Swampscott Dory circa 1900

R

Robert H. Wilkinson

New member
Saw a very interesting dory at the Tall Ship Days in Port Colborne Ontario. It was built by Barry Millar in 2002. Designed from a fishing dory popular in the early 1900's. Used in the Atlantic north of Boston.

It uses a single lung 2 stroke 3 hp motor that the owner restored to pristine condition. Hand started, constant speed of 800rpm.

A Kitchen Rudder controls speed, steerage and also acts as a stern thruster.

Some info can be found here - http://www.oldmarineengine.com/discus/m ... 95580.html

Also added some pictures of her in my album.

Beautiful boat.

Regards, Rob
 
Rob,
What an extra-ordinary boat and find. You learn something new every day. I had never heard of a "Kitchen rudder". Very interesting concept. Many early vessels had adjustable pitch props (including reverse), and some had flanking rudders which can also give reverse control, as can a rudder forward of the prop, just for reverses. But the "Kitchen" design certainly has a lot of features for a very simple device.

Also a beautiful boat and installation! My grandfather put a 5 HP make/break engine in his 30 foot sailing cutter in about 1907. It was unique enough that it made the front page of the Long Beach Press Telegram. Unfortunately I don't have any photos of the engine.

Thanks!
 
Don't know how many other places in the country have BIG jet powered craft around, but in the PNW Salish Sea we have a fleet of jet powered catamarans. Most of us have seen the big, white with red and blue and they run twin jets with outputs in the 24 inch range. (Jim probably knows all about them.) It is the Victoria clipper fleet, and they have a habit of cruising at about 30 knots, sneaking up on radar, and make a 4 foot wake.

I have stood on the dock and also from the boat and watched them maneuvering around the dock and in traffic, (especially at Friday Harbor), and they are extremely well controlled and ...

Guest What? They have a version of that Kitchen Rudder on those big jets. Well, so do the smaller jets like the Hamilton's too. Even down to the PWC jets as some of them have that same type of speed and steering control.

Yes, it is pretty cool and looks like it still is a great idea.

Harvey
SleepyC :moon

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There is a significant difference between the water jets reverse/steering and the Kitchen rudder. Matt Unique (ex Tom Cat owner) drives some of the big water jet ferry boats in the North East. They are used in big yachts all over the World. Azzam, currently the world's largest yacht at 591 feet has 4 water jets for propulsion at a speed of over 31.5 knots. The US Navy uses water jets on the Littoral Combat ships..which push out 500,000 gallons per minute! These propel the 414 foot ship at over 40 mph. There are water jet ferries all over the World. Austal is a major builder of water jet vessels, and one of their yards is in Mobile AL. (Kind of fun to see what type of huge vessel is being built as we drive by.)


The Kitchen rudder, uses the "side clam shells oriented fore and aft as flanking rudders--one on each side. These rotate on a vertical axis. The water jet steers with the nozzle moving to port and starboard with a "Bucket" which pivots on a horizontal axis.

For reverse, the Kitchen rudder clam shell sides come together and then form a solid barrier which moves side to side to direct the prop wash to one side or the other--not real effective directly in reverse.

The water jets have a "Bucket" which pivots down over the back of the thrusting system. The early jets actually steered the bucket the same direction as the water jet. The newer ones, have a split wash, and if the water jet is directed straight back and has equal thrust on both sides--if just part way, it is proportional to each side, and all of the way over, only to that side. These are far more efficient that the Kitchen rudder concept.
 
Thanks all for sharing my interest in this unique boat and its systems.

Bob, as for its reverse thrust the owner did tell me he could stop in the boats length. Going from full forward to full reverse almost instantly. No need wait for prop to slow down or worry about damaging gears shifting into reverse too quickly. Check out this 600 ton tanker going up a creek in reverse(using a Kitchen Rudder) - I assume because it was too long to turn around once up the creek - http://forum.woodenboat.com/showthread. ... model-boat - scroll down to post # 5.

Harvey, if you did some research on this I sure hope you didn't read the part where they claim a boat outfitted with a Kitchen Rudder is more maneuverable than even a boat with twin drives,,,,,,,,, oops I guess you did now,, :P :P 8)

Regards, Rob
 
Rob, Yup, I did some reading and I think it is a cool concept, especially for being able to have a simple drive from engine to prop. I have a friend who has a huge collection of the old 1 lung diesel engines, small to huge, and he would have a good time with this info.

As to the slow speed control, hard to beat my twins.

Harvey
SleepyC :moon

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Robert H. Wilkinson":9ow5atvh said:
Thanks all for sharing my interest in this unique boat and its systems.

Bob, as for its reverse thrust the owner did tell me he could stop in the boats length. Going from full forward to full reverse almost instantly. No need wait for prop to slow down or worry about damaging gears shifting into reverse too quickly. Check out this 600 ton tanker going up a creek in reverse(using a Kitchen Rudder) - I assume because it was too long to turn around once up the creek - http://forum.woodenboat.com/showthread. ... model-boat - scroll down to post # 5.

Harvey, if you did some research on this I sure hope you didn't read the part where they claim a boat outfitted with a Kitchen Rudder is more maneuverable than even a boat with twin drives,,,,,,,,, oops I guess you did now,, :P :P 8)

Regards, Rob
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Rob,
A little further in the link cited, I found this:

A word of caution on Kitchen rudders at 1:1 scale- to make emergency stops, and to make fast astern manoeuvres a LOT of force is put on the keel and transom knee. This was found out to the cost of the Royal Navy when they adopted the use of Kitchen rudders on a limited amount of 35ft and 40ft pinnaces. The decision was taken scrap the Kitchen Rudder on Navy boats from then on.
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I suspect that the dory was not going fast with 2.5 hp. The kitchen rudder system certainly is unique--but there seems to be reasons it is not widely used. The boat I built with the controllable pitch prop would also go from full ahead to full reverse (Slow turning diesel) without changing engine speed--but there was a lot of turbulence --as with any vessel going from full forward to full reverse. There are spectacular videos of the jet drives also going from full forward to full reverse at full speeds.

I wonder if the Kitchen rudder will allow the operator to "Walk" the boat sideways as can be done with twin screws?

A beautiful cruiser in the link which had the Kitchen drive--
 
We took a ride on a boat with Hamilton Jet Drives which can stop in it's own length from 40mph. You ought to see that bow wave! It looks like you are about to become a submarine.

Operating that Swampscott Dory would be a blast, and a real feeling of accomplishment once mastered.
 
thataway":229cbnlv said:
I suspect that the dory was not going fast with 2.5 hp. The kitchen rudder system certainly is unique--but there seems to be reasons it is not widely used.
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The owner told me it would push the 19' dory to its hull speed. I forget what he said that was. He did say it will support the use of a relatively large prop. Judging from the height of the engine I suspect it will have a fairly long stroke which will give it a fair bit of torque.

From what I have read the Kitchen Rudder is only suitable for slow boats. That is actually the name of the owners website - goslowboat. I suspect it presents a lot of drag at higher speed - much like the "prop protectors" used on some river boats.

When the dory was first launched it was fitted with a conventional rudder. With its direct drive (no reverse and no neutral) he is much happier with the Kitchen Rudder !!

Regards, Rob

P.S. - just a side note on hand starting an engine. I wanted to start my 4.5hp kicker the other day with the cowl off. The pull cord is all built in to the top of the cover so I took it off, primed the bulb, choke on, turned it till it was on compression stroke, then spun it using an open palm on each side - it started quite easily. 8)
 
thataway":2ygndhj4 said:
The US Navy uses water jets on the Littoral Combat ships..which push out 500,000 gallons per minute! These propel the 414 foot ship at over 40 mph. There are water jet ferries all over the World. Austal is a major builder of water jet vessels, and one of their yards is in Mobile AL. (Kind of fun to see what type of huge vessel is being built as we drive by.)
Click to expand...

I took pictures of the LC (LIttoral Combat) ships as we passed the Austal yard in Mobile. Out in Mobile Bay, we had a close encounter of the terrifying kind when LC-4 nearly ran us down in the Ship Canal. Patty was at the helm, and didn't think it was moving. I put the binoculars on it, and saw it was moving fast, bearing right down on us. I told her to put the hammer down and get us out of the way! She did - just barely in time for us to avoid getting cut in half by that bad boy!
 
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