Question:
I have recently been given a 16' Prindle cat hull. I would like to turn
this into a pontoon/party boat for inland lakes and some off shore use on
Cape Cod.The primary use would be as a scuba diving vessel, maybe a few
early evening ' booze cruises' around the lake after diving. I would
greatly appreciate any info available, or input from anyone who has built
such a boat or knows of common mistakes to avoid..i.e.,weight
limitations,adding flotation material to the hulls,etc.
Answer:
-I am not familiar with the Prindle cat. If you tell me more about it I might be
of some help. I have been involved in building a pontoon with my Dad many years
ago. As a place to start I will warn you to keep everything as balanced front
to back as possible. Even my 28 footer tends to "nose dive" into the waves if
the front (fordeck) is 200 or so pounds heavier than the rear (aft). Also use
as much aluminium as possible in place of steel. Cross braces, brackets,
anything you can, use aluminium. This might mean you will need to learn MIG
welding, or farm it out, but it will be worth it. I would stick to steel for
the motor mount (transom). The one on my current pontoon is steel angle iron
with a laminated oak board to mount the motor on. The laminated oak transom, 3
layers of 3/4 inch thick red oak, has held up much better than the previous
solid pine 2x12 boards. Good luck, let me know how thing go.
-I am afraid that the Prindle hulls don't have enough volume ot support
such a conversion.
Boat Plans Online
http://www.bateau.com
-I wonder about this. Here's my guess:
A Prindle hull has the necessary bouyancy to float, safely, two
times the weight of the boat, rig, and crew. (The logic of this is
simple, if the boat can "safely" fly a hull, then one hull is all it takes
to "safely" float all of the above.) I am assuming, but only slightly,
that the party barge will be out in less windy conditions, on flatter
water, and will be more inherently stable without that tall wing up in the
air.
Let us suppose you can build a platform, carefully, at about the
same weight as the entire sail rig. This should be easy enough to do.
(You get the weight of the mast, standing rigging, running rigging,
mainsail, jib, blocks, wire halyard, downhaul, boom, etc.)
You also end up lowering the metacenter of the boat, which is
generally A Good Thing, here.
OK, now you can add as weight (because of the "double" bouyancy of
the hulls), for outboard & gas, the entire weight of the boat, rig and
crew. Because the motor and gas (and don't forget the outboard mount)
should be lower than the mast, boom, & sail, you get some added design
stability here.
Don't forget that you've still moved your weight aft, with that
darn outboard, and so I would move my "deck" forward, probably by cutting
off the last 18" or so of the deck/trampoline.
You going to put up a bimini? That'll cost you plenty, in terms
of weight and stability (and cash).
So: You might be able to do it. You would NOT be able to move a
lot of heavy gear, large groups of people (and their liquor), if everyone
walked around standing up, you'd be in trouble, and you could not power
this baby much. I suspect that you actually *do* want to do this kind of
thing. Go get a pontoon/platform boat. They're ridiculously cheap.
If you want to take just a few folks out, maybe three and gear,
maybe four and no gear but a cooler, it might work.
I'd give serious thought to working out how to store gear lockers
down low on the boat.
