Sunday, June 17, 2007

Runabout


A runabout is one small motorboat holding among four and eight people, well suited to moving about on the water. Runabouts can be used for racing, for enjoyment activities like fishing and water skiing, or as a ship's fond for larger vessels. Some common runabout boats are bow rider, center console, cuddy and walkaround.

The use of aluminium in small boat creation came soon after World War II because of availability of aircraft materials as war surplus. Fibreglass was then introduced as an additional way to lessen the maintenance cost and weight of watercraft.

By 1960, wooden powerboats had become unusual since most new vessels used fiberglass or other lightweight resources. Fiber unbreakable plastic materials are now used widely in manufacturing small runabout boats to reduce weight and maximise speed when racing powerboats.

Sunday, June 10, 2007

Pontoon

A pontoon is a flat-bottomed boat or the floats used to support an arrangement on water. It may be simply constructed from closed cylinders such as pipes or barrels or made-up of boxes from metal or concrete. These may be worn to support a simple platform, creating a raft. A raft supporting a house-like structure is single form of houseboat.
Pontoon boats usually run slower and are less likely to cause harm to themselves or other vessels, and are thus less luxurious to insure. As such, they are the most admired vessel style for rental operations. They also present the largest value in terms of capacity to price.

Tuesday, June 05, 2007

Longboat

His longboat should not be confused with a Long ship; or with a narrow boat. In the days of sailing ships, a vessel would take a number of boats for various uses. One would be a longboat, an open, mainly rowing boat with eight or ten oarsmen, two per spoil. In other words the longboat was double banked: its rowing benches were planned to accommodate two men. Unlike the vessel or the cutter, the longboat would have quite fine lines aft to permit its use in steep waves such as surf or wind against tide where need be.
It had the double-banked understanding in common with the cutter. This was possible as it had a beam alike to a cutter's but broader than that of a gig, which was solitary banked. The longboat was frequently more seaworthy than the cutter which had a fuller stern for such load-carrying work as laying out an anchor and cable. In a seaway or surf therefore, the cutter was more flat to broaching to.