Chapter XIV

CATAMARANS

A Rowing Catamaran

For safety on the water, as nearly as safety can be assured, there is nothing to compare with a catamaran, for they are practically “non-capsizable,” and if not damaged to the leaking-point one or the other of the two boats will float and hold up several persons. Fig. 1 gives a good idea for a rowing catamaran that any boy can make from some boards and light timbers. It is provided with a seat and oar-locks so that the occupant may be seated above the water far enough to row easily.

The boats are fourteen feet long, eighteen inches wide, and fourteen inches deep, including the bottom and deck.

Pine, white-wood, cedar, or cypress, three-quarters of an inch thick and planed on both sides, will be necessary from which to construct the boats. At the bow the ends of the sides are attached to a stern-piece of hard-wood as shown in Fig. 2. Having poured boiling water on the forward ends, they may be drawn around a spreader sixteen inches long and twelve inches wide provided with two U-cuts as shown in Fig. 3. These are placed at the bottom, so that any water may be run to one end of a boat where it can be pumped out.

The first spreader is placed three feet from the bow, and three or four more of them should be fastened between the sides as shown in Fig. 4, the last one being three feet from the stern where the sides begin to curve up to the upper edge of the stern and to the deck.

The bottom is of three-inch pine or white-wood boards seven-eighths of an inch thick and well leaded in the joints and along the edges where the bottom and top boards join the sides. Before the top or deck is placed on, the interior of the boats should have two or three good coats of paint.

Three cross-stringers of spruce two and one-half by four inches and six feet long are securely attached to the boats, and on these the deck of four-inch boards is made fast as the illustration will show. Between the middle and forward stringer, at the ends, two boards are attached on which the row-locks may be fastened. These boards are eight or nine inches wide and cut away at the front so that they are not more than two or three inches wide.

The high ends are braced with round iron braces as shown in the illustration, and where the oar-locks are mounted a short plate of wood is screwed fast to the inside of each piece.

Near the front cross-piece a seat is built and braced with a board. With another boy at the stern sitting on the deck this catamaran will be well balanced and will prove very seaworthy, as well as a light boat to row.

A Sailing Catamaran

It is almost impossible to upset a sailing catamaran even in a gale, and for boys a boat of this kind affords a great deal of comparatively safe pleasure.

A catamaran is about the easiest sort of a boat to make, and no matter in what locality one lives there is always material at hand from which to make one as the wood is similar to that used for house construction.

Fig. 5 shows a side elevation of a safe catamaran, and in Fig. 6 the deck plan is shown. In Fig. 7 an elevation view of the stern shows the arrangement of the boats, deck timbers, and rudders.

The boats are fifteen feet long, eighteen inches wide at the middle, and two feet deep uniformly from bow to stern except for a short distance at the bow where the keel rounds up.

They are in the form of a V, and at the ends the angle becomes more acute, so that at the stem and stern the lines are vertical.

Four feet from both ends the deck line begins to curve as shown in Fig. 6, and in Fig. 8 the cross-braces are shown. They are cut in at the bottom to slip over the keel and to them the sheathing planks are made fast.

In Fig. 8 the curved stem-piece and one side of planking is shown, and it indicates also where the curved stem-piece is joined to the keel, which extends in a straight line to the stern of the boats.

The keel is of hard-wood one inch and a quarter thick and six inches wide. The cross-braces or spreaders are of pine or other soft wood seven-eighths of an inch thick and made up of three pieces of wood with the grain running vertically.

The sheathing is of pine, cedar, or cypress three-quarters of an inch thick, planed on both sides, and three or four inches wide. Each board should be given a priming coat of paint before it is nailed to the braces, and where the planks are edged together white-lead and lamp-wick should be employed for calking. Galvanized boat nails are to be used for all the fastenings, but screws may be employed where it is necessary to have a very secure joint.

The cross-pieces that fasten the boats together are bolted fast by means of long bolts that pass through the timbers and deck and into stout pieces of wood that are nailed fast to the upper part of the spreaders as shown at A in Fig. 8. The boats are decked over with the three-quarter-inch planking, and to insure an absolutely tight deck the wood may be treated to a thick coat of paint and covered with canvas which is pressed down well into the paint and the edges tacked down over the sides of the boats. The canvas is then given a coat or two of paint and allowed to dry thoroughly, after which it can be sand-papered and finished with the desired shade of paint.

Three spruce timbers eight feet long, three inches thick, and six inches wide are bored with holes at the ends where the bolts pass through them and into the boats. Running parallel to the boats three timbers are laid across the brace-timbers and on top of these the deck planking is nailed. These pieces are two and one-half by four inches, and ten feet long, and are bolted down with long slim bolts.

The decking is formed of slats three-quarters of an inch thick and four inches wide nailed down to these stringers. Spaces half an inch wide are left between each one.

The bowsprit is of three-by-four-inch spruce left with its square corners for half its length but dressed round at the outer end. It is caught under the middle cross-brace where the end is bolted, and extending over the front piece it projects four or five feet beyond the bow ends of the boats. With wire-cable the bowsprit end is stayed to the bow of each boat, where turn-buckles can be caught into eyes in the stem-posts.

The mast is of spruce dressed from a four-inch spruce stick and slightly tapered at the top. It is fifteen feet long and stepped at the middle of the front cross-piece and on top of the bowsprit where it is held in place with a collar and iron braces as shown in the illustration. Fig. 5.

Standing rigging of wire-cable stays the mast from the top to both ends of the front cross-piece as indicated by the dotted line in Fig. 7.

Three short posts are made fast to the cross-pieces close to the decking, and holes bored in the tops of them will hold a safety-rope around the deck.

The rudder-posts are of hard-wood one inch and a quarter thick and two inches and a half in width. They are three feet long and to the upper end of each a strap of metal is arranged to receive the tiller as shown in Fig. 9.

The tillers are of hard-wood three feet long and their inner ends are connected with a hard-wood stick by means of which the steering is done and both rudders operated at the same time.

The rudders, made from two sheets of galvanized iron, are riveted fast to the rudder-posts and are twelve inches high and fifteen inches long. Pins on the posts fit into eyes attached to the stern-post of the boats, and in Fig. 10 the arrangement of rudders, tillers, and connecting-rod is shown.

The main-sail is of twilled cotton that can be had at a dry-goods store for about ten cents a yard, and a rib should be sewed through the middle of each breadth to strengthen the cloth. The sail is nine feet and six inches on the mast, six feet on the gaff, thirteen feet on the boom, and fifteen feet on the leach. The jib, also of twilled cotton, is eleven feet and six inches on the forestay, eight feet across the foot, and eight feet and six inches on the leach. The blocks can be of galvanized iron but patent sheave-wood blocks are preferable.

For the halyards Manila-rope three-eighths of an inch in diameter will be the right size, and a half-inch anchor-rope will be stout enough, since a catamaran does not tug as heavily on an anchor as does a boat.

The wood-work of the boat and deck should be painted and the spars varnished. A pretty effect will be to paint the boat a rich olive green, with buff decks, and all the cross-pieces and deck planking in ivory white.

The ordinary sailing rules will apply to the handling of a catamaran. With these wedge-shaped boats you can sail quite close to the wind, but if round-bottomed and shallower boats are used they will have to be provided with centre-boards.

A Side-wheel Catamaran

The rowing catamaran can easily be converted into a side-wheel boat by removing the middle slat of the deck and making an opening through which a chain will lead to a cog or sprocket wheel on an axle.

At the outer side of each boat, between the middle and rear cross-braces, fasten two pieces of wood two inches wide and three inches high. Six or eight inches from the rear end make two U-cuts for a five-eighth-inch axle to fit into. At a blacksmith’s obtain two old carriage or buggy wheels, and cut the spokes so that they will be fourteen inches long from the hub. Dress one side of each spoke flat, so that a paddle may be attached to it with screws. The paddles are of hard-wood, eight inches wide at the outer end, six at the inner end, and six inches deep.

Have a blacksmith heat the ends of an axle and pound them square, then slip one hub over the iron, and with hard-wood wedges make it fast. The other wheel can be slipped on when the axle is in place and attached in a similar manner. It would be best to remove the old iron boxes from the hubs, so that a few screws can be driven through the hub and into the wedges to help in holding them securely in place.

In Fig. 11, which is a stern view of the rowing catamaran, one of the paddle-wheels is shown in place, and it also shows the location of the axle, the sprocket-wheel, and the chain that leads to the large sprocket-wheel by means of which the axle is turned.

An old bicycle chain and sprockets, together with the axle, cranks, and pedals, can be arranged on a frame, so that a saddle may be mounted the proper distance above the pedals. This arrangement is clearly shown in the illustration, which shows also the outrigger timbers at the stern, to which a sheet-iron rudder may be made fast. It is operated by a handle and bar, which turns the rudder by means of flexible wire-rope run through two deck-pulleys at the outer rear ends of the deck planking. The iron rod is held in place to the forward upright of the seat-frame with metal straps. At its lower end a wooden wheel having a groove is made fast, around which a wrap or two of the wire-cable is taken to hold the rudder steady.