Dumb Question

[kcvnd]

I have been wondering this for years but never asked. What was the purpose of having a wet sponson back just behind the dry sponson back on old round nose Hydros? Why have the hole at all?

 

[Piston1]

Got no clue???, Let me knowww!!, hi Kevin!!

 

[Hydro Junkie]

I asked Ted Williams that question years ago at a Tacoma Dome boat show while manning a booth with him and Ken Musketel, showing off the just finished rebuild of the Slo-Mo-Shun V. His reply was the boats were believed to be unstable, due to experience with the then older boats, when sitting still next to the dock so a full flooding sponson was used to give the boat the stability it was thought to need. Another "benefit" of having the sponson openned was if there was sponson damage, a VERY SMALL person could crawl inside part way if needed to help patch the damage to get the boat back on the water. Anyway, Ted went on to say that through the various teams experimenting with the sponsons, it was found that the boats didn't need to have sponsons that flooded to be stable at rest and eventually all the boats had sealed sponsons like they do today

 

[wayne middlemiss]

my thoughts to this is to dry it out thouroughly aided by large the air hole would be most probable.

 

[Hydro Junkie]

Along that line, Ted told me that Stan Sayer sent the two Slo-Mo's to Arizona every winter for just that reason. There were several other stories he told me of the "old days", several being along the lines of how competitive the teams were and some of the things that were done in the name of winning that, in the modern racing world, would get someone banned from the sport for life