Drawing Board

I am constantly working on new designs, either to fill some performance desire I have or to meet the needs of customers. Sometimes I just have an idea that I want to play with, so I'll draw something up. These ideas may be at different stages of completion. Some are just ideas, others I have taken all the way to having a complete set of drawings prepared. Some times they are the product of a request from a customer and they paid to have finished drawings prepared so they could build them. Other times they are ideas I think would be fun and hope someone will request that I finish them up.

These plans are product of Nick's years of boating experience and extensive research into what makes boats work. Each design starts out as an idea spawned on the water. Time out in boats will suggest how a boat could be tailored to perform better in specific conditions. The idea may be for something that works better poking into a salt marsh or for dropping down the wave face of hurricane surf. Inspirations for solutions come from traditional Inuit and Aleut kayaks as well as more contemporary powerboats and sailboats.

After an concept is born Nick will sketch up some ideas on paper, attempting to get the basic shape developed. From there the sketched ideas will be transferred to the computer and a naval architecture CAD package. CAD does not design the boat, it is just a fancy tool for drawing and analyzing the result. The design is initially roughed out and analyzed for basic hydrostatics, i.e. how and where it floats. The shape is then tweaked as needed and reanalyzed. This process is repeated as long as necessary until the basic concept appears workable.