A Guide to Motor Boat Design and Construction - A Collection of Historical Articles Containing Information on the Methods and Equipment of the Boat Builder. Various
the other fellow, besides the Government fine. All these lanterns must have fresnel glass lenses, which are fluted, with prisms inside, so that the flame appears as a long, bright bar of light when looking at it from the water alongside. In the spitkit class under 26 feet, plain glass is allowed, but it makes a poor, discouraging, dangerous light to carry. A set of fresnel glass lanterns in polished brass will cost you about $12 for the four. Screens for side lights of motorboats above 26 feet must be 18 inches long and above 60 feet, 24 inches long. The screens are usually painted red and green inside, though the law does not expressly require it.
The running rules on which the navigation laws are based have been made into rhymes by some forgotten poetical genius, and are well worth committing to memory, for it is impossible to get them wrong, once learned that way; the meter will not jibe if you attempt to get port and starboard mixed up.
RULE I.
Meeting steamers do not dread
If you see three lights ahead.
Green to green, or red to red,
Perfect safety, go ahead!
Pretty and soothing, isn’t it? Especially the third line. Rule II covers the only dangerous situations afloat, and so it has quite a poem:
RULE II.
If to starboard red appear,
’Tis your duty to keep clear;
Port or starboard, back or stop her,
Act as judgment says is proper.
But if on your port is seen
A vessel with a light of green
There’s not so much for you to do,
The green light must keep clear of you.
The poet who wrote that was a genius. Take it apart, and I defy you to get any of it in wrong again and yet come out all right in your meter. These two rules cover about the whole subject of maneuvering at night except when overtaking another craft, in which case you must keep clear of him. Sail boats carry no white light, wherefore keep clear a single red or green light as all sailboats have the right of way. Tugs carry two white lights hanging from the top of the flag pole for ordinary tows, three for tows 600 feet long or more. You can perceive by the above that “by their lights ye shall know them”—not only what the stranger is, but which way she is going.
By day the rules of the road prescribe a corresponding set of navigation signals; wherefore you will find the law requiring you to possess in good working order: a whistle or blast of two seconds’ duration; a fog bell; and a fog horn. (They used to call for four seconds’ blast, but even the 18-inch hand-whistle would peter out in about three seconds unless blown by an expert.) As sold, you get the hand-pump in polished brass for $1.75 in the 12-inch length, and $3.50 in the 18-inch, with the whistle stuck on an elbow at the bottom of the pump. This will not do, since the whistle has to be above the cabin roof to be both ornamental and useful; so the handiest place for the pump is to screw it to the cockpit floor just under the steering wheel with a brass 3/8-inch pipe, running up the cabin panel to the roof, on which is screwed the whistle. This sailorman has no use for a chime, for the reason that three small whistles use up a good deal more air than one larger one. One bright spirit of my acquaintance has an air cylinder reservoir 2 feet long by 12 inches diameter, with a check valve on it, through which his pump fills the reservoir with compressed air. A very respectable deep-voiced tugboat whistle connects to the reservoir and every one gives him a wide berth in a fog, not guessing by the whistles that it only belongs to an 18-foot motorboat instead of an ocean-going tug. The foghorn may be an ordinary tin fish-horn from 2 to 3 feet long. Don’t blow it under way in a fog, unless your regular whistle is rusty or out of whack, for the other boats will take you for a sail craft, and it isn’t fair to give wrong impressions at sea. Your fog bell may be 6 inches across the mouth for motorboats up to 40 feet, but the 8-inch bell in polished brass is only $1.85, so by all means get it, no matter how small your craft. You’ll appreciate it some day in a thick fog! And don’t blow your horn and ring your bell at the same time, as Kipling makes his fishermen do in “Captains Courageous.” The two signals mean two different things, under way and anchored, and are sure to get you into trouble if you sound them both at once. When under way at half speed in a fog blow a “prolonged” blast (say, three seconds if the pump will let you) every minute. If anchored, ring the bell for five seconds once every minute; not oftener, as that would tell the other fellow that there are two of you, but right on the dot, timing it with your watch.
In navigating by day, one blast of your whistle means, “I’m turning to starboard,” or “Will pass you on your port.” Two blasts:—“I’m turning to port,” or “Will pass you on your starboard.” Meeting obliquely, if you have the other fellow on your port you have the right of way. He should then give one blast saying that he is turning to starboard and will pass you to port. You answer with a single blast showing that you understand. If he wishes to cross your bow he will give two blasts, meaning he will turn to port. If you assent, two blasts give him the permission; if not, do not attempt to cross-signal or contradict—blow four short toots and slow your motor until both of you come to some agreement. He should at once slow down on hearing your alarm signal. Most harbor tugs will cross your bows even when you have the right of way, and few of them ask your permission. They feel that “business is business” and you are out for pleasure, so it is not worth while getting stuffy about it. If in a dangerous predicament and you have reversed engines, give three blasts to let the other fellow know you have done so, and if you see any of his lights out at night give him the “double-two,” or two short blasts, a pause, and then two more. It is not merely a courtesy, it is your duty. And if you hear the double-two, don’t gape around like a man paralyzed, but look to both your screens, your bow light and stern lantern, at once. It may mean you!
All boats are required to carry life preservers, two sets of the harbor rules, and means for putting out gasoline fires. While the law regarding life preservers reads only for the hired launch, it worked backwards to the bonafide owner, as every hired launch immediately became “the owner and his friends,” so that in many harbors the inspectors were forced to require one life preserver to each person on all boats so as to reach the commercial launches. The sets of harbor rules are printed both in pamphlet form and as a framed document. For small boats up to 40 feet the pamphlet form, kept in the chart drawer, will answer, but larger boats must frame and post up the harbor rules in some conspicuous place in the chart room. As for a good gasoline extinguisher, you can get a dandy little tin sand squirt-can loaded with chemicals for a dollar, and there is no excuse for being without one.
So much for the legal “fittin’s”—now for the equally important things that the Sea requires. First, good steering gear. There will come times when you will have to snake that boat around on her own tail with the seas driving you ashore and a rock-ribbed dock on either side of you, so don’t be niggardly about the size of the rudder. There is nothing more comfortable to a sailorman than a ship quick to mind her helm, one that will go the limit as regards turning on her own heel when she has to. About one square foot of rudder to every ten feet of length of your motorboat isn’t a bad rule of thumb. Have a good stout shoe running out from the skeg to the heel of the rudder. The kind that are swung free look pretty, but you lose interest in them if some one backs the boat against a bunch of rocks and jams the rudder forthwith. The tiller rope is best of red cord with steel wire insertion, for boats up to 35 feet. Beyond this, chain or steel wire rope only. The red rope costs 6 to 8 cents a foot. Lead it through flat iron sheave blocks under the washboards, being sure that the sheaves are somewhat bigger than the rope and avoiding sharp bends out of the general plane of the sheaves. The steer wheel drum wants enough port and starboard turns of your rope on it to swing the rudder full each way without over-running the securing staple which anchors the rope on the drum. A good five-spoke polished brass wheel large enough for any boat up to 35 feet can be had for $1.75. It has a brass shoe which carries the axle and drum, and this shoe should be bolted to some stout panel where it will not pull out, no matter if you put on strain enough to nearly part the steering rope. You will, you know, some one of these days, so you might as well be prepared for it.
The steering