The Time Has Come. Let's Launch Our Homemade Boat

OK.  We had a finished boat.  And we had paddles.  What else do we need?  Water.  We need some water to float in. 

Already got that covered.  We have procured a testing facility that we shall refer to only as pond X and have taken security precautions to ensure that we shall be the only boaters on the water that day.  There's no sense in putting other boaters in jeopardy in case of a catastrophic anomaly.  That means something bad happens.  The NASA guys called it something like that when the Challenger exploded.

Now what else do we need?  Paddlers.  How about some paddlers?

Oh yeah.  We rounded up a couple of them.  Anything else we need?

Life jackets.  Don't the paddlers need life jackets?

Nah. I'm not worried about them.  They're not my kids.  Besides that, the pond is shallow enough that they can stand up when...........um, I mean if they tip over.  Or sink.  Whichever comes first.

OK, just to refresh your memory, this is what the boat originally looked like.

Here we are at our testing facility.  Our security personnel is serving double duty as a dock hand.  He is multi talented that way.

Two happy paddlers have already been installed and off and away it goes.

Here they go.  Note how happy they are.  And by golly it certainly seems to be floating.  Could that be the reason why they are so happy?

See?  Still happy.

And still floating.  Did you notice that?  Does seem to be a bit nose heavy though.

Nephew is so happy he stands up in joy and rocks the boat back and forth.  Seems to be stable all right.  Girlfriend is not quite so happy after he does so.  But look.  Still floating.  Still nose heavy.  But it seems to be nowhere near maximum weight capacity.  Is there anything that could be done to fix the nose heavy part?  Some brilliant idea out there that could possibly correct things?

Of course.  Here is the brilliant idea in action.  Add more weight to the rear of the boat.  That should even things out.

Yes it should.  And it did.  But it was a little more weight than needed.  Now it is back end heavy.

Hmmmmmmm.

It certainly seems to be floating well enough however.  But what might be the answer to make it sit more evenly?  Is there anything that could be done?  Perhaps some high tech shock absorbing remote sensing automatic calibrating self adjusting linkages or something that might work?

Of course.  Cousin Jill.  She is the answer.  We'll get her.

What?  Who is this Cousin Jill that you speak of?  Is she some type of rocket scientist?  A mechanical engineer?  A specialist in robotics and fluid dynamics?  A miracle working genius of the highest order?

Well, almost.  But not quite.  She is just.......................  Well, she is just Cousin Jill.  But she is the solution to our problem.

What?  I'm a bit confused here. Whatever on earth do you mean?

This is Cousin Jill. And as you can see, in less than a minute she has already solved our problem.  Look at that.  The weight seems to be balanced out perfectly.

I knew she could do it.  Installing her onto the front of the boat evened things right out.

OK people.  We have a boat here that is 7 feet 10 inches long.  It is 40 inches wide. The sides are either 13 or 14 inches high.  Right at the moment there is 590 pounds of people in it.  And it doesn't seem to be anywhere near sinking.  How much will this little thing hold before it begins taking on water?

Well, we simply do not know.  Not yet anyway. We were out of people to install onto the little feller.  Perhaps we will find out in the future.

How much weight do other 8 ft boats hold? I don't know but i was kinda impressed.

Shortly after this picture was taken, Cousin Jill stood up at the front of the boat and rocked it back and forth.  It didn't tip over.  No one got wet.  It was pretty stable really.

What sort of conclusions can we draw simply from looking at this picture?

One.  Boaters are happy people. Especially ones that survive the first trip out in a home built boat.

Two.  The boat does not leak.  It was out for 20 minutes or so with a lot of weight in it and not one drop of water came in.

Three.  It is good to have nephews and girlfriends and brothers and Cousins.  When the time comes and no one else can be forced to, they make good Guinea pigs for experimentation purposes.

Four.  The solution to many of lifes problems is to add one more person.

Five.  Security personnel and Cousins make good ballast. 

Six.  Building boats is fun.  It does not take a lot of skill to do. All it takes is a living room.  So what is stopping you?

We are currently taking suggestions for the naming of our small craft.  Let me know if you happen to come up with something suitable.