Lead weights for ballast?

[Captain Jim]

Catigal, our trailer ( ) would be available for an emergency, May thru October. We are just up the road from you in Fort Miller, N.Y.. Contact us via e-mail

Captain Jim

[arvid]

as many others i have lead in the Board and bottom - ca 30 kg in Board and ca 30 kg molded in under the cooleman Box . i made New boardhanger and reinforced the hangerarea and the whole Board . the boat feels stiffer and heels slower and less so it feels safer for kids and womens. the only problem is that the Board are banging worse in the nigths so i have to figure out how to Mount rubberpads for silent sleeping - any ideas ?

[BOAT]

The M boat has about 1/2 a foot of lead or somthing permanently molded into the ballast tank around the dagger-board opening and actually I think it works quite well. I think it's works out to be around 350 pounds. I find that the boat does indeed self right with no ballast. I suppose it would be nice to have less 350 pounds to trailer around but for the most part I think it's a good idea. Roger seemed to like the idea because he designed it into the last boat.

I suppose he probably would have added it to the X boat too even after production started except for two issues that would make the permanent ballast difficult:

1. the X boat has a swing keel so there is not as much area to add the lead but even more important:
2. the x boat has a flatter bottom and the lead ballast would still not be as effective as it would be in a deeper hull like the M boat. The permanent ballast in the M boat is in the deepest section of the hull.

It seems the leaded keel might be a better option.

[Highlander]

Correction ,
The has approx. 300# of sand epoxied into the hull around the base of the dagger board trunk
#1 it adds strength to the base of the D/Board Trunk when the D/B is fully extended & incase of running aground as it is the deepest section of the hull & makes sure that the D/B takes the sacrifice & not the hull around the D/B Trunk

#2 the added 300# of fixed Ballast provides some stability when the Ballast tank is mty on the more rounded Hull

#3 when under power with mty ballast Tank the 300# of fixed ballast helps to keep the bow from raising as much so as u can see over the bow better

#4 Sand is a lot cheaper to buy than lead weight

#5 Lead is also considered a Contaminant in the work place where as sand is Not

Yer tink Roger had his sh_t together no wonder he out lasted a lot of others

J
PS That's why I say if u want extra ballast in ur D/B use sand

[BOAT]

Okay, thanks Highlander for the info - I knew it was lead or something - something heavy sand sounds like a better idea to me too. I can't actually touch it because it's inside the ballast tank and it sure is hard and solid like lead but I think sand does indeed make a lot more sense. Perhaps people in the X boat should consider sand in their keel instead of lead?

[Seapup]

Perhaps people in the X boat should consider sand in their keel instead of lead?

Specific gravity of water is 1, sand is 1.5-2 depending on type, and lead about 7. The tip of the X board is hollow and the body mostly solid. About 50lbs of lead fits in the end of the x board. Filled with water (neutral buoyancy) that area is about 7lbs, with sand 12lbs, & lead 50.

50lbs on a 6' lever may be similar to 300lbs on a short lever just below water level.

the only problem is that the Board are banging worse in the nigths so i have to figure out how to Mount rubberpads for silent sleeping - any ideas ?

We always kept the board up tight at anchor and the weight kept it to one side even when rocking hard in wakes.

[Jimmyt]

Not to be a PITA, but 7 lbs of water IN water weighs nothing. Everything else weighs 7 lbs less than it weighs in air due to having displaced 7 lbs of water. Not that it adds anything to the discussion, but in the quest for numerical accuracy...

My admiral says I have about 7 lbs of lead between my ears...

[BOAT]

I really think this is all pointless on the X boat. If the added weight in the bottom of the hull would have made any difference I thing Roger would have added it - because the bottom of the X is so flat I think the added permanent ballast in the hull would not be much help. I think that is what this post is all about according to the title: Lead Weights in the Ballast is the road I think the original poster was going down.

The bottom line on that is: No, lead weights IN the hull or ballast would not be any good in the X boat - because the bottom is too flat to take advantage of the small difference in weight between water and lead.

After reading John's post on the sand epoxy mixture used by the factory I went back and read Rogers comparison of the X boat to the M boat and also looked up the density values of sand and rocks and lead and water.

Rogers comments on the permanent ballast are such: it's 300 pounds and the same density as water (replaces 300 pounds of water in Rogers words) - so that does indeed rule out lead and also makes lead ballast pointless in the X boat. Roger would have never used it anyways.

So in the X boat this all boils down to the keel.

Modifying the keel is also a huge problem if you add up Rogers comments about the swing keel on the X hull - Roger says that the boat will tend to a weather helm with a partially retracted keel because the center of moment is shifted aft - that brings up the issue of not just swinging the lead ballast away from the hull, but also means your moving the ballast for and aft. That's got to have an effect of balance too. In the long run, I think you end up with only one solution, and that is an X boat with a greatly modified keel. Only the skipper of an X boat can judge the value of adding that weight and strain to the existing pin assembly. Apparently it was not an option Roger was going to consider.

I think a solid steel swing keel with a bolstered and heavy duty pin might be an option, but in a storm would the keel crash through the bottom of the boat? (That was one of the inherent dangers discoverer in the first VENTURES swing keels that Roger built). The design to prevent that was put in after only a few boats were built - but it seems that Roger himself was never really comfortable with a weighted swing keel and also his peer, Whitney Peden who owned Coastal Recreation just down the street. They had installed a swing keel on a Balboa 26 that tore through the hull on a turtle and made changes too. The Aquarius was therefore never produced with a weighted keel and I think Roger abandoned the idea forever also. These were all ideas that were fully tested back in the 60's that did not seem to survive.

[sailboatmike]

I dont see the issue with weighted swing keels, I would think that there is more weighted swing keel designed trailer sailors than drop keels such as in the M.

Swing keel designs are highly popular in designs for shoaling conditions as drop keel designs can suffer severe damage to the whole keel area if the run aground.

The major drawback to swing keels is the boat is slower through the water due to water entering the keel slot causing turbulence.

Given the distance from the center of effort to the bottom of the keel a small amount of weight in the bottom of the keel would make a significant difference to the righting moment of the boat.

Water ballast has some great advantages such as allowing a small car to tow a large boat, however in true terms is highly inefficient as you need to carry much more weight to achieve the same righting moment

A typical example is a 26 foot very fast and stable boat parked next to mine on the slip only carries 450kg keel against my water ballast of around 650kg, his mast is around 5 feet higher than mine and thus he carries much more sail area with less ballast and still sails more upright and thus faster.

I would think around 20Kg (44 lbs) of ballast added to the bottom of the X keel would make the boat much stiffer and in theory would allow you to reduce the amount of water ballast by around 30kg or 66lbs.

Of course this is theory, and you should NEVER sail with partially filled ballast tanks as it allows the water to slosh around in the tanks and would make the boat unstable,

[BOAT]

Oh I do agree that swing keels are very popular, it's the WEIGHTED swing keels that died out on the trailer able boat market. Even the Aquarius had a swing keel, but all the ballast was permanent. They ended up with a similar design for the Balboa26 - which was the boat that inspired Roger to go bigger. Prior to the Balboa 26 there really was not a trailer able boat that big. Most of them were 24 feet or less.

The CAL Jensen Marine 25 foot swing keel flush deck was a popular 1970 era trailerable boat but like the Balboa - it was originally a keel boat that was just re-manufactured with a swing keel for the trailer market. The first true Trailer boats designed from the get go to be trailer boats were Rogers Ventures and the Aquarius and a few others (in line with a cruiser that is, not the really small boats).

If it were me - I would seriously consider experimenting with a weighted keel, but I don't think I would weight the existing keel - I would prefer a new keel - a 'retrofit' as you might call it - that would replace the original.

[grady]

I put lead in my swing keel. I did have to upgrade to a 3 to 1 purchase to make it easier to raise. I also upgraded the external line to a SS cable. Also upgraded the pivot bolt and cable attachment to the center board. The issue I see with the motor sailer is you have the lead in the bottom of the center board and the line to retract it close to the pivot. That gives the lead a good mechanical advantage. With the motor sailer I would be concerned about motoring fast hitting waves.

[BOAT]

I don't think I would fill the stock daggerboard on the M boat with lead. It just does not hold enough lead to make any real difference and the stock daggerboard is not really that strong.

If I were going to do a weighted daggerboard on the M boat I think I would build a whole new daggerboard out of steel with a lead bulb on the bottom - to really give it some weight where it counts - like the keel on the 65 foot MAC.

The torpedo shaped bulb on the bottom of the daggerboard would still allow the board to be raised up so only the bottom 4 inches of bulb is exposed for shallow water.

It's a thought and I think two people have tried it including Blue Water Yachts, but overall they said it slows down the boat in light winds. It's also going to have a bad effect on motoring.

In the long run there is just not enough there on the stock board to weight it - the change in performance would be insignificant. To get a real change a whole new board would be needed, so it's a mod that I will never be doing.

[grady]

I don't think I would fill the stock daggerboard on the M boat with lead. It just does not hold enough lead to make any real difference and the stock daggerboard is not really that strong.

If I were going to do a weighted daggerboard on the M boat I think I would build a whole new daggerboard out of steel with a lead bulb on the bottom - to really give it some weight where it counts - like the keel on the 65 foot MAC.

The torpedo shaped bulb on the bottom of the daggerboard would still allow the board to be raised up so only the bottom 4 inches of bulb is exposed for shallow water.

It's a thought and I think two people have tried it including Blue Water Yachts, but overall they said it slows down the boat in light winds. It's also going to have a bad effect on motoring.

In the long run there is just not enough there on the stock board to weight it - the change in performance would be insignificant. To get a real change a whole new board would be needed, so it's a mod that I will never be doing.

I agree. Any time you add weight you slow the boat down in light winds. The one thing I was wanting to accomplish on mine is my center board has a very tight fit in the trunk to eliminate any slop. I was concerned about the ability of the board to extend without the added weight. I am very happy with the results I can leave the board all the way down at anchor with NO banging. Also after taking the slop out of the board I noticed I pointed above all the S model boats I race and almost point as high as a D model.

[BOAT]

Yeah, I think the S boat and the D boat would be way better at taking a keel mod because those boats are real sailboats and have the right shape to take advantage of a heavy keel. A D boat can sail on it's side like a real sailboat.

The M boat? I think it would be a marginal proposition because your talking about a boat that loses it's sailboat shape after 15 degrees anyways and no keel in the world is going to keep the M boat under 15 degrees.

On the X boat? Ferget it - that flat bottom and square transom are just going to dig in deeper into the water the more you heel and adding more weight will just dig that edge into the water deeper creating even more drag - - sure, it might be a little more stable, but slower. An X boat skipper would need to experiment with such a thing - the real deal would be to figure out how to keep your X boat flat on the water in high winds. That would make the boat faster, but how do you do that without adding weight?

On an S boat or a D with a real sailboat hull like they have it could probably take the weight of the keel and use it because it's hull will go through the water with more ease even when loaded down.

All boats have the same problem though, how do you get rid of the weight when you don't need it? (like in light winds) - so the theory is to design a rig that can do hull speed in light to moderate winds. And then offer a way to depower the sails in heavy winds to keep the boat on it's feet. That's the concept.

[Jimmyt]

Or... Water ballasted bilge keels and no ballast in the hull. As the windward bilge keel rises out of the water on heel, it becomes very heavy, and has a better moment arm. Don't add weight, move the weight to where it will do more good.