jdoorly wrote:Yes, I was speaking of the balanced jib idea, no, I wasn't thinking about the Hoyt balanced jib (I forgot about that). I was thinking about this boat: http://www.swallowboats.com/our-boats/open-boats/storm-17 There was a pic in a 2006 issue of Water Craft (U.K.).
The feature of the balanced jib is that you don't need much muscle or winch to pull it in even on larger boats, because it's BALANCED!
ooops, this is a better pic of the balanced jib: http://www.swallowboats.com/bayraider-17
Looking at this site http://www.swallowboats.com/bayraider-17, then reading the description and viewing the videos provided, another very interesting feature (for me) of this boat is their water filled ballast tank on the 17' boat, making it very difficult to lay over, and harder still to keep it down in the water. They speak of approx 220 kg of water (485lbs) in a tank inside the double hull, providing substantial stability (more like a keel boat) in more difficult conditions.
Doing some quick math (which is as likely to be wrong as right), I think that 485 lbs = 58 gallons?? of water, which I further think is about 7 cubic feet of volume, which I further think is a space about the size of the underfloor portion of the bilge in the DaySailer. Not having actually measured anything, but having spent a fair number of minutes looking around under the floor playing with flotation swim noodles, it seems to me, the depth between the inner and outer hull runs from about 8 inches at the access ports to just a few inches 5-6 feet back toward the drain well. With an nominal width of about 3 ft (minus the centerboard trunk), I'm coming up with just about 7 cu-ft?. (past performance is not an valid indicator of future earnings)
So... why couldn't one put a bladder tank (or two) in that space with a water pump that can take on or expel water to add righting ballast when the winds start getting ugly?
This would not have occurred to me prior to seeing this implemented on the Bayraider, but two of my absolute quests in life, are to both get my wife back out on my boat after almost dumping her in the water during a bad turn on a windy day last year, and also to be able to take my 4 year old grandson out for rides, both of these requiring rock solid stability until I am much better at my job of sailing than I will likely be for the next couple years.
Is this a really stupid idea?
Thanks - Scott