Skip to main content

Jonboat?

I've learnt the Harmonica design loosely fits a plethora of monikers. (Tiny/Micro) Houseboat, Shanty Boat, canal Boat and Jonboat / Johnboat. All good, but most reflect their respective locations, whether UK or USA. In Australia it would probably be called a Tiny House Boat.
Anyway, the name Jonboat is unfamiliar to me and I decided to do some research. Wikipedia describes the boat as those seen on the "Swampmen" (?) tv program, about 20-feet long, aluminium, bench seated and powered by a massive outboard engine. I suspect that the similarities lay in the hull profile, flat with a sweep up at the bow. But there's bugger all else, no hard top, relaxed pace of life and so on. But the website advertising the disadvantages of a Jonboat got my attention. Just to be shore I wasn't building a floating coffin!
Here goes, the top five disadvantages:-
1. Inability to cut through heavy waves like a vee-hull does.
2. Lack of comfort due to rigid movement and lack of cushions.
3. Not very sporty due to their rough ride at speed.
4. Inability to carry a large (200hp) engine in shorter boats.
5. Engine noise unrestrained by engine box.

Well, sounds like if you want to poke around in calm waters of canals, streams, creeks, rivers, lagoons, lakes and harbours, and don't care to travel at rapid speeds, this boat is ideal.
The designer, John Michalak does advise that the Harmonica is best kept in calm waters. Apparently, the solid, slab sides and "birdwatcher roof" are actually safety features in that they allow the boat to survive a roll or partial capsize, without sinking. The builder of Flipper installed foam floatation in the corners of the hull, but Michalak says few buildershave done that.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Painting

Today I began sanding and priming the bulkheads. Unfortunately I tried to save a few dollars and buy a quarter litre of primer. Pffft! I've struggled to paint just the bulkheads before I ran the pot dry. So tomorrow, having realised i need to paint the sides and hull in and out, I will get a 4 litre can of primer. Live and learn!
Post a Comment
Read more

Frames Done

Ok now I've finished all four of the Frames, the Bow and Transom Bulkheads and two others between. What impresses me so far it's how simple the build is. The next phase calls for me to cut out and butt join the Sides, assemble the Frames in position and then six the Sides. So I expect that any errors or bows in the Frames will show up then. But that's another day, and besides I'm not too bothered if there are a few wrinkles. She's a Pocket. Shanty Boat after all. Costs to this point are about $A200, and side from the outboard, I reckon the biggest expense apart from ply will be epoxy to waterproof below the waterline. I'm reading a pretty fab ebook at the moment called "Houseboat on the Seine". It's about an American artist who is living with his family in France where he builds and renovating a canal boat as a future residence for his family. The author is a self-confessed landlubber  and is doing the build on the cheap, so it speaks to me. Fa...
Post a Comment
Read more

A Greenhorn into Riverboating Tradition

 "...soon as night was most gone we stopped navigating and tied up—nearly always in the dead water under a towhead; and then cut young cottonwoods and willows, and hid the raft with them.  Then we set out the lines.  Next we slid into the river and had a swim, so as to freshen up and cool off; then we set down on the sandy bottom where the water was about knee deep, and watched the daylight come.  Not a sound anywheres—perfectly still—just like the whole world was asleep, only sometimes the bullfrogs a-cluttering, maybe."             Huck Finn I have the extravagant (not) plans to  build a Michalak "Harmonica", a tiny towable shantyboat. I've recently taken to paddling my local river and remain surprised at the glorious existance literally on our doorstep, that no one treasures. In fact, I'd argue that most men of the land actually hate rivers. They invariably turn their backs on it, and worse dump rubbish in it and allow ...
Post a Comment
Read more