The sailing ship "Cali-Maran"

[Joe C-P]

Cali-Maran

As more American ships went round the Horn to reach the riches of the Pacific rim, owners and captains tested different designs to gain advantages in this trade.

While some ships went for speed, most famously the tea clippers, such designs had a tendency to heel excessively, risking shifting of cargo, and surrendered space for cargo.  One enterprising captain and crew, after observing the catamarans and outriggers of the Pacific Islanders, their stability in heavy weather and carrying capacity, created their own experiment in situ.

Captain Janus Tophe purchased a smaller vessel, a sloop that had lost much of her rigging and mainmast in a "taifun" storm, and hired some of her crew.  The two ships' carpenters assembled a semi-rigid connection between the vessels, removing the rudder from the sloop and converting the remaining mast into a cargo-handling crane, aiding the lading of both hulls.

The second hull was filled primarily with cargo, even upon her deck, nearly doubling the laden freight, plus extra water as was always wanted on long Pacific voyages.  All the members were granted a box or barrel of their own to fill with goods to sell at home.

On her first sea voyage the new arrangement caused some minor problems with steering, while improving stability and even adding a unexpected small measure of speed, nearly a knot better compared to her best previous performance.  Sail handling did need some adjustment about the stub mast cum crane on the second hull. 

After a few more days sailing Captain Tophe was satisfied with the adaptation and set course for the Horn, and renamed his doubled ship the Cali-Maran after the vessels that had inspired him plus his beloved wife's name. 

Along the way the officers directed the crew in adapting to the steadier dual-hull, testing new sail arrangements, while the carpenters adjusting the rudder until she steered responsively without drift.

The added speed carried her to the bottom of the Americas a full week earlier than expected.  There the captain had the carpenters monitor the cross-link between the vessels, ordering all crew to the primary hull just in case.  Fortunately the connection held, and the crew praised the relatively stable ride, none of them put at risk from excessive heeling, though heavy waves did wash away a few boxes and barrels from the second hull.

In the Atlantic the Cali-Maran encountered ships heading west, offering their take on the adaptation.  She continued her course until arriving home in Elizabethport, New Jersey.  There the added cargo delighted the ship's owners, many of the crew making a goodly income as well from their barrels and boxes.  After reviewing the adaptation it was decided not to continue, the owners preferring the extra revenue from selling the sloop, the experiment Cali-Maran a footnote in nautical history. 

The models are a 1/700 brig and gunboat from LeviathanDesignsLLC, which I found on Etsy.  I had bought a set of ships so I could build the 1860 cutter HMS Jersey.  I scratched the masts and made the furled sails from coffee-stained tissue.

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Someone had to build something that wasn't a plane!

[Steel Penguin]

wicked smart 
another brilliant entry

[Rick Lowe]

Nice lateral thinking, there. 

[zenrat]

Someone had to build something that wasn't a plane!

 

Just one thing though.  Those aren't cannons on the decks are they...

[ericr]

 

[Joe C-P]

Someone had to build something that wasn't a plane!

 

Just one thing though.  Those aren't cannons on the decks are they...

Nope, those are storage barrels and crates.

[Wardukw]

  
Pretty cool 

[zenrat]

Someone had to build something that wasn't a plane!

 

Just one thing though.  Those aren't cannons on the decks are they...

Nope, those are storage barrels and crates.