A safety device brainfart

[Skoontz]

We had soccer pictures today, so whilst standing in line with all the other folks who were talking about soccer, I said to myself, "self, what if a person created a transom hook, air activated when a boat got verticle, a air device slams the hooks into the water in an effort to drive down the nose." Then I further thought of the possible scenarios that could occur, which, I'm hoping to hear from you all from.

First scenario is the device works with my STS (slicker than snot) rating of approval, and at 100MPH the hooks grab water and slam the nose down, a far better scenario than blowing over backwards. The second scenario is that the device slows the transom down, and not the nose, thereby causing the boat to blow over fast and harder..... This device would only add 7 lbs, and could work off a mercury switch.

Please lay your thoughts on me.....

[Tomtall]

Your minds going a mile a minute.

Just my thoughts.Blew over an SST 60 doing 80+,no capsule. OUCH!
I think your hooks are going to be of little help do to the tremendous force that the on coming air push's against the bottom of the hull.

Test this out - put a sheet of plywood in the back of your pick up truck. Get up to 60-90 mph and lift the front edge above the cab of the truck. If you want, site on it and see how high you go.:eek:

[Skoontz]

Ok Tom, I'll try that first thing tomorrow when I can see! LOL

Here is where I'm coming from. You hit 80. The nose starts climbing, up up you feel like it's hanging real well and all of a sudden you're beyond the point of no return. When the boat was trimmed, you hit 80. By the time it climbs vertically, it slows to say 70. About that time, these hooks, say 2' deepare grabbing into the water. This will sound weird but is the bottom of the boat going the same speed as the top? The 18' over the water works like a big lever, yet tail is on the water digging in.....The hooks grab and act like a parachute. The weight of the motor digs into the water as does the hooks. Say I build em 3' wide on each side of the boat.....You have essentially 2' of boat stuck into the water...But then there is the nose.....Here's what I just might do..Make a tunnel bottom RC boat and install the hooks. Somehow get it to blow over. Scaled RC stuff acts fairly closely to the real thing....Might be a fun experiment....

[kevin beaulier]

Just attach 2 long fiberglass poles sticking straight out of the back of the boat. When the nose goes up the poles will be forced into the water. This will either push the nose back down or provide leverage for maximum altitude upon liftoff. I figure poles about 12-15 ft long should do it...

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Clayton Elmer used to tell me (this is for hydros-old style) that if you started to blow over, such as nose already very high, and you were able to bring it back down it would go bump...bump then stuff. That would be my main concern is that if you did have enough force to change all that momentum and get it going the other way, you want to make sure it doesn't keep going down to where it interacts with the water in such a way it will stuff. The few times I recovered from being airborne I got on maximum power when the boat reentered the water. If you look in the splash section, back to some early posts you will find the stacks of Stan Leavendusky's runabout doing what you're talking about. I forget the title of the thread. Maybe something to do with Memphis.

[Miss BK]

I'm with Wayne on this one. I'd be afraid you'd end up creating a situation where the nose slams back down violently. Of all the crashes I had, the blowover was the least damaging - I didn't have a scratch. The stuff however, caused a lot of damage to both my boat and my body.

But it's always good to keep thinking about improving safety. :)

[John Schubert T*A*R*T]

Just attach 2 long fiberglass poles sticking straight out of the back of the boat. When the nose goes up the poles will be forced into the water. This will either push the nose back down or provide leverage for maximum altitude upon liftoff. I figure poles about 12-15 ft long should do it...
Dieter Schulze showed up at the OMC factory in Brugge , Belgium in I believe 1971 for testing prior to the Paris race with one of his boats with these extra long pieces of wood attached to the tunnel bottom. It wouldn't plane. When you think about it, during planing, the bow rises until rpm's pick up enpugh & you go over the top. The extensions prohibited the bow of the boat to rise, keeping the propeller somerged & no allowing it to plane. He removed the extensions & it planed rather easily.

[kevin beaulier]

Dieter Schulze showed up at the OMC factory in Brugge , Belgium in I believe 1971 for testing prior to the Paris race with one of his boats with these extra long pieces of wood attached to the tunnel bottom. It wouldn't plane. When you think about it, during planing, the bow rises until rpm's pick up enpugh & you go over the top. The extensions prohibited the bow of the boat to rise, keeping the propeller somerged & no allowing it to plane. He removed the extensions & it planed rather easily.
Joe McCauley took an old Mod 50 Molinari with a SE engine and put a wedge across the entire tunnel in the back, like a wide version of the wedge in front of the gearcase some tunnels had. He said when he tried it the boat submarined when he mashed the gas. Walter McFerrin had a McDonald hull with trap doors in the front of the tunnel. (side note 3 "Mc's" in one post). Ok John now we will have to make the poles telescope so the boat will plane. I always understood that you shouldn't let up when the nose gets up. The theory we came up with was to keep the gas floored and whip the steering wheel back and forth to spill air out from under the boat. We never had anyone remember this at the appropriate time.::eek:

[texnine]

Well Kevin hit the nail on the head. I always had these family members telling NEVER to burp the trottle if I thought I was going to blowover, just hammer and be on the down button at the same time and that was my best chance of surviving (all of this much easier said than done). And yes BK is right, stuffing boats (especially before cells) were very painful. Tell Brad sorry for destroying all the equipment.

[Skoontz]

This is good....INPUT!!!!!

Lemme throw this at you. The load sensors on the hooks react under a set amount of water pressure and the angle the boat is at. As the sensors pick up the boat is heading down, they release, letting air drift the boat onto the course again. Similar devices are used in the sensors of 30" travel gas powered coil over shocks in a class 6 Baja truck. The gas used to deploy the hooks would be an adjustable flow based off what the boat sensed needed to happen. I know this sounds compiclated but consider the first capsules, life jackets, helmets, and etc all had trial periods. I might not ever drove a race, but, I sure skinned alot of knuckles rigging things. Some worked, some did not..

I do know however the art of stuffage...Took a 10' GW Invader that John Janaky helped me rig, passed a Switzer Hugger with a 135 Merc, and, as I passed his bow, a 12" ripple came off a bridge pier....Hit the thing and in the air saw the deck and hull separated and as soon as the boat hit the water the deck peeled off..... That fiberglass mixed with Fox River water tastes like crap!

Back to the idear....The key at this stage before I begin to play with the idea is all your input!

Keep it rolling! Thank you!

[John Schubert T*A*R*T]

This is good....INPUT!!!!!

Lemme throw this at you. The load sensors on the hooks react under a set amount of water pressure and the angle the boat is at. As the sensors pick up the boat is heading down, they release, letting air drift the boat onto the course again. Similar devices are used in the sensors of 30" travel gas powered coil over shocks in a class 6 Baja truck. The gas used to deploy the hooks would be an adjustable flow based off what the boat sensed needed to happen. I know this sounds compiclated but consider the first capsules, life jackets, helmets, and etc all had trial periods. I might not ever drove a race, but, I sure skinned alot of knuckles rigging things. Some worked, some did not..

I do know however the art of stuffage...Took a 10' GW Invader that John Janaky helped me rig, passed a Switzer Hugger with a 135 Merc, and, as I passed his bow, a 12" ripple came off a bridge pier....Hit the thing and in the air saw the deck and hull separated and as soon as the boat hit the water the deck peeled off..... That fiberglass mixed with Fox River water tastes like crap!

Back to the idear....The key at this stage before I begin to play with the idea is all your input!

Keep it rolling! Thank you!

Interesting. When I first started driving for Jim Briggs, OMC Ex. V.P., my first ride was a Glastron Molinari. First time out at Clear Lake, TX at 77mph blew it over. Several races later Jim Briggs & I were having a conversation with Finn Irgens, then Chief Engineer at OMC & extremely smart with a lot of inventions within the industry credited to him. We asked him what can be done to read the air to assist in anti-blowover. He said that he could design sensors with I believe gyros that could read where the optimum attitude would be and would instantly make trim adjustments accordingly. Never persued it as at that time the related equipment was bulky & expensive, yet he knew that it would work.

[bajarick]

No way to stop blowovers. I disagree with staying on the throttle to prevent a blowover. Lower unit will act as a brake upon deceleration (only if it stays in the water). The driver has to react quickly when the front of the boat starts to get light. Safety capsul is best bet against injury. Good luck.

[JohnsonM50]

My Bezoats hydro lifted about 3-4 ft, without time to think it over I was off the deadman and leaning forward. It settled smoothly, 1-a forgiving boat, 2- I wasnt going very fast. [It was breezy]. Point being it seems to me being of modest experience it can be unpredictable.
The technology to overcome this is old stuff, an F16 aircraft for example has computer assist control giving it capabilities beyond its pilot. No problem lotsa $$$ cant fix.