Ralph Hoehn wrote: > More potential "prior art": [...] > Capt. Romer made it to St. Thomas (Haiti), but was lost in a > hurricane during his onward journey to New York. I can't decide whether that > speaks for or against the usefulness of sponsons. Well, his disappearance in the hurricane might rather be a factor of the outboarder he used - thus reducing the seaworthiness of his craft. But this is just another guess since neither him nor his boat were ever found again. For even more "prior sponson art" see the following page: http://home.t-online.de/home/derpoly/mehrrumpfboote.html#kenterschlaeuche The pictures are taken from a 1938 magazine, showing sailing folding boats, equipped with external sponsons. The text says that external sponsons were widely used in the 1930's but were not liked by the more "capable" paddlers. You can scroll up and down that page to get an impression of classic and modern catamarans and outriggers used with folding kayaks. During a folding kayak meeting, I saw an older (without internal sponsons) Klepper model having devices to add sponsons to the outside of the hull. These looked professional so I guess one could order a Klepper boat with sponson devices already on place. Cheers, Marian -- Marian Gunkel, Berlin, Germany http://www.mariangunkel.de *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Thu Nov 07 2002 - 01:32:08 PST
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