When Filip Jonker chooses a material with which to construct something, the choices don’t just seem odd; they sound impossible. He’s made ceramic racecars and cardboat tugboats with enough structural integrity to handle crossing the English Channel. The founder of Ortega Submersibles will be a guest speaker at the PINC conference in Sarasota on Thursday. We spoke with him about material subjects.

Are you ever trying to convey a particular message when you select a material to use in unorthodox ways? Jonker: Most of the time, a material for a product is chosen on either an effective or aesthetic approach. I rather look at their limitations and try to break them. We tend to look at the limitations of materials and this also applies to our thoughts and dreams. I think that everything is possible and no dream should be withdrawn just because there are some limits set to it. There are none, and if there are, they certainly should not come from you.

What challenges prove the most perplexing when dealing in the world of fast submersibles? It’s possible to make a working submersible with a small team and with little budget. The perplexing thing is that bigger, far more experienced and well-known companies somehow collectively seem to forget about the Sleeping Beauty project. Industry insiders directly recognized the origin of the shape of our Sub and told us: “Why didn’t we come up with that?”