Build Your Own SportsHydro

[Blizz]

You guys should check out hydroracer.net everyone on that board races hydros and a bunch build em for people all over the country. And from what i've been told if you use a resin like west system you don't need that many fasteners to hold it tigether so long as your joints r tight, They staple there decks and bottoms on and some of those guys r running a 100+ mph. Ken

[Hottrucks]

I wasn't gong to tell them that rite off but thats what I have heard from different boat builders but thats not to old School for me. I say for now I'm using screws but wait till I've turned about a babillion of them and ask me again???
I haven't check'd the link but I will when I get home as for now I'm going to get back out and hit some of the boat yards today and am hoping to make it to Lighting , Spectra, catch up with HDR and get south to Apollo for some House shopping and hopfully meet Robert Wilkins @ Talon Marine so I'm off

Later

[-Axis-]

So this specific thread lead me to joining, and I have questions. Did these ever get finished, are there pictures, was any of the build process documented, and does anyone still have the full scale plans? I found the plans like I'm sure everyone else has from the magazine in 62, but in my research cannot find many of them ever documented being built. As I would like to build one for myself to take my 8yo son out on our many Wisconsin lakes, I could use any insight possible, also my first build. I grew up boating my whole life, been on a 20' v since I was a week old and I want my own boat. I had a beat and total resto hydro viper lined up but he got fussy and sentimental and didn't sell it. So this is my plan B.

[Dave S]

If your not a good one with glass and wood, best off trying to find a small HP V bottom.... safer than a Hydro with 8 year old.

[-Axis-]

im fine with wood and glass, I can go off the magazine, was just doing research and reaching out. thanks anywho!

[Dave S]

Good luck with the build. I always wanted to do what you want to do. But in the old days you could buy old wood race boats. And fix em up. Now I don't think you can find any. They all rotted away.Keep us up with your project.

[-Axis-]

Thanks, the wife went to school for graphic design and we blew it up yo scale. We're going over all the dimensions and angles, cleaning up and matching all the measurements. Hopefully in the next couple weeks I'll be headed to kinkos and have a full set printed to start the project.

[silverfox]

Welcome to the help build a SportHydro project Post

I'm building a 3 point hydro Called a Sports Hydro, I would love to have all the input I can as this is my first Hydro build in years and it ain't no pumpkin seed !!

These boat plans started in a 1962 Science and Mechanic artical that I found who knows where. The plans then came from a web site
http://www.svensons.com/boat/?p=HydroPlanes/SportsHydro

I hope you will all look at these to see what we are starting with

Jeph422 will be building one also he and I are building the same Hull for a EAST vs. West build !!

I will be building mine old school. Ya I know Safety!! That is all are concern but it ran then and it will run now. How ever Jeph is building his tech and his will evolve over the corse of his build.
things like rack and pinion steering , maybe a jackplate, possiblly a four stroke WHO KNOWS?? what the buget or "free" stuff will allow. WE ARE BUILDING THESE BOATS OUT OF OUR POCKETS JUST LIKE YOU WOULD!!!

We a re hoping to have a magazine pick up the story soon and we will do a comparison on these two boats just for fun and to see what technoligy has brought us in the last 40 years.

Wish us luck and feel free the build along with us


Jeff & Jeph

We built this same boat many years ago. We had a 75hp V4 Evinrude on it. Around 45 to 50mph it started to get a little squirly. The sponsons are flat on the bottom so we built some dihedral to the sponson which gave it more stability. Maybe the afterplane may be a bit too short for the sponson length too. Overall it was a fun boat to build and drive. Good luck with the project.
Bill

[Hottrucks]

Thanks, the wife went to school for graphic design and we blew it up yo scale. We're going over all the dimensions and angles, cleaning up and matching all the measurements. Hopefully in the next couple weeks I'll be headed to kinkos and have a full set printed to start the project.

I wish it had but unfortunately I could never track down full plans...fortunately for you technology has come.far enough fast enough that you can clean up lines and build it in cad to see how everything looks...
There's a few guys left here on the board that may be able help guide you on things that will improve your build...just be careful where you take advice
Good luck and hopefully you can draft out a set of plans that others will be able to follow... I don't think father son time is completely dead...
Jeff

[-Axis-]

Her schooling is slowing the plans, but we have good progress, I'm having her make templates of the original sponsons frame, and making a bit of an updated version that's not so many pieces.

[-Axis-]

[Hottrucks]

If you can make those.plans complete and time Scale and make a boat those plans will be worth a fortune. And I would be interested

[-Axis-]

I've been playing with alterations, 30in in the sponsons, 30in in the rear.

[Hottrucks]

Until you build the first one and test you'll never know... just look at alot of tunnels.. big and wide in front and small and narrow in the back to compact the air and carry the weight ...

[-Axis-]

I'll build both, gonna do some balsa models first.