In reply to "chines ", posted by Pete on April 14, 2001:
>Hey Sandy: How round or square? What's a good compromise radius dimension for chines so as not sacrifice good pivoting characteristics while still being able to hit the big rise 'cross river?
>
>Pete
>
Just like my grand mother's bisquit recipe, don't
round the chines too much, and you'll be ok.
But make sure you round'em enough, OK?
This is a hard question to quantify. White water boats
want a rounder chine, fishing boats want a sharper one.
SlideRight boats (they used to make a molded polyester
resin lavro knockoff) had a very sharp chine, plus an
unusually stiff floor. In its time, it was the best
handling molded fiberglass boat around. I rememeber
talking to Ron Lavaguer (owner of Lavro) at a boat show.
He was pissed at SlideRight, because he accused them
of ripping off his hull design. But he was gleefull about
their sharp chine. "They'll be patching that chine
from the getgo" he said.
But it sure made the boat track well. To duplicate what they
did, you would make the chine as sharp as you could, and
then round it off a little bit by sawing sandpaper back
and forth over the chine, so it had about 3/16" radius.