The Perfect River Raid Boat (PRRB)

[Jeremy]

alopenboat wrote

When I was an apprentice a group of us entered a 24 hour pedal car
competition. We had a chain drive from a pedal axle to the rear axle,
but to make the driver change-over quicker we eliminated the need to
adjust the seat position by driving the pedal axle through 2 sprag
clutches.

The result of this was that the pedals reciprocated (as on the Mirage
drive, but also they were not directly linked together so they could
be operated 180 degrees out of phase, like the Mirage, or 90 degrees
out of phase or, for rapid acceleration, in phase. It was also
possible to rest one leg and just operate with one pedal. The length
of the stroke was also adjustable to whatever was comfortable at the
time.

Mechanically it was successful, unfortunately none of the drivers was
up to it :-(

A similar system could work for a dynamo with a suitable flywheel on
the axle to keep it running smoothly.

--
Hoping for calm nights

Alastair Law,      
Yeovil, England.
<http://www.little.jim.freeuk.com>

It's been done on bikes and boats too.  There is a bike pedal system that works with pedals that swing up and down (http://www.alenax.com), it's been used by some faired recumbent builders as a way of getting a slimmer front end, with pedals that go fore and aft on tracks and has been used on at least one pedal boat drive (see this thread on the Boat Design forum: http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/boat-design/pedal-boat-drives-talk-about-yours-32075.html, for example).

Here are a couple of pics from that thread, showing the cable drives (the cables connect to pedals that go back and forth):

This first one is an external drive, where the cables and bearings have to be made of stainless, as they run in the water:



This one is a better design as it drives a conventional propeller shaft, with the cables etc being inside the boat:




Jeremy

[Paul H (admin)]

Jeremy,

I think 50 rpm is a more comfortable cadence than 60-80rpm - perhaps some gearing really is needed?

-Paul

[Jeremy]

50rpm just needs a higher Kv motor, maybe one designed to run from 60V, rather than 48V.  

Given that competitive cyclists pedal at around 100 to 120rpm, 60 to 80rpm doesn't seem too fast for a leisurely pedal rate.  My folding electric bike has a 50t chain ring, 18t smallest rear sprocket and 20" wheels, and, although not a particularly fit cyclist I can comfortably pedal at around 15 mph, which is around 90rpm at the pedals.

[Timmo]

Now I do like the look of this:



http://www.clcboats.com/life-of-boats-blog/faering-coastal-cruiser-launch-day.html?utm_source=iContact&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=June%20BBU&utm_content=June+BBU+-+Group+8

What Zelva could have been if I knew how to design boats!

Not so sure about the rowing, but she might just go well enough with a Mirage Drive.

Where do the sail and spars get stashed when she's being rowed? Fancy a sail on Zelva but haven't yet solved that stowage issue.

[David Bewick]

Timmo,  

I saw this on the Wooden Boat Forum only this morning and I immediately thought of you!  Apparently, they do not yet have a solution for stowing the rig so they are rowing with the mast up.  Whilst this boat is certainly interesting, I would expect that windage would be its biggest problem with the rig either up or down.  I guess if the solution to this design challenge was easy, someone would have found the perfect solution long ago.

Best regards,

David.

PS. How is Zelva's bottom?

[Timmo]

Hi Dave

Been too busy to attend to Zelva, will give her the attention she needs and deserves as soon as we get back from France! Having said that the temporary repair, facilitated by your sealant, has been absolutely solid, would probably last for years.

Tim.

On 4 Jul 2013, at 11:58, David Bewick [via UK HBBR Forum] wrote:

PS. How is Zelva's bottom?

[Chris Partridge]

It certainly looks impressive and the lines are lovely, and at that length she will be very fast, but I don't think it is a practical boat at all.
It is over 22ft long and decked at both ends, so it is going to be too heavy and unwieldy to launch on your own. And you can't take a chum (let alone a spouse) with you because the cabin is too small and the cockpit is filled with the sliding seat and centreboard, making it impossible to relax there, make a brew and so on.
The sail is so big the rig can't be stowed in the boat.
I think Zelva is a much better design, to be honest. You can clear the cockpit for sleeping and when the tent is up you actually have some headroom.
If you rigged her as a ketch (yawl?) the spars would be short enough to be manageable and the boom would not extend too far over the cockpit to be a danger.
I don't know why he bothers with sliding seat - sliding seat is for sprints. Over the longer distances that you cover in cruising, you have to row aerobically and you can keep a boat going at hull speed without a sliding seat for hours at a time. So why bother with the complexity? And it does your glutes in.
For me, the most practical cruising row/sail design is John Welsford's Walkabout

[Timmo]

Not being able to fit the rig stowed aboard is a bit of a let down, and you're right about the weight. Better suited to extensve waterways with no risk of a portage required (or the need to bring her ashore for repairs!) Also agree about needing to be able to relax in the cockpit. A nice reclining seat perhaps.

Advantage of a cabin is it stays dry in the rain. The need to sponge out your sleeping area after putting up the tent is worth some effort to avoid.

Not being able to take the spouse? Well mine won't go anywhere she can't have a hot shower in the morning so small boat trips of longer than one day will always be solo for me.

Been playing with thoughts of what to build next. The Vivier Ilur caught my eye too, but the Walkabout might win through (not least because I already have the plans, they were in a sale.) Just not entirely sure about the complexity of the tiller system, though I do understand it's tried and tested.

Tim.

On 5 Jul 2013, at 07:52, Chris Partridge [via UK HBBR Forum] wrote:

For me, the most practical cruising row/sail design is John Welsford's Walkabout

[Paul H (admin)]

Timmo,

I really like that design - with the various (free) CAD tools available we could easily copy the lines and shrink her to 16ft which would still be big enough to sleep in.

-Paul

[Chris Waite]

Spars and sparsity, eh?  

Another little topic I have been secretly fondling for a few months, hence the, er, antlers on ‘Polly Wee’ at Beale and beyond, this time:



I think this picture is one of Grum's, but whoever; thank you.  Even if this is not the best antler picture and 'PW' looked as if she was going to a Christmas fancy-dress, does anybody have a better one that they could slot in somewhere about here?

There are three places aboard that you can store spars while not in use:

1.  In the boat, which normally means on the sole; so they have to be in connectable bits that come apart to fit flat and get in the way of your wayward feet.  They also take forever to fiddly-fit together to make up a rig; rivers may present living as easy, but they also only have moments when sailing is the preferred option.

2.  Overhead, which is actually quite useful – witness those punts and other stunts that roll their canvas up over hoops, or frames to a high falutin’ midline sausage, allowing you to sit underneath and see out each way and similarly use the space each side of the boat, to climb ashore, or lunge for escaping equipment and generally make use of the edges of the vessel. Has to be the answer doesn’t it?  Well it is until you need to stand up in the mid line of your nervously narrow boat, when it will endeavour, usually with marked success, to tip you overboard as you clutch wildly at the swaying sausage; all that stands between you and standing upright, or swimming.

3.  Or it’s the antlers.  I’m talking about the large crutches that often adorn the sides of Mediterranean fishing boats, where the crew jettison any long poles that happen to be involved in their trade, when not in use.  You could lower them until they are below the gunwales, but there they are vulnerable to every edge and branch and reed and weed and difficult to get to as well.

The crutches seemed like a good idea to me, and they are.  First of all, I only made an aft set as OFT….    No, not the ‘Office of Fair Trading’, but ‘Old Father Time’ was against me and I had the cuddy to lash the forward ends to, ropey-strop-loop and hook stuff.  This version of the truth has three drawbacks that were not prepared to expose themselves until I actually set the system up on the Kennet and Avon:

1.  They stick out beyond the sides of the hull fore and aft, so spend much of their time in the locks collecting weed off the sides, which they exchange for paint, epoxy and scrapings of wood.  They also have an eye for anything they could hook up with, rising or sinking.

2.  They need to be raised above the average sweep of an oar loom, so they don’t interfere with your main propulsion.

3.  Once in this position, they are high enough to make sure you trip over them when trying to traverse the side of the hull on your way back from the pub.  Or if you’re sufficiently senior, on the way there as well.

Well bugger

I would have said ‘bother’, but you know me well enough by now

CW

[Port-Na-Storm]

A Mediterranean Fishing Boat with Crutches?

Here's one I fell in love with earlier. One day my Love.......................



A Yuletide Polly Wee with Antlers ?



No, not this time, which begs the question where do you put your antlers while sailing?



Ah there they are.

Personally I think the design in question, the other one not Polly Wee, looks more like something you'd want to cross the Atlantic in rather than row gently down a river or canal. And I can't imagine what it would be like to actually sail it.  I'm beginning to think that the best type of rig for river cruising is a golf umbrella.
Still each to their own.

[David Bewick]

Timmo wrote

 The Vivier Ilur caught my eye too, but the Walkabout might win through

Timmo,

I think you might be right about Walkabout as a good raid boat but I have to disagree with you about Ilur.  I think it is a very fine boat but much more suited to DCA-style dinghy cruising where the oars are rarely used.  It is just too much of a lump to row well.  I remember a very enthusiastic French crew had one at Seafair Haven 2010 and they ended up taking a tow to get back to Lawrenny one day.  If you want a Vivier design for raiding, it has got the be an Aber! (not that I am in any way biased).  

Perversely, though, I am thinking seriously about building a Vivier Beg Meil that is gaff rigged day sailer that shares her hull shape with Ilur.  I reckon one of those would do quite well in the local OGA races and it would also be good for cruising with a tent.

Long may the pursuit of the perfect boat continue.

David.

[Port-Na-Storm]

I like the Beg Meil too.
I'm attracted to the simplicity of the Ilur but I like the side decks and modern stuff like buoyancy in the Beg Meil.

Years of comparing the simplicity of the Lug Sail thanks to CW, compared with the relative complexity of the gaff on my Coot I'm convinced that Lug is the way to go. I think a Lug Sloop like the one on his Minahouet would work well.
Just Dreamin' though.

[Chris Waite]

The PRRB

Takes some thinking about, doesn't it?

Hence the delay in uploading this eagle-eyed expose'....    and I have to warn you that not only is this but the first part; there are no pictures
 
Looking at our trip along the Kennet and Avon, there were three problems - few camp sites, adverse current and tree lined banks stopping any useable wind.  Just when I was expecting to loaf along in a happy heap of other slow-coaches, this was a time-trial, with steely-eyed veterans scowling into the drizzle as they drove their machines against the torrent for hours on end.
 
It had not occurred to me until recently that I had the shortest boat there, by some two and a half feet; this is meant to be an observation, even if it has the same shape as an excuse.  The next one up, Al's Paradox, was still some two feet shorter again than most of the rest – four canoes, a double rowing skiff and the only other sailing boat, John and Josephine’s well proven, own design.

I don’t think anybody spent much time planing, so we are talking about displacement hull speed: 1.34 x the square root of the waterline length; that is less than four and a half knots for ‘Polly Wee’ and over five knots for a fifteen foot LWL.  Is that significant?  I don’t know, but it is the difference between being built and stored in a small garage and easily handled ashore….

Or not

The sailing boats were consistently slower without help from the internal combustion engine.  Again what is the significance?  Well there is a bunch of intrusive attributes that can be stripped out of a hull that does not need to sail, making it narrower and lighter.

Apart from a sail, which I freely admit does not get used often enough to make it worth the aggravation, the time honoured question is to face forwards or backwards?  So, wear your canoe and see the future, or live aboard your dinghy, see the past and bump into things; unless you’re Chris Partridge, who despite all appearances of being a good looking dude with just one pair of eyes in the usual place, must have an extra set in the back of his head, 'cos he could do six knots round the Hampton Court Maze in a flood, without disturbing so much as a twig.  Or you can fiddle around trying to face front and pedal, or worse yet, do strange things with even stranger oars.

I sailed a few feet (well hundred yards) with the current, on the Thames, but otherwise the rig was only useful to support the boom tent and catch on locks and trees and stuff.  ‘Polly Wee’ was intended as a single-handed, sail and oar, raid boat, with a pedal-yuloh and the intention that she should cover all possible trips.

Does she?

Well she’s tender enough, under sail and anyway, to be something of a handful and slow enough to hold back all the others on this last river raid.  Having said that, she’s not actually thrown me in the water yet, though she regularly gives the impression she’s thinking about it.  I still haven’t challenged her to go ahead and do it; I’m waiting for Cobnor again, where I have chums and several changes of clothes close by, before I start pushing my luck.

Next, I did hamper her speed by carrying full rig and kit – enough to actually go sailing, sailing for a week, without requiring any re-victualling, (including water) and then had the nerve to ask her to keep up under Pedyuloh drive, so that I could enjoy the view.  I gave up pedalling once we were well into the first day in the Kennet as it became apparent that the current was in no mood to let anybody off with just a warning.  At that stage I took to the oars to avoid becoming a party pooper.

The Peduloh works satisfactorily, but I am hoping that some further refinement in the engineering, (blade and handle lanyard length, etcetera), will produce an extra half knot, or so.  To be even fairer to the boat, for much of the pedally bit, the rig was up, the wind was as ahead as it always is on the Thames and I had not bothered to pump out the ballast water in view of the possible requirement to sail.  So I was actually pedalling with an extra bloke and three quarters in the bilge, plus sustenance for a week and all the windage of the rig.  How stupid can you get?

Just as a point, some of you will be aware that I did set up the Pedyuloh on my rowing skiff ‘Octavia’ and it compared not unfavourably with TimmO and his Hobie Mirage Drive in his canoe; (the one before ‘Zelva’).  All very well, but there are three problems with this.  Firstly, The skiff is not a camp-aboard; secondly, as it has no centreboard, or rudder and as the drive unit is on the transom rather than under your feet, forward of amidships, she will not make way up wind, but blows off – useless.  Finally, if it was not for her demounting into two sections, (the necessary strengthening for which induces a weight penalty all of its own), she would not fit in the garage.

That rounds up the problems and when I get around to it, I'll follow up with a rumination of possible solutions.

Summer isn't quite over yet, so don't hold your breath

Ancient and Marinated

[Paul H (admin)]

A & M,

Don't forget electric drive - silent and far easier on the knees. That's my personal crusade of course.

-Paul

[Chris Waite]

There you go then Paulie!

Already onto the "possible solutions".

I agree that is an interesting crusade and worthy of your attention as a professor of the World of the Wiggly - I refer to electrons*.  (Though, I did think half a week cast adrift with Coach Partridge had just converted you to Oarism?)  

*Unfortunately, letting those small and negative masters of the universe do the work can turn us into flabby little bunnies and there'll be none of that

Not aboard a Waite-driven PeRRB

Now where's my whip?

Greybeard

Tsch....aargh!  Tsch....aargh!

[AdrianG]

Greetings y'all

Whilst paddling relentlessly (despite an incriminating photo to the contrary) on the last Thames trip, I glanced to one side to see Timmo effortlessly overtaking whilst at the same time reading a book. Later (much later) we caught up with him as he was making a brew in Zelva and fluffing up his duvet ready for a good nights sleep aboard (I may have imagined the duvet). Methinks Timmo has has come jolly close to his PRRB. Well done that man.

Kind regards to all
Adrian

PS Have a jolly nice time at Cobnor. Wish I could play, too. But I can't.

[Port-Na-Storm]

The last time I raised my head above this particular parapet it got riddled with bullet holes, so it is with some trepidation that I now proffer some pearls of what passes for wisdom in these parts.

Its not a bloody race! But it has been observed that, human nature being what it is, whenever there are two or more boats in close proximity and heading in the same general direction, its a bloody race.

There is a world of difference between The Perfect River Raid Boat, and The Perfect Go Anywhere do Anything and Still Fit in your Garage Boat. You Chooses you Parameters and You Gets Constrained by Them.

God, or SlartiBartfast  made Rivers flow downhill for a reason, ignore him and ye shall incur his ridicule.

Cobnor!

[BrianP]

face forward, peddling action, ride to and home from event, surly the perfect PRRB

http://www.shuttlebike.com/





Actually I think Tim's boat is the one. I am sure John Hesp would be more than happy to digitise the lines and cut kits on his CNC machine for members, if Tim would like that?

Brian

[Timmo]

Happy to collaborate in such a process if anyone is really interested. Would have to be some work done, I modified as I went so the offsets I created at the design stage are a little different to the finished boat. Also need to choose which side of the boat looks best since I'm sure Port and Starboard don't exactly match!!

Tim.


> Actually I think Tim's boat is the one. I am sure John Hesp would be more than happy to digitise the lines and cut kits on his CNC machine for members, if Tim would like that?
>
> Brian