Bob Ammerman wrote:

>> I didn't think of orienting the water flow, good idea. I think it would be
>> less complicated than the sideways propeller I had in mind. Perhaps an RC
>> servo could do the job of twisting the flex tube. I had also thought of
>the
>> mesh at the intake stage but considered doing a "backwash" maybe once par
>> day. I feel this would be easier to implement than a wiper.
>
>Um....
>
>How about making the boat completely symmetrical front to back, and
>periodically turning around so that the turbine/screens stay clean?
>
>Also, perhaps a simple vane in the water flow would work well for direction
>control. You don't need to turn on a dime.
>

I would think something like a reversible peristaltic pump would
work here to both keep things clean and to change directions.
Basically a piece of tubing that gets pinched down by a rotating
cam. Tubing thru hull front to back, pump inside hull. Helps
solve the how to waterproof it problem.

Again, however, the tides and winds would probably overwhelm
anything like this, short of Evinrude twin-diesel powered pump.
Possibly having a sail attached to the whip antenna used as
mast [similar to Roman's idea] would be the way to go.

- danM

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