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Kayak stability
Gene,
I've read the other posts and believe that talking about hulls without mentioning the kayaker may not really be the point. While the physics of the posters may be right or wrong (I can't definitively state that a moving hull is more stable than one that is stationary, though I believe this to be so). I can state, however, that if you are moving forward in your kayak, you are also moving your body as you paddle (or even if you cruise between strokes). These small muscle adjustments may not seem to be much at first, but they add up to a significant amount of righting force (note that the boat has little tendency to be tippy until you add a paddler in the frist place, hench changing the center-of-gravity by a significant amount). As one individual said to me, "there are no tippy boats, just tippy paddlers," (meaning, of course, that any boat can be paddled by the properly skilled person). When stationary, just like on a bicycle, kayaks tend to be less stable. Stand on one foot and you are less stable than you are on two. Close your eyes, and you tend to become unstable very quickly. Hop on one foot, eyes closed, and you can do that for quite a while. It isn't the bike that is unstable, it's the human. In the absence of eyes, the dynamic changes the body makes during motion are very effective at keeping balance, so hopping is easy, standing is less so. I remember in the film, "Baidarka," the boat was uncomfortably unstable to the paddlers when they were launching, but once under way, they found it to be a real joy. While part of this was definitely hull design (the bifurcated hull improved stability while moving, something the boat designers hadn't considered), the dynamic motions of the paddler as they autonomously adjusted for balance were probably more significant. Rick "Gene Cosloy" wrote in message m... Does the final stability of a kayak depend on how much forward propulsion the boat is undergoing, all things being equal. In other words if edging a boat dead still on flat water gets me to the edge of the combing before the boat wants to capsize, will the same boat permit further edging when it's underway? A bicycle heeled over at speed is stable and unstable heeled at rest. While a kayak does not experience centrifugal forces, does the hydrolic surge force of propulsion provide a similar effect? Gene |
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