Starting A New Adventure.

[flightdeck]

Hi, I am looking at starting out a new venture, to build my own boat to my own exact specification and then to sail it off to distant places. During my lifetime, my friends have scattered to the four corners of the world and I want to go and catch up with them, but spend a while in different ports. So, a couple of questions.

1. I have family that owns a house in Knysna so I would like to make that 'home base' What would be the cost of mooring my yacht in Knysna? Best place, best price, and how about just dropping anchor somewhere away from the jetty ... is that still prmissible?

2. Where would be the best place to build it, in terms of not to expensive keyside construction area and easy access to steel and engineering facilities, while still retaining a degree of privacy and security. And what would the typical rental of such space be for say a 6 month period. Where would one go? Richards bay, Cape town, Saldhana ... ?

3. What authority does one appoach for seaworthiness guidelines, and how involved do they get? Must plans be specifically drawn up by a naval architect or would my own plans be adequate, as I am more than able to do all the cad drawings and 3d representations and so on., considering that I do have sailing experiece from 20 years ago in the Caribbean, (allbeit as a lowly crewman/passenger on my very good mates yacht, and now he can be crew and passenger on mine hehe. ) I have very specific design requirments and know exactly how I want the yacht laid out. do plans need to be approved or are there just a set of guidelines that an inspector will verify?

So, thats basically it, I want to find a spot that I can use for six months to park some caravans for me and my building team, who will then also be my crew (all sailors ... but a fair wild bunch of pirates, all retired now), build my boat, pop it in the water, hone up my skills a bit on nice days out of Knysna, sharpen ourselves up on a few shakedown trips , and then a year from now, hit the high seas.

What do ya think, ideas, suggestions all welcome

Oh yes, 24 meter steel hull motor sailer.

[danblu]

Good day mate,

I suggest you start by looking into the various naval architecs and their designs. You really do need these guys, they will give you the benefit of years of experience both design and building. To do the drawings oneself to save a thousand bucks or so will almost certainly doom the entire project. The resale value would be nil or nearly so and also the resulting yacht would be dangerous and unproven. Google Benford , Paul Gartside, Tom Macnaughton and others and check out the style you like. Talk to them and you will be amazed at the depth of their knowledge. 24 metres is a rather large project. If you get the drawings you also get a list of materials which will enable you to budget the project. Best of luck,

Pete.

[JeanneP]

Please take the following snippy remarks with a grain of salt, but I feel that we do not have enough information to advise you, except to say that without the knowledge of a marine architect, you are wasting a great deal of money.

Not-so-tactful remarks now follow.

More than 20 years ago I learned how to ride a bike. I am still not qualified to design and build one.

I know how to drive an automobile, have been doing so for 50 years or so, and I still haven't a clue as to how to design or build one, and just because I have a strong opinion about the layout of an auto's interior, I don't think I would be able to create an efficient layout.

I know how to draw architectural plans for renovating residential interiors, and have done so for many years, but I still find the need to hire an architect to design and create the plans necessary to build such interior/exterior structures. In fact, it's our many years of seeing the sad results of amateur building that convince us that the education and training that professionals have are necessary for avoiding the most elementary mistakes in construction. The professionals are not reinventing the wheel every time they take pen to paper, as you and I most certainly would be.

Many years ago we had to replace a rotted wooden bearing beam in a building we had just bought and started restoring/renovating. I was lucky to have an engineer friend who spec'd the new beam, which we wanted to be a steel I-beam. We figured that it would be smaller than the wooden beam. We were wrong. The steel beam had to be a greater depth than the wooden beam, and could not support as long a span - we had to construct an additional support column halfway along the span that the wooden beam had supported. Amateurs such as us had no idea of the stresses and loads and design necessary to keep the floor from collapsing! Translate that to the keel plate and stringers in a boat. Do you know how to calculate load, flex, shear, etc.?

Your comment that you are going to "pop" the boat into the water - have you considered the causeway and rails you will need to build to get it into the water?

Knowing how to sail does not make a person an expert in mathematics, forces, vectors, rigging, sail area and plans, and all the gear that is necessary to make a sailboat go well and safely. And for the size of boat that you want, the possibility of errors increases geometrically.

A mantra we repeat whenever we consider cutting financial corners, "you get what you pay for", has saved us countless times from expensive problems.

IMHO.

Fair winds,

Jeanne

[redbopeep]

Good April Fools Day joke. Oh...it's a few days late...perhaps you aren't joking

Even the most experienced, existing, boatyard would have a hard time building a 24 meter yacht, finishing it out and launching it in 6 months. Suggest you go to one of them and talk about your proposed project.

Right now, buying an existing boat is (as it usually is) much cheaper than building one. You might just take a look around for what's on the market that will suit you. Your 6 months will be all taken up with the few bits that you want to change on electronics, perhaps updating sails or rigging and such.

Good luck.

[flightdeck]

Hehehe ... whats this duckpond doodles .... what , no one takes you lot seriously, so yawl have to take yourselves seriously and talk down to people to make up for it.. Now, please pardon the snippy remarks but seeing as that that is the response one gets when genuinely seeking some advice and assistance ... , and the tone adopted in this forum here goes.

Now, last thing I want to do is bore you with my 'credentials', I come from a seafaring family that stretches way back to before my grandfather, who was one of the founding officers of the Canadian navy. My father worked at sea for many years and my uncle ran a fishing factory and fleet out of Gaansbaai. He was as such, also a marine engineer with various offshore operations, and was the consuting enigneer on the heavy lift dry dock at walvis bay and also managed the conversion of numerous dredging barges for marine diamond corporation.

He was also one for building his own boats and between my grandfather, father and uncle I have been in, over under and around boats and things that float most of my life, the most memorable of which was the oil drilling platforms off mossel bay. Marine architect ... yawn ... the last time I saw one was in Hout Bay the last time that I wnated to tackle a decent sized boat. He quated me abut R 50 000.00 in todays money to do a plan. He said he would have it ready in abut 4 weeks. I asked him if he could tell me one thing that I did not know ... he could not.

So, please do not make the presumptive mistake of confusing me with someone that sat in Johannesburg traffic jams for most of my adult life ... I am a qualified engineer in my own right and having sailed on just about everything sailable form ocean liners to yachts to power boats and have a circle of friends with extensive yachting experience, we have decided to put a boat together, the way we want it and not how some stuffed shirt marine 'r key tekt' thinks we need.

Now, for those of you that have not seen how one 'pops' a 100 ton barge in the river, I can help you out ... there are no causeways and no rails ... its a fair snap when you have seen it done a few times.

That said, if you bothered to read my post, I did not say that I would not seek out professional advice, I did enquire as to what the correct procedure was that one should follow. And, seeing as that I have managed to acumulate sufficent capital to tackle a project of this nature, one would by implication that I did not do it tby being a bloody fool, and in the same token, when investing in a project of this nature, I am only too aware of the needs to get it right.

And if you think I ham going to pay a bunch of dawdlers to stuff around for six months while I pay for everyones party, that is so out ... I will be living right next to the thing and cracking the the whip over the heads of several teams of welders on an hourly basis. I have seen the light, and learned from the mistakes of others and my project will not be an abandonded half built hulk that clutters up a boat yard for months to eventually be sold off as scrap to pay for the space it occupied.

So, seeing as that you obviously dont know the answers to the three simple questiosn posed, as a starting point of this thread, why dont you tootle off now, with your 'snippyness' and leave this thread alone till someone who is preparded to answer my three specific opening questions does come along.

Then maybe you can follow on and learn somthing from a couple of professionals.

But allow me to repeat ...

1. What would the cost of mooring a yacht at Knysna be, and is free anchorage in the lagoon still permissible?

2.Which port would be best location to buld such a boat and what are the typical costs of dockside real estate rentals?

3. What certifcation guidelines exist, where does one obtain them, and to what degree is one able to complete the plans? Will it be signed off by a certifying authority if a marine arkeytekt is not involved. I did not ask for a list of your out of work mates names.

But, just so as that I can set all of your fluttering hearts at rest, Yes, I will run the plans past a suitably qualified engineer before build time, but sure as hell not someone with a pumped up name that is practiced at the art of seperating fools from their money. But me, as an engineer ... I am doing the major layout myself. I'll take some advice on the thickness of beams and plates but thats it.

So, you can either come down of your condescending pedestalls, and give a straight question a straight answer, or stand back, keep quiet and possibly learn something.

Or shall I leave you guys to get back to your apple pie recipes.

At lease dan there started with the most sensisble response .... but, marine architect ... A thousand rands ... dman, Him I will use right away.

Bear in mind, we are putting together a working boat for a working crew and not a multimillion dollar toy for some playboy to impress his mates.

Cheers all, look forward to the next chirp, but in the interim, if someone has an answer, let us know.

[MMNETSEA]

Knysna, a place with its own boat building history - How Many builders still on Thesens. That would be a very good place to look at designs. Some very good steel builders near Capetown.

Give us some thoughts on the type of vessel you have in mind and where you would like to cruise (types of anchorages)

Another good place to scan designs and ideas -- from where the majority of today's steel boats are made :-

C L I C K

[flightdeck]

Thanks very much for your useful reply. So, it is possible to build a boat down at Knysna. But we will do the building. As engineers, there is also nothing wrong with our welding skills, and we will employ maybe 2 extra teams to welders to assist. We have our own profile cutter so that makes that bit much simpler as well.



This is a picture of our yacht that we ailed the Caribbean with in the early 90's. While OK, it did have its shortcommings which we intend to address with the new design.



This is the basic layout which has been paintshopped from an original pictue which looked close to what we want.



This is another rough concept sketch.

The idea is for a diesel electric motor sailer, with vertical axis wind turbines as the primary drive, with a seconday sail and a backup generator. But sails will only be used in an emergency. The idea is to get away form sails and all of the associated issues. The design uses six vertical axis wind turbines as its primary drive system.



The advantage of this system is that is can 'refuel' the vessel when in port, off the wind, building up charge in the electrolyte reservoirs and when the electrolyte is fully charged, we can head to sea again with a 'full tank of gas'

A bit of background on the propulsion system. Batteries use an electrolyte to store the charge. If one has a large reservoir of electrolyte, about 10 000 liters, this represents a one time capital outlay for your fuel, and the electrolyte is cheaper than fuel. If you immagine a battery with a hose on the one side and out the other side, through which fresh electrolyte is circulated as the charge is drawn off the electrolyte in the battery, a battery with electrolyte will be able to generate power for as long as there is electrolyte containing a charge.

A standard battery with 2 liters of electrolyte can supply 50 ampere hours or 600 watt hours. That is 300 watt hours per liter. 300 x 10 000 therefore equals 3 megawatt hours of charge.

So, while test have shown that a vertical wind turbine will barely manage to propel a craft, against the wind, tacking works marginally and downwind is no problem, (because the wind turbines act like sails and create a drag on the wind, in addition to generating electricity), what it can do, is charge up the electrolyte reservoir for the few weeks at anchorage until you have enough to move on again. This also satisfies our day to day eletrical requirments for equipment, entertainment, refrigeration and cooking

Now we know that the U boats could remain underwater for 5 days running at 5 knots off a 200 cell battery, and we, have a lot more electrolyte on board. With this vessel we will also have the advantage of a lighter craft, running on the surface and with continual replenishment by the wind and even then, backup dieslel generators could be used to supplement the drive. This makes a 2-3 week run quite feasable, giving us a range of 2 - 3000 nautical miles between recharges.

The turbines would generally generate about 50 amps in a fair breeze (20 kts), which is 600 watts, per hour is 600 watt hours times 6 turbines = 3.6 kilowatts per hour which then translates into about 800 hours or 30 days to recharge.

With electricity at the mooring, a moderate charge rate of 15 amps @ 220V = 3 KW which will then cost R 3.00 per hour to charge the electrolyte. That translates into R 3000.00 of electricity, and how much does the diesel cost to motor sail for 5 days ? R 100 per hour x 24 hours = 2400 x 5 days = R 12 000.00 . But, and here is the huge advantage, you can just hang out and refuel on the wind.

That is the general idea.

First, though, to find a spot where we can build it, and how much the space rental would cost.

Working out budgets here.

[MMNETSEA]

Like your innovative ideas - remember well the thinking when commissioning my first catamaran. Dudley Dix also has some very practical ways of putting a steel boat together. HERE

And of course Wynand N and his very useful info - pity he has retired - for the right inducement ???? http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/profile/wynand-n.html

Richard

[danblu]

So are you going to make the hull the actual battery?

[JeanneP]

Flightdeck, it would have helped if you had given more information about your experience and your plans in your first post rather than wait until you received an answer you didn't like.

I assumed that you are presently living in RSA, which begs the questions as to why you can't find the information posed in both your posts straight from the agencies that matter, i.e., RSA departments that regulate such things? And as for costs for mooring/etc. in Knysna, wouldn't it be easier for you to just call over there to find out?

But let's move on.

Are you familiar with the Metal Boat Society? I'm not, but it has been recommended as a good source of information for those interested in owning or building a metal boat. Information is only available to those who pay the USD $30 to join, but it might be a worthwhile investment. Here's a link: METAL BOAT SOCIETY MEMBERSHIP PAGE

[redbopeep]

Indeed, Flightdeck, the first post you penned read like someone who just had a "wild hair" and had not thought things through. That's a typical post of someone wanting to build a boat. However...

It does seem you are quite a technophile and with deep pockets, too. That wonderful but rare combination makes for interesting yachts.

Your questions did not relate to your design plans so sticking to your questions:

I'm not in SA sou can't help on location. If you are there (or have a family home there), going around on your own to check things out seems the way to find your spot. Talking to the locals will tell you if free anchorage is still permissible and which port/location most reasonable for your task.

I don't have knowledge or experience building boats in South Africa but, as a mechanical structural engineer and construction manager here in the US, like most engineers, I know how to find the right permit & regulatory folks to approve a project. In the case of SA, 5 seconds with google search term "South Africa Boat Construction Regulations" showed me that the South Africa Maritime Authority would be my place to get information http://www.samsa.org.za/ and if I wanted a bit of industry insights, I might contact the boat building association http://biasa.co.za/ to get some scoop on SAMSA. There may be a back-yard boatbuilder's association there but I didn't bother googling it for you. If you are Canadian, you may also wish to make sure the boat meets Transport Canada's fairly new Small Vessel Regulations and Construction Standards. If you plan to eventually market the boat elsewhere, you may wish to make sure that those standards are met, as well, or choose to build to an international standard.

You likely can find a marine surveyor in the local area that can assist you with the standards. As you build the vessel, having the surveyor follow your work and document progress will be helpful when it comes time to insure. Further, if SA standards have the equivalent exception to construction inspections like we here have in the USA for backyard boat builders, the regulatory folks won't have to follow your progress but rather just do a quick end-inspection or take the word of the surveyor. The regulators may all be well and good in such a case, but your insurer will want progress inspections along the way.

Good luck.

[caddyspanker]

In Spain there is an Island called Ibiza. When I went boating there the experience was amazing. There was a specific area where you could see the rocks of the Island so outstanding. It is not easy to describe. Try to google Ibiza from Spain and see for yourself under images the beauty that is found there.