I built a boat last year of my own design, a 15 1/2' flat bottom boat
for duckhunting. It was the forth boat I've built. The reason I
designed it myself, is that there was no existing design that could do
what I wanted the boat to do. It has worked out very well. I'm very
happy with the boat. I looked at several other boats, designed by
professionals, that were about the same size and got ideas about how I
would build my boat. I read a book by Sam Devlin, that was very useful
on Stitch and Glue boats (my boat is stitch and glue). A very
satisfying experience overall. It took me 5 months to build the boat,
but I fooled around with different designs and built and tested 4 scale
models over a 2 year period before I started building. The design part
of the project was more time consuming than the actual construction.
My advice to you is to consider the hundreds of sail boat plans out
there, and only design one yourself only if no existing plan can be
modified to suit your needs. Here's an old link to Devlin's book on
Amazon. Not sure if it still works:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...books&n=507846

Oh, and if you haven't been to bateau.com, definitley check it out.
Also there's www.amateurboatbuilding.com

Ed.


Thomas Veber wrote:
Hi all,

After building a simple plywood dinghy to test my capabilities, I now
feel
confident to go on and realise an old dream: To build my own sail
boat. It's
going to be trailer-able and around 15-16 feet. With centerboard and
a
little cabin with sleeping capabilities for two and a half.

I have searched the net, read a lot, and found many nice designs in
this
category. But then I realised... Why not take it one step further and
make
the design my self?

I have Googled some more, and found Carlson Designs "Hulls" program
and
started playing with it. Fantastic that you can get such a program
for free!

But I know, that designing a Hull is one thing. Designing a seaworthy
and
yet beautiful hull is another. And then designing centerboard,
rudder, rigg,
cabin, deck and so on is another thing. How do I know that the sails
will
not tear it all apart in the first breeze? How do I ensure that the
sailing
capabilities will be Ok?

For this I am now asking here for any good advice, books, web pages
etc.
which can help me. I have no particular time-frame, and I will rather
do
this good, than ending up with a useless boat after spending
thousinds of
hours in the shed building it.

Best regards,
Thomas

Same with boats. If you're willing to stand the risk that the boat won't be
any good and will have zero value (or worse, drown someone), have a nice
trip.


Oh for heaven's sake. A guy who's actually built a boat appears, asks a
respectful question, and this is the sort of useless quack people make.
If every aspiring designer had listened to this sort of cynical
self-defeating advice, we'd still be paddling across the river on a log.
You know, we shouldn't have anything to do with those guys with their wild
talk about hollowing out their logs. I have it on the best authority that
hollow logs attract bad juju, and anyway my grand-daddy paddled across the
river on a regular log and it was good enough for him, so it's good enough
for me.

There are a number of useful books: Google for Dave Gerr, Sam Devlin, and
some of the Gray Eminences of boat design like the Atkins and Chappelle
(primarily a historian, but vernacular design that has stood the
test of time is very often superior to things designed on the basis of
current trends.) Marchaj is a good source for empirical data. There are
several active boat design and building groups on Yahoo-- very useful
communities, and largely devoid of pointless discouragement. Make a list
of boats you like and research their designers. Often they'll have written
about their work, which will give useful insights into the design
philosophy they have developed. Eventually you'll develop your own, and
who knows? Sure, the odds are your boat will be no better and perhaps
worse in some respects than a design from the board of a professional, but
so what? It'll be yours, and that's what you want. In a hundred years it
won't matter a bit, and there are far less noble pastimes than trying to
create a thing of beauty.

There's a wealth of information out
there, and someone out there who's going to be the next great designer.
Might be Thomas. Probably not going to be someone who's excessively
concerned about the financial risks of home boatbuilding.

Ray, there are a great many postings on this (and other) board(s) from
inexperienced people, who seem to be getting off to a bad start. They
should be encouraged to get some experience in a variety of boats, and to
look long and hard at buying a commercial product, before building one.
And to research existing designs and designers, before trying to design
their own. The consequences of failure can, indeed, be high.

From Thomas's initial posting, it appeared to me (and others) that he might
be in this category. Having built one skiff, he was going on to design and
build a small but complex sailing craft. Not until later postings did it
emerge that he has significant experience on the water, in large and small
craft.

Anybody contemplating building a boat should be aware of the time, expense,
and risk involved - as well as the rewards and pleasures.


"Ray Aldridge" wrote in message
. ..

Same with boats. If you're willing to stand the risk that the boat won't
be
any good and will have zero value (or worse, drown someone), have a nice
trip.


Oh for heaven's sake. A guy who's actually built a boat appears, asks a
respectful question, and this is the sort of useless quack people make.
If every aspiring designer had listened to this sort of cynical
self-defeating advice, we'd still be paddling across the river on a log.