Part II of our series on the Anatomy of a Sail Boat talks about the ‘foundation’ of the sail boat itself. A hull is the external BODY of a ship or boat. Technically, it is a ‘central concept’ in floating vessels as it provides the buoyancy that keeps the vessel from sinking.

Though the purpose of a boat’s hull is very simple, the effort that goes into designing and making one is of gigantic proportions. A lot of factors need to be considered and calculated in order to make a hull that is efficient in terms of reducing drag and at the same time provide stability in order not to capsize and sustain acute angles of turn.

Nearly all watercraft, from small boats to the largest ships, adhere to a general form that serve the needs of stability and efficient propulsion, featuring:
a) horizontal cross-sections that have narrow, usually pointed, fronts (at the bow),
b) smooth widening from the bow until roughly the middle of the length (midships), and often narrowing smoothly but usually significantly to the extreme end (the stern), whose width may range from a large to an insignificant fraction of the beam width.

Hulls too come in different designs and basic forms and the commonly used ones are flat-bottom, vee-bottom, round-bottom and multi-hull.

Hulls at times undergo a ‘disease’ known as ‘Boat pox’ which is technically the formation of blisters on the hull due to the friction and at times extreme conditions and speeds that hulls experience. They are due to wear and tear on the fibreglass gel coat that is the main component of hulls nowadays. Remedies for these are many but are expensive.

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