Motorboat
The motorboat is technically a power driven
vessel. A speedboat is a small motorboat designed to move quickly, used
in races, for pulling water skiers, as patrol boats, and as fast-moving
armed attack vessels by the military.
Even inflatable boats with a motor attached which may be serving as
a high speed patrol boat or as a plodding pedestrian dinghy providing
transport to and from a mooring buoy are motorboats.
There are three popular
variations of power plants: inboard, inboard/outboard, and outboard.
If the engine is installed within the boat, it's called a power plant;
if it's a removable module attached to the motorboat, it's commonly
known as an outboard motor.
An outboard motorboat is
installed on the rear of a boat and contains the internal combustion
engine, the gear reduction (Transmission), and the propeller.
An inboard/outboard contains
a hybrid of a power plant and an outboard, where the internal combustion
motorboat engine is contained inboard and the gear reduction and propeller
are outside.
A purely inboard motorboat
contains everything except a shaft and a propeller inside the vessel.
There are two configurations of an inboard, v-drive and direct drive.
A direct drive has the power plant mounted near the middle of the boat
with the propeller shaft straight out the back, where a v-drive has
the power plant mounted in the back of the boat facing backwards having
the shaft go towards the front of the motorboat than making a 'V' towards
the rear.
Motorboats vary greatly
in size and configuration, from the 4-meter, open Boston Whaler type
to the luxury mega-yachts capable of crossing an ocean.
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