Draft

I am curious as to the draft of the various boats that have been built from this forum.

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Permalink Reply by sanderson on May 7, 2009 at 11:09am
this 19x56 has 7 in of draft with 1500lbs in it.

other boats on average i would say 3 to 10 inches of draft depending on weight. in the pictures the bottom of the rub rail is approx 3 in and the top approx 9 in.

Permalink Reply by Mike Dearing on May 7, 2009 at 5:27pm



Nice pictures. Please don't take this the wrong way, but they illustrate my point. The first picture of the red boat is floating pretty high, but with one guy in it and no gear it should be. The next photo with three guys in the boat is floating low IMO, and it looks like the boat is empty other then the passengers. Imagine it if they had a big cooler, coats, waders,anchor, etc. it would be floating even lower. The last picture is how a boat should be sitting when on the water (once again IMO) but with only one petite passenger and no gear at all I still think it should be floating higher.

The picture above is of my Willie with me, one of my smaller buddies, and three days worth of overnight camping gear in it which = two 75 quart coolers stuffed full, two sleeping bags, two tents, clothes for two guys for three days, stove, pots and pans, five gallons of water, roll up table, propane,two chairs, fishing gear, z-drag pin kit, 150' rope for lining the ladder, bilge pump, extra oar, 30# anchor, and more stuff I'm sure I'm forgetting. Point being, look how the boat still has both ends out of the water.

I don't have any pictures of my wood boat with three guys and all our gear for a day float. The next time I take it out I'll try to get someone on the bank to take a picture of the boat to show what I am talking about. Most of my buddies are pretty big, none under 230, I weigh 200. When you put three of us in my wood boat with a cooler full of beer, tackle, a 30# anchor the boat sits very low in the water and is near impossible hold in faster water even though its longer then my Willie.

Bottom shape is the #1 most important thing in drfitboat design to me, and for how I fish wider is better.

Mike
Permalink Reply by Randy Dersham on May 7, 2009 at 10:04pm
Not taking this the wrong way at all Mike. You have pointed out something very important. The right boat for the water you are on the most often is a wonderful thing, a real joy to use.

The original question was how deep does a boat draft. Sanderson posted a bunch of photos to illustrate what boats look like from 3inches to deeper. I have to add a little more color to your comparison of your boat to the photos above. The red boat is a symmetrical bottom 16.5x48. It is not a Tatman design it is one of mine. I am adding new designs to the boats we have available. They have symmetrical bottoms with continuous rocker. Why, because the Tatman designs already have the teardrop shaped bottom and a flat spot. Plus, like everyone else, I have to tinker. But mostly it is to be able to get people into the boat that will perform the best for them in the water they are on the most often.

We make the little red boat for mostly class II water. It will handle class III with a splash. It has a very low rocker bottom and a long length of waterline. We packed it down with three beefy boys ( the second photo) in it to measure the draft and make sure the stem and transom of the boat came out of the water with all 700lbs of us. It did. That is only six inches of draft. It looks so deep because the sides are low. Only 22in at the rail and a lot of flair. At six inches of draft it has about 12 inches of free board. The reason for the extra flair is to keep the boat low and out of the wind and allow the boat to haul a big load. We could add the extra 200lbs of gear and only drop another inch because of how much displacement the flared side adds in one additional inch of depth. Obviously that wouldn't be a great boat for the Rogue; however, it would easily get two people and a big camp down any ClassII+ river.

The little boat with me and my wife in it (the last photo) is a little 15.5x48. It is made for two people and has the same bottom rocker as the original 14ft McKenzie double ender. It's a lightweight day boat for two or an additional third if the three of you aren't as big as me. It can also be a perfect HUGE water boat for one person if it had a full deck and rowers seat in the center with a small self bailing cockpit.

Your Willy has some characteristics that I admire. They are specifically made for the Rogue. As you mention the bottom is nearly as wide in the back as the front to carry a ton of gear behind the rower. The ends tip up quickly to keep the stem and transom up out of the water when the waves are big. The front stem has the reverse curve to tip the front rail out to deflect water and the boat is short. Short is important on the Rogue when you are in the canyon. Short also helps that big flat spot turn quickly. And, believe it or not, some guides like that big flat spot because they can pull the boat out of the water, turn it upside down and use the bottom as a table.

What you are describing when you mention the wider boat being easier to row is true for your load on your water and it sounds like you have found your perfect combination. What we try to do is help other people find their perfect combination.

Here is what we consider. As a general rule the longer the length of waterline the easier the boat will be to row. Two boats of equal weight with the same length of waterline but with different bottom widths, the narrower boat will be faster, or easier to row. Always, the lighter boat will be easier to row and a narrower boat is usually lighter than a wider boat. Wide is good up to a point then the added weight to carry the bigger load becomes a chore to row. Most people hit the sweet spot at about 52 or 54 inches.

Displacement is an interesting calculation and I agree with you that the bottom shape including the width and the amount of rocker is critical to performance; however, displacement and boat performance is dynamic depending on the load in the boat. The flair of the sides heavily affects this dynamic displacement. The more flair the more you can load the boat down. Also the more flair the more wet a ride can get so then the sheer line becomes an important consideration. It is very hard to design a boat without taking into account all aspects of the hull shape. We ask people what they need. Do you need to stay out of the wind or keep the big water out of the boat, how many people do you carry, where do you want to carry them, etc. Then we come up with a couple of boat size and shapes that work well in those conditions and point out the compromises between them.

BTW, Jason K. did a lot of research on boats for his home water and ended up with a low side, symmetrical bottom, 17x52 with a rowers seat that can move from the traditional rear position to the center of the boat. He is seldom in Class III water but his boat will be able to handle it if he gives it a go. Thanks for sharing the photos with us Jason, it's coming along great. I can't wait to see a photo of you on the water.
Permalink Reply by Mike Dearing on May 8, 2009 at 7:09am
Randy,

Its cool to know that you are questioning people about what kind of water/ needs they will be using their driftboat for, because I think most people who build boats really don't understand how all the design factors of a drift boat come together and will either make your boat work with you or against you. When I built my driftboat I thought I would be getting a boat that would haul me and my rather large friends easily. It didn't, and consequently I was disappointed. Now my wood boat has become my "Prom Queen" which means I only take it out on nice days and always with only one passenger or two normal sized adults, which is a shame considering all the time and money one gets tied up in building a boat.

I envy you guys being able to experiment with different hull shapes and designs, I mean how cool must it be being able to have multiple boats for extremely particular situations.

I think my whole reason for dragging this post out is to try to point out to those guys who are or may be starting boat building projects to strongly look at bottom design/shape as possibly the number one design feature of whatever boat they want to build buy. No one boat design will do it all, but be honest in evaluating how your boat will be used and build/buy accordingly you'll be much happier then I was with the end result.

Mike
Permalink Reply by AJ DeRosa on May 8, 2009 at 4:57pm
Mike,

Very well said. Myself and my crew are some of the lucky guys that get to mess about with a whole fleet of boats in varying styles. But years ago we were the guys who had wooden boats that we enjoyed and did some fussing to try to make them work in our waters. Mostly 16x48 hulls, very sweet rowing but not perfect for fore and aft seating. We experimented with rear seats and knee braces of many designs. Depending upon the water types they worked with varying degrees of success and not so good. It was the plastic boat guys who had taken the next step by building bigger hulls like the old Lavro16 that measured 16"LOA. It was big and supported significant weight behind the rower, especially with a sliding rowers seat. Guys with these often carried 3 anglers. Compared to our 16x48 hulls it was a beast to row but it carried the groceries. Clacka came out with a flyfishing model as well and it worked fine. Very short front decks and a bottom to support rear weight. I remember talking to Roger about the traditional 16x48 MacKenzie boat, inspite of it's extraodinary evolution in the begining, had kind of stalled out when it came to the driftboat popularity in the Intermountain West in the 70,s and 80,s. Traditional framed boat guys were falling behind because the builders were on the coast where that style boat was still in demand. The stitch and glue guy's Sandy Pittendrigh and Jason Cajune whom I knew and others who I didn't had taken up the torch and continued to evolve. What they were doing in stitch and glue made sense. Bigger bottoms and, maybe more importantly, wider and flatter bottoms seemed to make boat handling easier. We didn't need the fast turning nimble boats that the guys on the coast needed.

Times have changed and frame guys are back at continueing the evolution in traditional frame boats. Thanks in a large part to Sandy Pittendrigh of Montana Riverboat's
forum, the Intermountain guys started trading info and looking at each others boats.
Now the Wooden Boat People forum has brought the MacKenzie River tradition into the mix and we are learning in leaps and bounds. Thanks to guys like Roger Fletcher, Ray Heater and Cyrus Happy for inspiring us and the whole group of MacKenzie river guys like Randy and Sandy Dershim, The Steele Bros, the Helfrich and Pruitt boys and all the folks who participated at Randy's show and on the forum we are back into the game of making boats that work for our individual needs. This is cool and I am excited. We can never stop learning. Thanks for the insites.
Permalink Reply by Jason Knight on May 8, 2009 at 7:52am
Agreed. I think the key word would be "compromise". No one boat does everything... so think it through and plan to build/buy one that covers the most of your essential needs.
Permalink Reply by Jesse Ronnow on May 8, 2009 at 8:22am
Randy & Sandy,

Thanks again for othe insight. It's great to have you guys here.

Jesse
Permalink Reply by Mike Dearing on May 8, 2009 at 7:09pm
Aj, and everybody else for that matter;)

Randy hit the nail on the head when he said I found the perfect boat for my uses. My Willie is that boat. As he also stated, its a magic moment when that happens, I couldn't agree more. I also understood Herb when he said he could stick two guys, camping gear and everything else he needed in his wood boats and they worked well for him. I also have an inkling that Herb is an old school tough guy who could probably row most of us down almost any stretch of whitewater he put his mind to. When he was doing all his guiding it sounds like his wood boat worked well for him and that's great. He's obviously happy with the way his boat worked for him, I was not. I row a lot (not 200 days a year like Herb) but probably on the order of 75 or so. I boat all year long in all types of water up to and including class 5. I've learned a ton in the 10 years I've been boating and still feel like I learn something every time I'm behind the sticks. The rivers, more then once, have spanked me hard, but for me one of those lessons learned was, life's to short to compromise on boat design. I rowed a bunch of different boats before I found my magic boat, but it was well worth the effort. I hope everybody here at some time gets to experience what this is like.

I also don't want anyone reading this board to think I'm a wood boat hater, and honestly, after reading everyone else's posts I really don't think they do. I was disappointed with my boat after I built it, but that doesn't mean that I hate it, because if did I would have sold it by now. So that being said, here's a few things I do like about my wood boat.

It works very well with one guy standing up front fly casting while the oarsman rows it lightly loaded for day trips.

Wood boats have always caught my eye and they are THE most beautiful boats on the water, end of story. Especially traditional framed style boats, IMO.

I love how quiet the boat is getting down the river. I learned to row out of this boat and it was a blessing not have every rock I hit broadcast to every person on the river in the form of a GONG! like the aluminum boat does!

I still enjoy the "nice boat" comments from most of the other boatman and bank fisherman on the river. I mean who tires of hearing that?

The lessons I learned from building it were priceless. I could write a whole book about these, but long story short, I put it together entirely by myself and do not regret doing it this way. You learn to think outside the box when you have to do everything by yourself.

So I do hope to build another framed woody someday, with some help from the talented people on this board the next go round, I hope to copy the shape of the Willie, for me, this would be the ultimate boat!

Mike

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