (gone but not forgotten)

Republicans think every day is 4th of July
Democrats think every day is April 15th
Ronald Reagan

On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 15:49:24 -0500, "KLC Lewis"
wrote:

It is my considered opinion that all containers should be made so that they
will sink if they go aglub.

They will unless full of low density water resistant cargo. The doors
on the boxes are not watertight. Electronics, with all that foam, just
won't sink. CRT's are bouyant. So is wood. Depends entirely on the
cargo. With the right cargo a boxboat is basically unsinkable.
Read the empty weight stenciled on one that I spotted on I-80.
Something over 8000 lbs. and they would weigh over 40 tons if full of
water. That is way too heavy for a boxboat, some of those carry 8 000
containers. Those ships will not carry 300 000 tons. that is
ridiculous, so the boxes have to weigh much less. They mostly start
out very bouyant, but they are not watertight, like I said .Even so
they can't be guaranteed to sink. They will take quite a while to,
however. even if they do, eventually. A container washed off a ship
and spilled a cargo of bathtub ducks. Scientists collected data on
currents for years. Had it not come open, it would not have sunk until
it dissolved into rust.
There are the floating oil drums as well.

Casady

On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 13:20:50 -0000, "
wrote:

On Aug 20, 9:25 am, "Wilbur Hubbard"
wrote:
wrote in message

ups.com...



On Aug 16, 9:24 pm, "Wilbur Hubbard"
wrote:
Yes, cruising catamarans have something extra. As a simple Google and
YouTube search using capsize and catamaran will reveal, the something
extra is the remarkable ease with which catamarans turn turtle.

With this in mind, any potential catamaran buyer must ask himself if
the
paltry advantages of a catamaran - things such as small heel angles,
slightly faster speeds downwind, more elbow room below (but not load
carrying capacity), shallow draft and largish cockpit - outweigh the
fact that sooner or later the whole shebang is going to end up
upside-down and swamped. Don't even think about what happens if you
get
trapped under the thing and drown. Just think about upside-down. In
other words, everything is ruined.

Why put up with a boat that has a designed-in flaw of being more
stable
upside-down than rightside-up? Is the trade-off between a platform
that
doesn't heel quite as much and an upside-down platform worth it? Only
you can answer that question. It depends upon how much you love your
life and the lives of your loved ones.

I wonder when the Coast Guard is going to get some balls and declare
any
and all cruising catamaran ocean voyages "manifestly unsafe voyages"
and put a stop to them?

Wilbur Hubbard

Sir I think you are confusing racing cats and lightweight hobby cats
with cruising cats, Cruising cats again and again have proven to be
more stable than a monohull and I am a fan of the monohull. The
appears to be more space in a cruising cat but this is an illusion as
it is just more cramped spaces and more of them, but if you need to
know the truth on cats go to http://www.tennantdesign.co.nz/ Malcolm
is one of the world's leading marine architects on catamarans. then
you can speak with authority, check out the technical details and the
record of CRUISING CATS .
David Law

Thanks but the bottom line is the stability curve. That says it all as
far as I'm concerned. Cruising cats have stability curves similar to
racing cats at the top of the curve where it says, "oh oh, turn turtle
because there's no going back." Since they are heavier, the bottom of
the curve looks a little better but that's spurious information because
it's at the top where the problem arises. Anybody who claims cruising
cats have an impeccable record are not familiar with the facts. People
have died when their cruising cats have turned turtle. People will
continue to die. The various manufacturers have an aggressive plan to
cover up any incidents of capsize. They'd rather people weren't aware of
the fact that they are selling a dangerous product. A product of dubious
worth when it comes to ocean voyaging where sometimes one just cannot
avoid a survival storm.

Wilbur Hubbard

WIlbur this is easily settled put your money where your mouth is, name
3 people who have died and name the manufacturer of the cat, and show
how it caused their deaths. As you want them banned just go for it.
you seem to know the facts please enlighten us, but beware some of the
manufacturers have deep pockets and big lawyers.
Why do some manufacturers of cats claim unsinkability ? which Pleasure
cats have turned turtle due to the design or due to the captain taking
them to hard, is it design or education? How come most of the southern
hemisphere Australia and New Zealand there is a preference for cats,
an their not sailed or motored in sheltered waters. Why did not all
the polynesians die out it was the only boat they knew? to many
questions and as for the conspiracy well I wasn't on the grassy
knoll . you mean all these competing manufacturers said "hey guys lets
not tell anyone this is unsafe" and the thousands of employees and all
the staff never mentioned it to anyone untill you discovered it
WOH !!! ELEMENTARY DEAR WATSON ! look at these guys
http://www.trawlercatmarine.com/whatisnew.html and go tell them they
are dangerous as all their range goes round the world, tell them it
won't.
Regards
David

Your problem, as mine was, is to believe that Wilbur responds to logic
- he doesn't. Willie has decided that Cats are unsafe, therefore Cats
are unsafe. That is the long and short of it. Logic, statistics or any
other arcane knowledge available to the rest of the boating world is
totally immaterial. Husband had decided and therefore it is so!


Bruce in Bangkok
(brucepaigeATgmailDOTcom)

On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 22:42:06 GMT, (Richard
Casady) wrote:

On Mon, 20 Aug 2007 15:49:24 -0500, "KLC Lewis"
wrote:

It is my considered opinion that all containers should be made so that they
will sink if they go aglub.

They will unless full of low density water resistant cargo. The doors
on the boxes are not watertight. Electronics, with all that foam, just
won't sink. CRT's are bouyant. So is wood. Depends entirely on the
cargo. With the right cargo a boxboat is basically unsinkable.
Read the empty weight stenciled on one that I spotted on I-80.
Something over 8000 lbs. and they would weigh over 40 tons if full of
water. That is way too heavy for a boxboat, some of those carry 8 000
containers. Those ships will not carry 300 000 tons. that is
ridiculous, so the boxes have to weigh much less. They mostly start
out very bouyant, but they are not watertight, like I said .Even so
they can't be guaranteed to sink. They will take quite a while to,
however. even if they do, eventually. A container washed off a ship
and spilled a cargo of bathtub ducks. Scientists collected data on
currents for years. Had it not come open, it would not have sunk until
it dissolved into rust.
There are the floating oil drums as well.

Casady

Actually container ships are rated in 20 ft equivalent containers, but
you are correct any container loaded with dense goods - machinery -
goes straight to the bottom.

In fact given that a single port - The Port of Los Angeles handles in
the neighborhood of 8.5 million containers a year and insurance
companies reckon that between 2,000 to 10,000 containers are lost per
year the numbers of TEU's lost vis-a-vis the total units in transit at
any given time is infinitesimal.


Bruce in Bangkok
(brucepaigeATgmailDOTcom)