Capacity Issues for Camping Trip

[Joe Nelson CS#35]

I am going to a group messabout in the San Juan's in just over a month. My wife and I have 3 kids (still at home, 3 others off to college etc.). Based on the Coast Guard formula, you can get 11 people in a Core Sound 20. :roll: Again based on this formula, we 5 equal 5.17 people. With gear for camping is it reasonable to load my boat with the 5 of us and head 18 miles into the San Juan Islands? We will be going over as a group and will have power boats along as well. I am just wondering if I should try to get some people and gear on other boats? If there is no wind, my 4 horse kicker will probably push us pretty slow! By the way, it pushes me alone at a planing speed.

[rlchenry]

This won't help you much, but you remind me of us last year.

We packed 3 of us (me, wife, 13 year old) and what must have been 500lbs of camping gear into my 9ft nesting spindrift. The water was about 1.5 inches from the gunnel. Lucky for us (we wouldn't have gone otherwise) the water was quite calm. My son was sitting on most of the gear with his center of gravity about a foot above the gunnel.

My 3.5hp outboard acted funny the whole 3 mile trip over to Bear Island. It made it over, but just barely. The boat was quite stable-feeling, however.

We unloaded the 500lbs of gear and schlepped it what must have been a mile to our campsite on the beach.

The next day, we schlepped the same 500lbs of gear back to the water and loaded up the boat. Attempted to start the outboard - it would have none of that.

I ended up rowing (into a headwind, BTW) the 3 miles back with all of our "stuff" loaded to the gills!

I can laugh about it now..........

Listen, can't you hear me laughing?...........

Can you hear it?........

No, really, listen...........

HAHAHHAAARRRGGHHHH! :x :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry:

[Garry]

B&B website says Core Sound 20 "BOAT WEIGHT...500 - 600 lbs amd SAILING WEIGHT 1200 lbs @DWL With people and gear"

I would do a rough estimate of the surface area of the DWL. At 64 lb/cu. ft. for seawater your displacement per inch would be about 5.3 lb/sq. ft.

If you have an area of 90 sq. ft. (my rough estimate) that would be 477 per inch.

So 1,000 lbs people and supplies would put your design waterline about an inch under. 1,500 lbs about 2 inches under. Probably very doable since it would not add that much additional surface resistance.

Make sure everyone has a GOOD life preserver. :wink:

Maybe get somebody to stand by while you try it out for a short trip first.

FWIW, Garry

[Joe Nelson CS#35]

Gary,

I doubt that the PPI is quite that high...Maybe Graham knows off the top of his head. Princess 22 is 498# and the Belhaven is 394#. So somewhere inbetween I would assume. 425# seems like a good guess. But your estimate via math is pretty close. Thanks for the ideas.

I bet the boat would be rock stable with that much weight in it. I kinda worry about the force on the masts with that much ballist in a hard wind. I guess that you could ease the sails to let out some more wind and be conservative about pushing the boat.

[Tom Lathrop]

Graham should chime in here but I think you are OK with the five you are thinking about if you don't go "overboard" with gear. If you have access to Messing About In Boats, a couple of recent issues has articles about two people cruising the west coast of Baja. They went for three weeks along a mostly uninhabited coast and had to carry everything, including water, fuel, food tents, etc in a Bay River Skiff 15 that I built in 1994. This is a much-much smaller and less burdensome boat than a CS20.

Actually the desire for more sea keeping and carrying capacity in a drier boat than the BRS is what initiated the CS line of boats anyway.

[mustangermatt]

We have been running around the san juans and puget sound for a year and a half in my coresound 17 with up to six people and gear on board. We even took a run across the strait of juan de fuca. The boat is a lot more comfortable on the long trips with the extra weight. Slower, but more comfortable. We rarely take spray into the boat, and the weight eliminates the pounding with just one or two onboard. Short answer is in the 20 I wouldn't worry about it.

By the way, what messabout is that. I would love to sail with another coresound :-)

[Designer]

Joe,

I would load them up and have a good time. Have you seen the pics of Rob's boat under way to and from his camp site?

I just rechecked my calculations on the boat and it takes 1300# to bring the boat down to the DWL and not 1200# as stated on our website. The pounds per 1" immersion is around 375#.

I would not worry about the mast strength unless you had everyone hiking out hard in a very strong wind. Just use common sense if the masts seem to be bending further than you feel comfortable, just back off the power. We have not lost a mast when using the right mast specs.

Of course you won't have the snappy performance as when sailed light but it won't be bad either.

[Ken_Potts]

If you'd like to read about the baja cruise but you don't have access to the back issue of MAIB it's on the B and B Yacht Designs website...

http://www.bandbyachtdesigns.com/Baja/Baja%20adventure.htm

At least I'm guessing that it's the same cruise

[Joe Nelson CS#35]

Thanks all for your confidence building comments.

Here is the link for our messabout.

http://members.shaw.ca/jamie.orr/Sucia%202005/Sucia%202006.htm

We've got at least 20 boats at this time. Should be a great time! Most of us are launching from Bellingham on July 7th.

We also have a Yahoo group...do a search for Sucia. That is where we are talking about things.

Thanks Graham for the numbers. My boat is over built and also constructed with Meranti. I bet that I am 100# heavier than specified. That extra hundred pounds of capacity to the waterline will help.

[Terry Dunn]

Joe,

We have had 6 people in our CS 20 a few times. She is solid as a rock with that many people. Jane and I were on the local reservoir the other day in some strong winds. We had the mizzen in the reefing position. We could have used a few more people that day. Actually we should have stayed on shore. After we got home we called into the recorded message for the wind conditions and it said "25 mph gusting to 47". We stayed in a small bay where there were no waves built up so we stayed upright fine.

We have a 5 hp outboard on ours. We have used it at 9,000 ft here in Colorado. At that altitude it probably has less power that your 4. I thnk you will be pleased with the performance with a 4 even with the boat loaded.

As it turns out We will be in the NW the week after the messabout. Bad planning. I would drag my boat to the NW if we culd make the messabout. maybe next year.

Have a good time.

[Barry Pyeatt]

You should have a ball. Lots of sights to see and things to do in the San Juans. Biggest consideration should be watching the tide tables and currents between some of the islands. Launching from Bellingham is a great approach. And of course watch for the tankers!

Also pay attention to the pods of Orcas. If you see them, just give them room and watch from a distance. Not because you will be in any danger from them but the fines will kill you if you are too close and get caught. Lots of nice coves and places to go gunkholin'. Have fun!

[Aaron_G]

What are the rules for camping in the San Juans? Can you pull up your boat and pitch a tent on any beach, or are you restricted to parks and other public property?

I hope you plan on taking some pictures and posting them to the forum.

[Joe Nelson CS#35]

It is pretty regulated. There is a lot of private land. We are camping in a state park. I dont think you can camp anywhere you want to.

[JeffM]

In Narragansett Bay where I sail there are practically no camping sites--so we sleep aboard. If I go for an imitation of canned sardines, I can sleep two adults and three kids. (But nobody better move!)

[Rob Blackburn]

The word with Cessna 182's is that if you can shut the doors they will fly. Much the same with a CS 20.

It seems to me that the MORE weight on board, the less likely you are to suffer some sort of misfortune.

Note the amount of stuff in photo four of this series.

http://homepage.mac.com/blackburns/Expeditions/PhotoAlbum93.html

It is a funny thing, but having owned a Laser (super tippy and you can never relax on one) and a Norwalk Island Sharpie, tippy in a floaty unstable sort of way... then the CS 20 is nigh perfect for something that lives under the house.

What Graham needs to do is design a wider deeper version at the 23 foot mark with a nice sheer, not too boxy profile and a nice tapered rounded top sort of small cabin... ie Norwalk Island Sharpie 23 topside with CS hull underneath...

R

ps it is late here and the bottle is empty so shall say no more

[Joe Nelson CS#35]

Rob,

You da king of loads! We are thinking of even taking our cast iron frying pans now.

[JeffM]

Good idea, Joe! I've been thinking of lead, but cast iron will work if you hang 'em off the end of the cb! 'course--you couldn't get to 'em on the beach when you really needed to cook...

[brigait1]

Rob said "It seems to me that the MORE weight on board, the less likely you are to suffer some sort of misfortune."

I've noticed several people mention that the CS-20 gets much more tame with a load. Has anyone out there experimented with water ballast for rougher conditions. It seems like I've read somewhere that similar boats like the Sea Pearl do this.

Any thoughts?

Pete

[JeffM]

Graham has said that the best place for ballast is the cb. I haven't tried to figure out weight of lead there's room for, but I'd worry about the strength of my cb, pin and trunk, the amount of tackle it would take to raise it, and the consequences of running aground (which I do a lot!). At the moment my board is unweighted and, if not cleated down, floats neatly up into the trunk. The downhaul has a releasing clam cleat (Duckworks) which I love. It has never popped without a good reason, but always pops if the board touches. I have thought about dynamic ballast (i.e. my 200+ pounds), and have installed toe straps on the keel batten and arranged extra mainsheet cleats where I would sit on the side deck. If you think about it, getting your center of gravity a foot or so farther from the centerline would have a significant affect on righting moment (think about levers). Additionally, I am considering killing two birds with one stone: an electric trolling motor with two 12v batteries (probably one beside the cb, the other just aft of it in the aft cockpit). In a way, I have created my own problem: my masts are a bit taller than spec, giving me more headroom and opportunity for a higher dodger. I may reduce the height, now that I've decided a high dodger is a mistake due to excessive windage.

Water ballast is flexible, but rather low-density compared to lead. Would you put in a separate sole and use the space between bottom and sole for water tanks? How do you avoid "slosh"? I know the Sea Pearl has tanks, but no more than that.

[Ken_Potts]

The Sea Pearl I was on recently has 2 ballast tanks that are long and skinny - one on each side of the bilge roughly centered fore-and-aft (maybe 1/2 or 2/3 the length of the waterline?). I think the key thing with that arrangement is that the tanks are skinny ones as far outboard as possible. The way I understand it the water ballast really starts working as the windward tank is raised above the waterline.

If I'm correct in that thinking then the thing to do for water ballast would be to fill up the air tanks under the seat with water - Wait a minute... (any heavier-than-water ballast does best when mounted as low as possible, though, hence the centerboard).

Any ballast will slow the boat down, though.