On to St Barts

The last time I went ashore in St. Barts was 25 years ago. Ive sailed past it many times since because it is so  crowded to anchor. This time however was the same but different. The sail up wind from St. Martin was all done in 18- 25 knt winds taking 4 tacks to make the beautiful anchorage of Anse Du Colombier. Of course Wild Bird beat us there but only by about 15 minutes. Hogfish does well to weather pointing just as well as this 74" deep Van De Stat design but not fast enough to weather. We carried full sail easily but Wild Bird had a reefed main and Genoa.  I love chasing other boats as it really gets you to try and sail better to weather. We came in under sail and anchored right off the beach.

Rachel giving her best St. Barts pout. Hogfish and Wild Bird behind her.

Hiking to the highest mountain around the next day shows how pretty it is and how many yachts are about in todays world. Being in the Carribean in the summer is different as not to many boats but you have to be ready to take off if I hurricane is coming.

The bay is getting smaller as we go up the trail.

At the top looking to the eastward. We are heading for the beach ahead and then will back track along the shore. All the roads here are poured in concrete with elaborate stone work every where. All the houses are built beautifully and are well built to withstand the storms sea and salt. I like the way they have been very careful in cutting into the hillsides on this island. Very little visible scaring.

Gayle posing along a standard road and rock wall. The grades here are like living in Knob hill in San Fransico. Very steep.

No snow and ice here so who cares!

These tortoises roam freely about the islands down here. Pip and Gem have no idea what this thing is.

Walking back along the shoreline.

.

Rachel spent a month a few years ago as a nanny to my old bosses new child on St Barts staying in his new villa. She had a blast and was spoiled rotten by him as he has done very well in life. Needless to say she likes St Barts very much.

These islands have lots of dry cactus areas on the windward sides as the rain tends to be dumped on the leeward side.

Rachel on Shell  beach. I found lots of broken sea glass that Iam sure was from the original Jack Sparrows drinking binges from years gone by on this beach.

Standard photo of the harbor. The intresting thing is so far most basic food items in the grocery stores are not much more than in the states. Resturants are different but still not by much. I think the U.S. Is getting to be very expensive. All the islands so far are better as when you buy a beer they are a buck or two. Try finding that in the states in a chichi place that has topless girls on the beach and its not a national crisis .

Eating lunch with David and Samina at their beach front house. Years ago I built a house for David in Grenada. I will be posting that story soon here. We all used to race on Davids yachts in the regattas down here. 

St. Barts is a very fun place . I could live here. They have a very good tax code. Unfortunately in the hurricane season you have to have a place to put your boat which is not here. The harbor is very crowded with tons of local boats on moorings plus all the charter yachts. You need a very good car here to drive up the inclines. Plus you will have to get used to looking at and being around lots of good looking people. Yes there were lots of topless girls about . Ill be back.

Read More..

Shantyboat on the Mississippi

In July, we are bringing the shantyboat across country to launch in the Mississippi River on an art and history expedition:

Thanks to espressobuzz for the historic photo

A journey to rediscover the lost narratives of river people, river communities, and the river itself. 

Secret History is an anthro-historical artists journey through the history of a river. It weaves together threads of adventure, history, art, and story. 

We take to the river, Those forgotten waterways that flow through most towns, hidden behind levees, shoved underground or behind the seediest neighborhood.

Just a few generations ago, there were whole communities of people living right on the river in shantyboats. And people living in the bottomlands that flood every spring. Now mostly all gone.

We are fundraising right now to help make the project happen. There is also a beautiful video we produced to give you a lyrical flavor of the project.

Support A Secret History of American River People Kickstarter

The Kickstarter campaign is critical for launching the Secret History expedition. It will help pay for final outfitting of the shantyboat and transporting it across country. It will make sure we have decent audio-video equipment to record our interviews in the river communities we visit.

Thanks for helping support the project.

Read More..

Clarity on Catalina 38

Catalina 38

After our posting yesterday about design #1903, the Hughes 38, we received an inquiry from a blog reader as follows:

"Didnt the Hughes 38 go forward to become the Catalina 38 and was successfully raced in the Congressional Cup for many years? How did that transition take place from the Hughes 38 to the C 38 "?

Its a good question but the answer is no. The Catalina 38 was actually a development of the Yankee 38, design #2094-C2. The story is that Frank Butler of Catalina purchased the molds from Yankee Yachts and started building the boats. When he called the firm and asked about advertising the boat as an S&S design, he apparently balked at the royalty and as a result the boats were advertised as designed by Frank Butler, as can be seen in the brochure below.


Granted Butler redesigned the deckhouse and made other changes. More information can be found on the Catalina 38 international Association website by clicking here.

Principal Dimensions
LOA 38-2"
LWL 30-3"
Beam 11-10"
Draft 6-9" (deep keel) 4-11" (shoal draft keel)
Displacement 15,900 lbs (deep keel) 16,700 lbs (shoal draft keel)
Ballast 6,850 lbs (deep keel) 7,650 lbs (shoal draft keel)
Sail Area 639 sq ft

Read More..

Didi 950 Build Stringers going on

Earlier this month I posted about the start of construction of the Didi 950 of Micheal Vermeersch in Ohio. Construction is progressing nicely.

The backbone components have all been fitted and glued. They have slotted connections, egg-crate fashion, with all of the bulkheads. Further into the project all of those junctions will be strengthened with structural epoxy fillets.

The sheer clamps have been scarphed into lengths sufficient to span the full length of the boat, from available shorter lengths. Before that they were also bevelled along both edges to remove excess material to save time later planing them to shape.  The sheer clamps are the major strength members along the deck edge. Normally they would sit flat against the inside of the hull skin but with these designs I turn them diagonally across the corner for a cleaner and lighter detail that also has a better balance of gluing area between the components that are being joined.

Now Michael is fitting the hull stringers. With this method of construction the stringers are arranged to suit the different regions of the hull skin. In the photo below you can see the sheer clamp, spanning the bottom corners of the bulkheads. Just above that is a topside stringer. There will be another similar stringer close to the chine that will accurately align the upper side panel.

The other full-length stringer that is in place is the tangent stringer that defines the edge of the curved portion of the hull that is laminated from thinner plywood. On top of the hull there is a stringer partially slotted in, defining the other edge of the curved panel.

Below the tangent stringer is a short stringer at the right in the photo. This is an additional stringer needed to fill in the space where the side panel increases in width due to the tightening of the radius toward the bow.

In the foreground are stringer lengths that will be scarphed together into the long lengths required. The angles have been planed and are ready for gluing.

 

 

 

 

 

Didi 950 with hull stringers being fitted.

To see more of this and our other designs, go to http://dixdesign.com/

Read More..

Celebrating Belle Starr On the Water

At the end of a very productive week, we find the sloop-rigged cutter Belle Starr in the water for the first time in many years.

Belle Starr, as you know, is a Stone Horse, built in wood, as originally designed by Sam Crocker. This classic was designed in 1931. Less than forty were built before production was interrupted by WWII. Some of the original wood models are still sailing.
An additional 150 fiberglass Stone Horse models were built by Edey and Duff between 1969 and the early 1990s.

The defining feature of the Stone Horse 23 is her raised, flush foredeck and integral coamings. Twenty three feet on deck, the overall length of the Stone Horse is 28’-3” with a bowsprit and boomkin. The hull has a full keel with hard-chined sections and a transom-hung rudder.

After a year and a half in the shop, Belle Starr touched water this week at family-owned Zittles Marina, outside Olympia, Washington. The launch was flawless, stepping the mast went smoothly and the boat sat pretty on her lines. Its fair to say, this deserves a celebration.

With an enormous amount of help from friends and the professionals at Zittles, this project has reached a milestone. My very good friends, Doug Follet of Olympia, his brother Steve, from Vermont, and Dougs son, Ian, of Seattle, all chipped in to make two days of rigging and outfitting go smoothly. My heart-felt thanks to these generous men!



Launch Day for Belle Starr from doryman on Vimeo.

The four of us took the cutter out for a trial sail and wouldnt you know, a calm day of 3-4 knot breezes suddenly built to 15 knots. We turned around and headed back but there was enough time to see what could be done to finish the rigging.




test sail from doryman on Vimeo.

Belle Starr behaved like a thoroughbred. Look for updates, right here, in the days and weeks to come. She is bound for adventure...

Read More..

Update on S S 30

 
We continue to receive a lot of inquiries about the S&S 30 asking about the status regarding production. We are pleased to report that the hull tooling is complete and the deck tooling is nearing completion as can be seen by the image above. We are still targeting having a boat on the water in time for the fall boat shows.

For plans, additional images, specifications and project history, please visit the Sparkman & Stephens 30 website at www.sparkmanstephens.com/ss30.  Also multiple postings can be found within these pages by doing a search for S&S 30 in the search field above.

Offered at $149,000, sail away price.

Read More..

Latest on new skiff builds going on

Here are some updates on one of the past skiffs being built and some new skiffs being designed and built. I get these photos via emails and on Facebook.

 The first skiff is Jon Conners from Vermont.

In the last blog post Jon was building his skiff. He has since launched her and has been doing sea trails in a river near his place. I dont know if this is salt water or not. I dont think so because the trees are so close to the waters edge.

Jon and I first met when he emailed me asking if I would email him a clear set of drawings for my Ian Scott Devlin skiff proposal. Sure. He liked the idea of a slightly rockered bottom and some of my chine details. He wanted to design his own hull to be built in plywood using the stitch and glue method.

During sea trails we have talked back and forth via email about her performance.

Here she sits. I say she looks "right". By that I mean that everything flows well in this hull and shape.

Jon wanted a simple light weight skiff that would pole well with him alone and for small hp. 25 hp is his goal to have on the stern. This boat weighs under 300 lbs as built.

On the first few runs Jon used a very small trim plate on the engines cavitation plate. Here you can see her bow up attitude with the engine level. Jon had added a long wedge to the outside of the lower Chines to help the bow come down. I sent him the measurements of my outboards trim plate.

He removed the wedges which were slowing down the skiff a bit and making it very stable in turns.

Bow up quite a ways.

See all the leaves and flat water. This kind of bow up is really only good for very flat water running.

The engine with the right sized trim plate will lift the stern and the bow will still be out but the angle will not be like this. A more level angle.

Now a few weeks later! New trim plate, cold weather has set in and all the leaves are on their way out.

See the difference in the trim with a bigger trim plate. The skiff now does not have the above mushing along look.

Jon and a friend went up and down here and never got wet. It was a wet windy day. The ride was fine for all.

Bows trimmed right down now. All you have to do to lift the bow is tilt the engine a bit up by using the trim pin or you can build one of Jons simple trim plates.

You get this kind of prop wash when trimmed all the way down.

Look at the bow and you can see the seas - chop that hes going through. Are they called seas in a river? 

All in all Jon reports that he is very happy with his new skiff. I hope Jon comes to visit me when I get back to our place in the Bahamas. It will be fun to talk building and designing your own skiff.

Well done Jon.

This is Alexyz Milians skiff vison.

 Alexyz emailed me asking a few things about design. He has built a beautiful strip plank wood canoe and wants to build himself a no motor zone poling skiff that is very light in the same manner. This skiff is 4x14 long. It will draw very little.

He had several questions.

The first was why was his bow so down when he placed his hull in the water.

Why did on my bow on lines drawings of skiffs look like the decks of the skiffs were curved?

How to get the bow up look?

Simple answers. Its good for me to get questions like these as I need feedback to see if people are understanding my drawings and thought process.

Heres Alexyzs hull sections.

 

From this angle you get a real good view of his shape. Lots of firm displacment aft going foreward.

This will make the boat stable. The 4 of beam is not too narrow. The wide stern will do its job keeping the boat steady. I would place what ever weight I was going to bring along back there to replace the engine.

Here I explain in my email drawings how to add or subtract displacement-bouancy. What the skiff needed was 2-3" of freeboard added to the bow tapering aft. The design is fine at the waterline as it is.

The curved line you see in bow on hull lines drawings is the sheer. Because all the stations are laying one on top of each other the sheer line gets exaggerated.

This sketch explains how his skiff will sit with different loads.

Now a new sheer with no weight in the stern. Perfect.

The new hull stations ready to take all the measurements off of.

A nice shape. This shape will be easy to strip plank. With a 5 hp two stroke it will plane out doing most likely 12-15 knts with one person on board.

Nice job Alexyz, I look forward to seeing the hull being planked.

I saw this hull on Facebook the other day. I think its coming from a shop called Glasser Boatworks.

This is a very well proportioned skiff. Really looks nice.

Same skiff I believe inside the shop. I can see they have station molds in the background so its a one off. Nice to see new skiffs out there. Nice rounded transoms edge. I dont know who you guys are but youre doing a nice job.

Heres an email acquaintance that is building a Carolina type small skiff in epoxy and core.

This will be a nice all round skiff. But not a quiet skiff with that chine setup. But she will be the best looking skiff out there. Classic

Thats it for now. 

In a few days I will post all the latest on the Tom Gordon- Islamorada Boatworks skiff that I have played a small part in. They will be doing sea trials this week so will then post all the pictures and give you all the details.

Send me your skiff ideas and builds and I will post here. Over 95,000 viewers this year.

3/4s though read my sailing stuff though.

Read More..

Back to work on the boat

Its been a while since Ive made a post but Im happy to say that Im back to working on the boat. Life seems to get in the way of things we want to do, and Ive recently had a run in with just such an episode. Getting the house ready for winter, a short lived uptick in my business ( business is still way down and dropping), pulling the Caver boat out of the water and winterizing, cutting firewood for the shop and house, blah, blah, blah. I"ll quit bitching now, but Im sure all who might read this will be able to relate.

The next job at hand on Conalls big boat build is to finish getting ready for the insulator to do his thing. I need to finish painting the engine room witch is turning into quite a bit of unfinished business. My list of what needs to be done in the engine room is as follows:

- Install the generator and weld in all the fittings for the water lift exhaust system.
- Weld close the generator access hole.
- Install ac and dc electric conduits and various junction boxes and fixture boxes.
- Install the center baffle on the exhaust/intake trunk
- Re-prime the engine room with etching primer, then top coat with Alkyd Enamel
- Install all the wood firing.

This is the abbreviated version of my list as I still have ac and dc conduit work to do in the master stateroom, forward cabin, and head. All in all I would have to guess that Ill have a solid month worth of work to get her to the point of being ready to insulate.

I"ll start to post some pictures as I move forward. Ive found that this boat building thing seems to go a little easier if I break the "big boat build" down into about 80,000 smaller jobs that make up the "big boat build". I might continue this post and add to it as I mover forward, or Ill post a separate entry for each of the micro jobs I get finished.

Conall

Read More..

Update on OkoumeFest

My previous post was about having my Paper Jet at OkoumeFest on Kent Island, near to Annapolis. After that I received requests for the opportunity to sail her with the Turbo rig as well. I have arranged to have another Paper Jet at the event, which will allow us to have both rigs available for sailing. My own boat, the prototype will have the Turbo rig. The 2nd boat is being loaned to me by my friend, boatbuilder Howdy Bailey, and will have the Standard rig.

PJ 007 with Standard rig and PJ 001 with Turbo rig.

The two boats in the photo are the ones that we will have at OkoumeFest. This happens from 10am on Saturday 18th May on the beach at Matapeake State Park on Kent Island, south of the eastern end of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge on US Route 50.

This is a boating rendezvous, so there will be many CLC boats on the water. If you have one of our plywood boats and live within reach of Kents Island, I am sure that you will be welcome to bring your boat and to join us for a day of sailing.

To see our full range of designs, go to http://dixdesign.com/ .

Read More..

Ken Basset Firefly on the Connecticut River

Upon seeing the Basset Firefly Finesse here in these pages, Lorenz Rutz wrote to tell me of his most recent creation. While Finesse is a double, Lorenz has built the original eighteen-foot single from Ken Bassets plans. However, he departed significantly by constructing a tape and glue version. The resulting boat is much lighter and Lorenz says he can easily load it on top of his truck.

Well ask him to tell the story...

"I was looking to build a performance pulling boat, something a step up from my Gloucester Light Dory and my search kept coming around to Firefly. Being new to boat building, I liked the simple plywood construction. I had successfully completed a 17 okoume/composite ocean kayak and looking at Firefly, it occurred to me that this hull was perfect for stitch and glue construction."

"I contacted Bassett and he gave me his blessing to proceed. Stitch and glue plans usually include plank expansions, a set of numbers that allow the builder to cut out the planks without setting up molds. Firefly did not come with expansions, so I had to begin by setting up the molds."

"From the mold I was able to take the four plank shapes and then proceed to stitch and glue them together. The plywood easily accommodated the twists required, no torturing involved. Though I did use 4mm okoume instead of the called for 6mm which would have resisted a bit more. I used 4mm because I fully fiberglassed the boat inside and out."

"I took a page from the Annapolis Wherry and added sealed tanks fore and aft both for stiffness and because I am a fan of positive flotation in a boat. The center frames are laminated Douglas fir. All the trim is Douglas fir. I have not weighed the boat yet, but I can easily carry it over my head."

"There is a bit more wood to add and more epoxy and paint, but I suspect the resulting boat will be quite a bit lighter than the original version. Im installing a salvaged and refurbished Alden Row Master for seat and riggers. Im shooting for a spring launch on the Connecticut River."

"My daughter built an Annapolis Wherry last summer. We are anticipating a double launch date. I’m curious to see how they compare on the water. I will send you photos."

Excellent job, dont you all agree? Well be looking forward to the launch, Lorenz. Thank you for the great photos!

Read More..