How to make a ship more buoyant

[TheNormalPlatypus]

i have this ship, that is resonably wide and long with only about 10 weight blocks, but the ship sits unreasonably low in the water and i dont know why, any ideas. iv checked, its not flooding

[Lindburg]

I use small wing parts on the side and bottom, this seems to help a fair amount with raising it up out the water.

[Recel]

Originally posted by Lindburg:

I use small wing parts on the side and bottom, this seems to help a fair amount with raising it up out the water.

...and into the skies during a storm!

[TheNormalPlatypus]

ok, thanks guys, ill give it a shot

[TheNormalPlatypus]

does it not work when the ship isnt moving, because the wings arnt working

[Recel]

Originally posted by tinalouiseharris:

does it not work when the ship isnt moving, because the wings arnt working

Any control surface can only work if you are moving or the water or wind is moving against your ship.

[GrumpyOldMan]

Check your length:width ratio.

I'm getting good results with 1:6 for faster vessels, and go as low as 1:4 for cargo stuff.
So if your ship is 20m long and you want speed, aim for a max. width of 3.25m.

A 20m Cargo barge would be at a width of 5m, maybe more.

Usually a good ballpark to aim for if you're making a monohull ship.

You can also increase width around the center of mass to add more buoyancy there, or simply make the hull deeper, even 2 blocks might make a significant difference but could also put your centre of mass too high.

[TheNormalPlatypus]

ok, ill look and try those things. my ship is 72ft long (about 95 blocks) and 14ft wide (19 blocks)

it a large motor yacht

[pontfogel]

Maybe you already know/have thought of this, but in addition to what Grumpy said, you also have to consider what's a reasonable draught of the type of vessel you're building. A 30 m general purpose vessel will, very roughly, have a draught of somewhere between 2-4 meters. A high speed craft of the same length will have a draught of, also very roughly, 1-2.5 meters. Those are, of course, real world figures. This is a game and we can make things that would be impossible for an actual craft.

[TheNormalPlatypus]

going from experence, i expected this boat to displace about 5-7 blocks, but its displacing 11, and that is high enuff thats its flooding the side walking areas

[GrumpyOldMan]

Originally posted by that_frog_kurtis:

Just put about 12 or 15 pivots down inside your hull.

Abusing bugs should probably be last resort.

[TheNormalPlatypus]

iim building a 72ft motor yacht

[TheNormalPlatypus]

ok

[TheNormalPlatypus]

i might have to try that bug, everything i have tried hasnt worked, not do i use the glitch

[coopnt]

There was (and maybe still is, don't know if it has been fixed yet) a glitch causing fluids in custom tanks to have double mass, meaning your boat may be significantly heavier than it should be due to this glitch on your fuel.

Besides that, though: the ocean water in Stormworks is way less dense than it should be, and so you end up having to displace an excessively large amount of it to float a given mass (i. e. vessels seemingly sit too low in the water).

This is also what causes a lot of the too-bouncy boat physics issues.

Personally I think it would be great if the Stormworks ocean water density was increased, say by about 1.5x - 2x.

[coopnt]

Originally posted by GrumpyOldMan:

Originally posted by that_frog_kurtis:

Just put about 12 or 15 pivots down inside your hull.

Abusing bugs should probably be last resort.

Agreed. While this would work, it would be better if the in-game water density could be rebalanced (increased) to make this unnecessary.