The hull, the shell enclosing our boat. A mysterious element to most of us, yet essential to state the dna of a boat: type, speed, sea worthiness, comfort, sailing expenses. Something we should thoroughly know when evaluating and choosing a boat. In fact, we often ignore the importance, the shape, and the features of a hull. We might hold it up as the waterproof shell that keeps our boat afloat, yet hardly anything more. True, a boat is sold for her visible parts: because she’s beautiful, she moves us, she is spacious and has so many cabins. Or maybe she has powerful engines, she reaches 30 knots and so on. The hull instead is underwater, you don’t see it. It, simply, doesn’t exist. A hull cross section can be round or angular, thin or sleek, planing or displacing, through half planing and half displacing and countless variations. Without considering that even a small local variation in the shape or dimensional ratios can upset the features of a hull and, therefore, of a yacht. Stretching or shortening a hull, even very little, significantly changes hydrodynamic features. Not to quote an increase in displacement, that increases immersion thus generating a second hull. Let us keep in mind that the hull is the underwater part of a boat, directly touching water, and therefore crucial in building up hydrodynamic features. Not accidentally is it called live work, as opposed to the dead work, which does not touch the fluid. These technical aspects are unknown to most buyers but, what is worse, to some yards as well, the same hull being lightheartedly proposed for different purposes. Well, the customer will not know the difference!! And it is not so rare to see the same hull proposed for a 30 ton displacing boat that hardly reaches 14 knots and a 20 knot motorboat that exceeds 25. It’s just enough to change the engines! With all due respect to efficiency, consumption and comfort.
For the sake of honesty, most yards are fully aware of how important the hull
