Why did wooden ships never get much beyond 300 feet...

[reed1v]

[QUOTE=boatman61;2114100][QUOTE=reed1v;2113835]Evidently your "scholars" probably spend too much time at the bar and not at the books. As far as your "eastern" training, suspect the old latin units(adopted by the Romans later on) had equivalency in ancient India's civilizations. Many of the ancient Buddhist temples(predating the Hindu influence) followed geometric measurement series very similar to what was employed by the ancient Greeks, and interestingly, by the ancient Persians.
QUOTE]

Ahahahaaa... you've just shot the pulpit your preaching from..
Guatama Buddha was a Hindu prince who foreswore his heritage and went walkabout.. Buddhism and Jainism sprang from the roots of Hinduism and the belief in Brahman and Vishnu which predate Buddha by over 1000yrs
[Quote] Go back to School Was referring to the temples built prior to Bhuddism becoming absorbed into the dominant Hindi culture and thus reflecting that in a change in temple designs.

[Slip Aweigh]

Look up "Vasa" the Swedish vessel. It is most impressive to see in person. ;-)

[nicholson31]

I would say Anywhere from around 50 to 100' was typical for this area, predominantly fishing based. This allowed for access to a many harbours for transferring product and safe anchorage. 400' hulls would not be of any benefit in this industry and I would say holds the same for others.
This would be Difficult to do this with a 400+ foot hull but easily performed on a 100 ' or less boat and by a handful of people anywhere.

[reed1v]

Originally Posted by nicholson31

I would say Anywhere from around 50 to 100' was typical for this area, predominantly fishing based. This allowed for access to a many harbours for transferring product and safe anchorage. 400' hulls would not be of any benefit in this industry and I would say holds the same for others.
This would be Difficult to do this with a 400+ foot hull but easily performed on a 100 ' or less boat and by a handful of people anywhere.

Thanks for the picture. Beach hauling was the norm about 100 years ago for most commercial sailing vessels. Seldom done nowadays.

[leftbrainstuff]

Timber material properties are not the limiting factor.

Manufacturing and supply chain inefficiencies with timber limit its use. The brits pretty much exhausted their supply of oak in the late 1700s. The same occurred for yew for long bows much earlier. This shortage, in part, allowed the iron and eventually steel driven industrial revolution.

Much of the innovation was driven by defence. Here timbers material properties, principally toughness and hardness are vastly inferior to modern steels in terms of ballistic protection.

If you're building small ships with low tech tools, and you can source your timber locally, then timber is a great option.

To meet modern codes and to be able to demonstrate compliance, without extensive testing then you would find timber to be uncompetitive to steels. Mainly due to its variability from lot to lot.

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[leftbrainstuff]

Originally Posted by Slip Aweigh

Look up "Vasa" the Swedish vessel. It is most impressive to see in person. ;-)

Except it sunk because of instability. Several more successful vessels were built aftee the Vasa.

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[rhubstuff]

Gavin Menzies' book, "1421, The Year the Chinese Discovered America," has been thoroughly debunked by numerous scholars, historians, and naval architects. I have a copy and have read it twice. He presents as historical facts events which absolutely could not have happened, such as an entire fleet of large Chinese ships sailing right over the shallowest areas of the Bahama Banks, and numerous other impossibilities. Menzies does have a cult following, but one should not take anything he writes as factual.

[reed1v]

Cults tend to be formed by grossly misinformed people in search for
salvation from themselves.

[psk125]

No one seems to have heard of the Wyoming: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wyoming_(schooner)
It would seem to correlate with the idea that size was a function of economics and harbor capabilities that have been brought up in this thread.