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West Wight Potter Mailing List maintainer
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Robert:
A stock P-15 is easy for one man to right when turtled. Grab the keel and
pull/ lean back. Make sure the keel is somehow tied down beforehand (before
turtling) otherwise it could come out and go to the bottom.
I would say no amount of flotation is too much. Fibreglass by itself is
supposedly bouyant so it would figure that the largest sinking part of the
boat is the keel. It's fortunate that this is at the bottom of the boat.
My guess is to put foam under the cabin liner and alot under the cockpit and
up the sides. You can use your body to help balance the boat during the
levitation process. Once the styrofoam is above the waterline it isn't
helping. Heed Solar Fry's advice and put a really big drain plug in it.
Check out the size of the self bailers on other sailboats of similar size.
Some of the self bailers act as check valves.
I tried inflatable inner tubes under the cockpit, but I had to stab them
with a knife to get them out. Inflatable life raft are donut shaped, so
there can be alot of water in the middle. Another alternative is to install
a watertight bulkhead under the cockpit where the cabin starts. This makes
the whole under cockpit area a large flotation chamber.
When I sold the boat I gave the new owner my large collection of milk jugs
that I had intended to use for flotation.
A good flotation bag may be the large water storage bags sold by survival or
livestock outlets. They can fit in the bed of a pickup and hold several
hundred gallons. These would be ideal for under a cockpit. From memory a 300
gallon bag costs $59. I'll have to check through my literature to find the
source. Also a waterbed inflated with air should work.
Any flotation up high (cabin roof) will surely help with righting the boat,
but it doesn't get the gunwales above the water.
Another possibility is to have a "collar" go on the outside of the boat to
float it up, just like the Mercury/Gemini/Apollo space capsules had. This
"collar" could be a large self inflating raft in which the P-15 sits. It
just has to get it up high enough for you to bail the boat out. I believe
Stanley Smith had some type of inflatable things on his P-14 during his
famous sail to Sweden from England.
All this may sound highly anal retentive to some, but believe me swamping
the boat can lead to a real ordeal- especially if you are alone. I wouldn't
wish it on anyone.
Hope this helps,
Jim Nolan P-19 #426 Panache
>From: Robert Skinner <robert@140.com>
>To: Jim Nolan <panache426@hotmail.com>
>CC: Potter Distribution List <wwpotter@tscnet.com>
>Subject: Re: Unidentified subject! - flotation
>Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2000 15:48:08 -0500
>
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> West Wight Potter Mailing List maintainer
> dfarrell@ridgecrest.ca.us
> List hosted by www.tscnet.com
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>Jim -
>You make a strong case for a bilge plug. Combined with bladders or
>other flotation low in the cabin (which is/are absent from Little
>Dipper at this time), and more than the usual flotation aft (which
>Holland Webb did install), it sounds very workable -- specially as
>opposed to the fire drill that I envisioned.
>
>One item to be resolved: A lot of flotation low in the cabin would
>seem to make it more difficult to right a capsized and flooded P15.
>How much flotation would be too much?
>
>Must have been a real thrill, having the mainsheet as such a close
>friend. I am not envious.
>--
>Robert Skinner, Rockville, MD
>'87 Potter 15 HMS #1618 "Little Dipper"
>=================================================================================
>Jim Nolan wrote:
> > Another alternative to save the P-15 from floundering and perhaps make
>self
> > rescue a possibility is to install enough flotation in the boat to get
>the
> > gunwales above the water. One way to help this along is to install a
>large
> > bilge drain plug (mine at first did not have one) on the lower part of
>the
> > transom. When capsized, simply (haha!) unscrew the transom drain and
>right
> > the boat. This can also be done with the boat upright and swamped. The
> > bouyancy of the boat and flotation will lift the boat up and drain the
>water
> > from the boat to the point where it can be bailed.
>
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