The Ark - materials, construction and seaworthness

There was a pretty good movie about this called "Longitude"(linky)Ooops, nevermind, Ringo and Inano both beat me to it.Edited by kjsimons, : Too slow to post!

I don't need references. I've just provided a perfectly acceptable working design for pump actuation. Perhaps I was too hasty in stating the pump works but supposed that Discreet Label (to whom I was responding) is smart enough to get the restBut if you want me to explain how a piston pump works then I will.

Not good enough. This is a science forum. We need a demonstration that the pump is workable, not just a speculation. I could just as easily provide a "perfectly acceptable working design" for Santa's flying sled.It ain't "acceptable" unless it is working.I ask again: if it's possible, why hasn't it been done?

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Perhaps you could. But lets restrict it to the supporting this notion you have as to requirements for science fora. Hint: it ain't rule 4.I've given you a reasoned argument. Reasoned argument against (the reasoning) would be welcome.

So you have now generated an 'ideal' pump mechanism that does some form of pumping if there is minimal forward or backwards motion of the boat.What occurs if the boat is actually moving forward or backwards since there is no a horiontal resistance?How difficult is it to hold a large surface aread object over the side of the boat while waves pull and push it? On the scale you are describing how much horizontal force do you expect to occur? The eye you are discussing how is it to be attached to the ark?What occurs if the horizontal forces in the wave action shatter your eye? Will the shattering take a side of the ark with it?Biblically, are funny seesaw wings supported by the description of the ark? Are you purposing to add more to the bible?Since there was no mention of a mechanism to control the up or down stroke how do you prevent either one of the strokes from either poking a hole in the bottom of your ship or your piston leaving the cylinder it is in? How large would the displacement of your cylinder be?How would your purposed mechanism shift the center of gravity of the boat? What occurs if the center of gravity of the boat is above the waterline? Does this mechanism make the boat more prone to capsizing?What kind of torque does your upper horizontal piece of timber experience? What prevents that piece of timber from shattering?Why do moving ships not put anything over the side like you are suggesting?And again you have only described a cylinder and its piston, how would you purpose again to harvest the energy to pump your ship?

How do you feel your working design is acceptable? What kind of conditions would this pump work in? Could you describe these conditions? For example high winds or large waves or anything else?How would the conditions affect your pump mechanisms? For example would large waves over torque your arm and shatter it?It would be important if you could explain the piston pump as well, because i'm still uncertain how you are taking this piston and using it to pump out waste from your ship?Also I find your tone in

quote:

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Discreet Label (to whom I was responding) is smart enough to get the rest

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to be persuming quite a bit. For one you are asking me to read your mind Iano by assuming i can get the rest because I can not be sure how you mean everything right?Would you like me to be able to read your mind iano? do you want me to? What would i discover if i started to read your mind Iano, and started to know you? What would i learn about you?

genesis 6 says it was made of -’ (etsi-gofer) or "gofer wood." most of the rest of the verse describes how noah is to cover the wood with pitch, or (kofer). ’ is probably a scribal error for . if you don't make the horizontal parts of a kaf long enough, it looks a little like a gimel. turns into ’

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I'd pick side rolling myself. There would be more side to side movement than front to back pitching I imagine - given the arks rectangular dimension. Noah being the age he wa, had probably seen the destrutive forces of nature before. A good place to position the pump drive apparatus would not be 'outside' the ark - where wind and wave load can load its elegant structure. I say 'outside'. There is nothing to design the side plain of the boat to be somewhat castellated - and then sheet the castellations off in order to provide pockets behind the sheeting which are open to the ocean below - no wind, no waves, or currents just a still body of water that swells and decays according to the rolling of the ark or larger, slower swells in the main body of water. In these 'pockets' one postions the far more delicate apparatusThis to avoid the need for heavily reinforced structures Little or none due to that described above Welding (only kidding) There being more or less only vertical movement of our tree trunk, attachment isn't a big issue. A good joint always does the trick (the wooden variety I mean) Biblically we are in the dark. There could have been a thermonuclear reactor on board for all we know but we are working on the basis of the technology that can build relatively simple structures. A 2 metre (for the sake of discussion) diameter disc would shift some poo but it would have a hard time forcing a piston to punch a hole through the bottom of a suitably supported pump housing The poo is in the bottom of the ark (this according to the maxim: poo runs downhill). There we will find our pump. the disc is in the water below the water line - there's not a whole lot to it really. You can place pumps on both sides of the boat if you like to balance it. In fact I would have a bank of 20 on each side. Small and many rather that big and heavy. Better for reliablity(no matter how well designed - stuff always breaks down in my experience) No more than a two metre diameter disc can apply. Another sizing issue to be dealt with in Noah tent. This item could be quite light in fact. Seeing as the action has been reduced to merely vertical loads we can make it quite slender in the width and big on depth. Not that inertia is a big problem given the slow period of the arks rolling (which gives me an idea about these castellations we have our disc placed in (think pistons there too!) Probably because they haven't got this poo issue to resolve Huh? I haven't said anything about cylinder and piston. That is the pump. This is only the action which drives the pump. At the moment I have a working see-saw. Pistons, cylinders and one-way valves are for later (should you persevere in your unbelief)Edited by iano, : No reason given.

You've had your reasoned response:

1. There isn't enough relative motion between the ship and the water - much like Wile E. Coyote's fan-powered sailboat.
2. The motion that there is is too random to be harnessed mechanically. It will literally "stop a clock", which is why Harrison's chronometers had to be mounted on gymbals.
3. We have seen no evidence that - in the whole history of seafaring - such a device has ever been used. To say it's "possible" is like saying that leprechaun's are possible.

It's your turn to respond to the responses.

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interesting. Are you saying that you think it likely that "gofer" is a misreading of bad handwriting and that the original said it was to be made of "pitch wood" meaning I suppose wood with a lot of pitch in it?lfen

I'm giving you global principles. If you can say what the wind load and pump rates are and what the compressive strength of gopher tree trunks are I can get more specific. General experience in practical engineering raises no significant problems yet. But I welcome your rigor Put it this way, I wouldn't like to be reincarnated as one See In-Ark Pump Activation Chambers^tm described above dealt with in the above In responding I would ask some latitude in retaining a right to reply to criticims of the design. I figured it out on the 40 min ride home. Noah had somewhat longerRight, we have a see-saw action somewhere above the water line. I'm (in my minds eye, where engineers are prone to wander) standing on the bottom of the ark looking up at it working. I hang a weight from it. 1 slave. It keeps working. 2 slaves. No problem. 3, then 4, the 5.... At 15 slaves it starts to wilt and my foreman reports back that whilst every thing is fine with the mechanism so far he did see some flexing in the tree trunk connecting rod and suggests another eye or two down the 'outside' to rectify things. So I decide to remove 1 slave to compensate for the friction associated with the extra eyes and some downstream losses and. This pump is going to replicated 40 times (which includes a factor of safety of 2) so I build in only notional factor of safety at this point.Do you really want to find out about pumps. Its quite easy (I figure square pistons instead of round). If you would only believe it would be so much easier... I'd give my right arm if you could. Left as well at a push. Left and right legs You'd discover what I know. God You'd be too mind boggled to be worrying about knowing me. All your attention would be on him.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

pitched wood, yes. it's a somewhat common explanation, actually. i'd like to see the inerrentists come up with something better.

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The relative motion betwixt water and a fixed point on the hull is a function of the amount of roll the ark undergoes. DL was talking about a different thing altogether. Given the arks breadth even 1 degree of roll would provide sufficient stroke for Noahs pump The period of roll involved with the ark would be slooooooooow. Who knows a minute to lean to the lef...I mean port and a minute to get back to centre. This is not a cork we are talking about here - nor a timepiece. In fact given the long period I would probably shift to a float operation - but that is just a detail in design Which ship ever had this volume of poo to shift. A normal bilge pump has to pump water which is a different matter altogether than semi-solid sludge. Design for function is the name of the game.

It won't roll much (unless it rolls over and capsizes). If the width of the ark is greater than the wavelength of the waves, they won't have much of an effect on it.

In that case, you're looking at way too long a stroke. I've been on a boat with 20 degrees of roll. How long a pump rod would you need? (Not to mention the elephants rolling back and forth. Your machinery would have to be pretty robust.) I've been on ships the size of the ark. I'd say a few seconds in a calm sea.Of course, the slower the pump stroke, the more problems you have with your seals. I don't know where you get this "semi-solid sludge" nonsense. Fresh manure would take a lot of water to make it pumpable - and the bedding, etc. would gum up the pumps in no time. That's why they clean out barns with a front-end loader, not a pump.And you still haven't addressed the problem of the bilge pumps.Have you ever been in a fiberglass canoe? No seams, no leakage - yet they still take on water. Why is that, do you think?A fishing boat's bow will dive right under, even in a moderate sea. The decks are always awash. How do you propose to deal with the water that inevitably comes in through the ventilators? (A Canadian submarine had a nasty accident of that sort off your coast a while back.)

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