Pinto—a horse of a different color
I like Palamino. It is, indeed a pure plywood hot rod.
There’s something about the big hammock cockpit. Its a very inviting place to hang out. The inside space, not so much. So I went about dumpifying Michael’s concept. Turning his nervy thoroughbred more into a work horse.
Pinto’s cabins have been stretched up (by about 6 inches) and freeboard raised (by 3 or 4). That gives 40” of headroom sitting on the floor of the cabin and a 12” tall foot box under the self draining cockpit providing a long berth, with a pleasant hang out space for one.
On the rig front, I’ve replaced the smoking hot F16 rig with a pair of freestanding carbon masts (about 22’ tall), that rotate to roll the sail up. Kind of like this:
http://chantiermer.wordpress.com/productions/144-2/
I’ve always dug this rig, ever since we used to reef lasers that way. In this version, self vanging booms rotate around the rotating masts. The rig is quick to reef, has a low CE, but still shows over 180sq feet of working sail. And it keeps everything out of the cockpit—making that a relatively uncluttered space. The floor of the cockpit is 8” above the loaded waterline, but still 15” deep.
The cockpit seats are fabric. That adds a lot of flexiblitiy to our work horse. You could take them both off, and row. Maybe there are features on the cockpit floor for a home made sliding seat that rolls on roller blade wheels. Take the leeward one off to BYO safety ama. Strap a kayak up under that thing. Or a canoe. Whatever you want to take a long. Those crossbeams hanging out there are like davits! Need to carry two kayaks? You can stash a second one under the cross beams to windward of the windward seat.
Another feature of the cockpit will be an outboard well. A tapered plug gets pulled out and you put a long shaft 2.5 hp outboard through the hole. When your outboard is that light, why have a bunch of articulating nonsense? Maybe we modify a Hobie mirage drive to go in the well too, just for fun.
But the thing that really got me going was this.
http://www.diy-tris.com/2012/10-24-footer.htm
Frank Smoot’s idea takes the easy to build, flat bottomed dory and gives it a nice narrow entry up under the bow, and then transitions to a wetted area shrinking shape as you move back. On pinto, it goes from a nicely pinched entry to a semi-circular section that is not tanget to the topsides. There is still a chine in the midsections, but it almost disappears in the last couple of feet of bow. Kind of like this:
http://www.biekerboats.com/Bieker_Boats/Riptide_41_Images.html#1
On Pinto, the foam is only 5” thick at the midsection and 2” thick at the nose, but it provides a LOT of shape. It has got to be a hell of a strong keel as well. I wonder if it reduces the need for bulkheads and/or stringers.
In the end Pinto has a lot of the flexiblity of a Gary Dierking boat with a cabin and some speed tweaks. More to build than a tamanu, but less to build than Scampi.
more…
a cross section…the outboard motor well is not drawn
Not really that much less to build than the Scampi, and Scampi looks more lika a real boat. I hope you dont get offended but i think the Scampi looks to be a far superior boat to me.
With this style you get less cousyness in the cabin and what do you gain?
/Garg
Very interesting! What I like:
The name (we can start a horse named series, much like Apple did with cats), more room, the shaped foam bottom, the overlapping of cabin bunk area with the cockpit overhead, the surf board or kayak as safety ama - this would be a cool boat for two surfers to camp cruise, searching for the endless wave. For Palomino, I limited the hull panel height to 2’, so that a sheet of ply ripped in two would suffice for the sides, you may have a bit more than that here?
You know I like schooner rigs but in this case, it’s not working for me. The way the mast goes through the cabin top/side joint, and how I’m sure I’d be cursing the mast if I ever tried to catch a few winks below. I think the schooner works really well on Scampi, since you aren’t trying for bunk space in the ends of the hull. Can you move the rigs further apart, so that they lie fore and aft of the berths? Maybe that’s too far.
Michael
I like the hammock or bench deck chair idea, it is light and simple but still provides a reasonably secure seating area. I wonder though about the fabric flapping in the wind, it may need battens and tensioning lines to keep it taught (up goes the weight).
Gargen,
I agree that Scampi is a nicer boat. But he’s a lot more boat. And Pinto has that crazy tremolino cockpit. What a luxurious outdoor living room! And with masts on either side, a giant tent would be easy to rig. But my favorite part might be the outboard well. Its so simple to put it there—no articulating nonsense. The whole central cockpit thing, and the benefit of same, is very Searunner-ish.
Mal,
I went down that same road—adding a bunch of flimsy appendages to protect the seating from the spray and give it form…it’s one of those things you need to try in real life. Which lots of tremolino owners have.. But man, does that look comfy in nice weather. How big a boat would you need to have to duplicate that hang out space?
Michael,
You totally get this. The minimalist surfer cruiser, or whatever other lashed together adventure you can imagine—that’s what its about. Flexibility. Simplicity. Reconfigurability for tiny adventures.
And I hear your peeve with the masts in the meager accommodations. The reason that they intersect the cabintop/side joint is that they only invade the floor space below by one inch. If they invaded the floor by two inches, they’d clear the cabin side. But I was trying to conserve space! They eat sight lines more than real space. Having said that, the first time I bang one, I’ll be cursing them just the same.
But rolling up the sails on the masts? Its weight aloft. There are aero losses from poor sail shape. But it is still interesting to me because it is so straightforward.
Pinto is about minimalism. I like that.
Cheers everybody,
Chris
I like Pinto (and almost every other proa rendering I see)!
It has a lot of similarities to my EZ proa, but does more, much more gracefully.
I really like the ‘Smoot’ bottom construction, and I’d do it if I wasn’t avoiding epoxy. I think a Titebond III/cloth skin would delaminate from the foam too easily.
I’m not sure about the outboard well. Is it in the center of the vaka, or in the windward cockpit bench? In either case, I don’t like the idea of trying to mount a 30lb chunk of metal while in a heaving sea. I forsee lots of paint scratching. I’d rather drop an articulated mount and pull the start cord. But maybe I’m biased from sailing small monohulls.
I think reefing sails around the mast is fine if the sails aren’t too big, and they have modest or no roach. If it’s necessary to reef, I could live with imperfect sail shape, as long as its controllable.
Cheers,
Curtis
I’d make sure the boom didn’t interefere in case you were carght aback. I like the Smoot tris & had a chance to spend a couple hours talking boat at his place. As for boats like this, I remember seeing some guy used a CLC proa hull as the vaka for a small tri. Kinda has this flavor. I’m all for simple, cheap, and speedy. Smoot keeps it cheap by using luan and limiting epoxy to the outside of his hulls (varnish inside), but mostly by using homemade or recycled rigs. When I built my ulua, I spent as much on the sail as the rest of the boat. In fact, I could have bought a 2 hp outboard at the time for the same price. I like to sail though….
All that to say, if you don’t reuse a rig, this simple hull just got VERY expensive with carbon rigs etc.
Dan
I’m not sure about the outboard well. Is it in the center of the vaka, or in the windward cockpit bench? In either case, I don’t like the idea of trying to mount a 30lb chunk of metal while in a heaving sea. I forsee lots of paint scratching. I’d rather drop an articulated mount and pull the start cord. But maybe I’m biased from sailing small monohulls.
I love the outboard well. It would be in the floor of the cockpit, with the motor clamping on the mid bulkhead. That puts it right where you can start, steer and, inevitably, open the cover to figure out why it won’t start. The 360 degree rotating head sounds like a dream for close quarters, and water too shallow for the rudder to work. On a monohull, the motor is behind the boat—a somewhat protected place. On a sled, you need to make another, albeit small hull to protect the motor. Power operating on the end of an articulating doo dad means that the articulating stuff has to me made well, and be plenty stiff. Also, most folks who side mount the motor have done something to fair the shaft.
All of those problems disappear with the well. Now the well itself is not the easiest thing to make (especially with the Smoot bottom). But because I’d have all the foam CNCed, we’d build it into the design.
That cockpit is the place to be for cooking, fishing, sleeping, rowing, socializing, and running under power.
IMO
All that to say, if you don’t reuse a rig, this simple hull just got VERY expensive with carbon rigs etc.
So true! But what rigs would you like to fit in there?
Michael has show us a beach cat. Does anything else floating around in the used market make sense?
Have we come back to balanced lugs? How about two goat island skiff rigs?
Here’s Pinto with the rigs spread out. It solves some problems with the interior, but it does mess up the sheeting, doesn’t it.
Other changes were that I added two feet and a couple inches of beam—she’s now 26 feet long. I moved the gunwale stringer to the outside (like a Wa’apa) and I revised the booms.
Sails that wrap around the mast tend to have a rising foot. So I flipped the booms around to accommodate that.
I’ve been thinking about the pick up truck Pinto.
This is an oar/sail boat, when the dinghy/pod is left on the mooring. With the dinghy, its ready for a sailing in rougher weather. The dinghy/pod gets dropped at anchor so that there can be a sling seat on either side.
The rig and rudders are super simple. Two 90sq ft balanced lugs have short masts and can be accessed from the cockpit. The rudders have no linkage, besides a tiller, and are close enough to the cockpit to raise and lower by hand. CLR is adjusted by raising and lowering the boards, with the front tiller locked.
The bottom of the plywood portion of the vaka is flat, for ease of building and to make the machined foam bottom “Smoot” bottom sections easier to make. It’ll have both plywood stringer down the keel, and under each bulkhead. There’s a lot of simplicity gained by not putting any holes in this type of bottom.
The cockpit is really the place to be (especially with the dinghy dropped). But its not SO bad inside. Despite a sleeker profile than the last version, there’s 38” of headroom in each cabin, a 12” foot box and almost 8’ of bunk space.
This is a simple boat. Its a flexible boat. Its intended to be a relatively cheap to build little camper. You can add anything you want as a dinghy pod, but this one is designed to be a better pod than dinghy.
more pix
I love the outboard well. It would be in the floor of the cockpit, with the motor clamping on the mid bulkhead. That puts it right where you can start, steer and, inevitably, open the cover to figure out why it won’t start. The 360 degree rotating head sounds like a dream for close quarters, and water too shallow for the rudder to work.
IMO
Plus the plug could be transparent if you ever envision being in one of those places where the view below can pull at your heart strings.
cheers,
Skip
This is an oar/sail boat, when the dinghy/pod is left on the mooring. With the dinghy, its ready for a sailing in rougher weather. The dinghy/pod gets dropped at anchor so that there can be a sling seat on either side.
If the sling on the lee side remains attached at its inboard end to the vaka then it could be folded up (and secured somehow) to act as a dodger. It would fill in the the cut-out in the vaka inboard of the dinghy. When you drop the dinghy at anchor you could slide the top of the ‘dodger’ out along the lee aka to get your sling back.
If you want something else to do double duty then turn the dinghy upside-down and use it as a camping ‘hard-top’ to close off the cabin….