Get your boat in the water now, hoist your sails, and, with a fine breeze, take your first sail in your catamaran. You need have no fear of capsizing, but your boat may do what they call "pitch pole," that is, dip its nose into the water, and go completely over. We are in hopes, however, that this one will not act so.
In making the drawings for this catamaran the supposition is that you have an ice-boat, and that you utilize certain parts of said boat in the new construction. New timber is used in whatever radical changes are made, and under no circumstances do you cut any of the old timber, but lay it away until the next cold snap. The construction of this craft from your ice-boat has necessitated a rigid frame-work, preventing the independent movement of the hulls. In a catamaran properly built the hulls should move independently; and for those boys who have not an ice-boat, or prefer, if they have, to lay it aside altogether, additional drawings are made. The changes are only in the manner of fastening the hulls to the frame-work—the arrangement of the keel and bowsprit, an additional mould in either hull, a crown to the deck, and a slight difference in the iron-work and position of the tiller.
The keel, K, of white pine, four inches wide, an inch and three-quarters thick, and eight feet long, runs twelve inches beyond the after cross-beam; instead of being on top, it is hung underneath the beams, and bolted to them by half-inch links or eyebolts. The ends of the cross-beams are fastened to the moulds in the hulls (Fig. 1 will show you how), with a rubber washer on top; this will give elasticity. You will observe that these are used wherever there are bolts, with the exception of those in the keel. Fig. 2 gives the detail of the stanchions (of oak, one by three inches) for keeping the hulls on an even keel, and at the same time allowing a limited rolling motion; the other end of the stanchion is bolted to an extra mould in the hulls, marked R M and L M. You notice the difference in the positions of the same (see Fig. 1 and plans in Plate I.); Fig. 2, Plate II., explains why. The detail is given (Fig. 5, Plate II.) of rubber washers, links, etc.; this is drawn quarter size. Mast bench of oak an inch and a half thick and six inches wide. If you like, instead of pine for cross-beams, oak can be used, an inch and a half thick, but only four inches wide, and, if it is possible, get them with a slight curve upward.
Instead of nailing the floor to the bottom of the side pieces, lay a four-inch plank of oak on the cross-beams, G, Fig. 1, and fasten the floor to that. Make it three-quarters of an inch thick, instead of half an inch, as in Plate I. This will prevent the floor going through when you happen to get in a rough sea, and your craft gives all over. The side pieces should be bolted to the cross-beams with half-inch bolts, with washers of rubber underneath; one bolt is sufficient in each end of the side pieces, running through the middle of the cross-beams.
With these alterations, in connection with Plate I., there is no reason why you should not have a comfortable craft, and no doubt you will get through the summer creditably, and without a wet jacket from a capsize. As for a "pitch pole," that should not occur, as your craft, when afloat, will be pretty well down by the stern.
["LA CHEVALIÈRE BAYARDE."]
BY LILLIAS C. DAVIDSON.
"Oh dear! I wish I lived in the Middle Ages!"
"What's up now?" asked a voice from Tom's sofa, where he lay idly turning the pages of a comic almanac.