Sailing Magazine : The Beauty of Sail

Southern Cross 31, Originally reviewed October 1975

Cutter In the early 1970s, the world of offshore cruising boats was dominated by double-ended types reflecting the designs of William Atkin. Atkin’s double-enders were Americanizations of the Scottish designer Colin Archer’s work in offshore lifeboats in Europe. The most famous of these American varieties is of course the Westsail 32, based on an early Atkin design, Eric. The general agreement at the time was that the best bluewater boats were double-enders with full keels. The Southern Cross 31 designed by Tom Gilmer is a good example of the type. Gilmer was a great designer. He had the eye. In a nutshell that’s why I chose this design. It’s a very good-looking boat with shapely ends and a nicely balanced and springy sheer. Gilmer took the Colin Archer type and flattened the buttocks, firmed up the bilges to add initial stability and added volume in the ends. The idea was to improve boat speed and reduce the Archer/Atkin type’s tendency to hobbyhorse. Gilmer kept the trademark outboard rudder, an essential part of this aesthetic. The full keel is pulled back from the bow slightly but it still is a true full keel with a hefty D/L of 388 and a L/B of 3.26. Keep in mind when you look at a design like Southern Cross that this was a time when “speed” was not a word associated with offshore cruising boats. There was a huge performance gap between the offshore boat of the day and the latest IOR “freak.” The IOR boats were fast but they were considered dangerous by cruisers and not fit for offshore work. Heck, the IOR boats had fin keels and spade or skeg-hung rudders. That would never do. Of course, my Valiant 40 design changed that. It was essentially a hybrid design that bridged the gap between racers and cruisers. Someone called it a “performance-cruiser” and the term stuck. I remember an angry John Neale coming to my office with a “how dare you” attitude. John sails a nice Halberg-Rassy today with a spade rudder and fin keel. Times change. At the beginning of the 1970s the ketch rig was considered the ultimate for most bluewater boats. But the cutter rig soon replaced the ketch as the standard rig for offshore work. The Southern Cross shows a well-proportioned cutter rig with a short, plank type bowsprit and a boomkin off the stern to get the backstay clear of the outboard rudder. It’s not a big rig. The SA/D is only 12.57, so it would be very slow going in light air. The interior layout is as simple as it could be and near perfect to my eye today. For pure functionality it’s hard to beat these old orthogonal layouts. They don’t make them like this anymore but we sure made a lot of them like this back in the 1970s and 1980s. Read the original review at: http://www.sailingmagazine.net/boats/3-perry-on-design/1096-southern-cross LOA 31; LWL 25; Beam 9’6”; Draft 4’7”; Displacement 13,6000 lbs.; Ballast 4,100 lbs.; Sail area 496 Original sailaway price $54,900

Wednesday, 21 September 2011 | Print | PDF |  Email

46-Meter Training Ship

Bluewater Cruiser Here's another concept that crosses the line from yacht to workboat. Designed by the Dutch firm of Olivier van Meer Design, this 151-foot vessel is intended for a German organization involved with the counseling and education of "young people with social-pedagogic problems." (I had to look that one up.) This will include everything from "handicaps to difficulties in adaptation." In the old days "difficulties in adaptation" were handled with the cat-o'-nine-tails. Times change. The big topsail schooner will be worked by the crew and capable of offshore passages where survival training will be part of the curriculum. There are no footropes shown on the sailplan so I would guess that the square sails will be furled mechanically around their yards. The long bowsprit allows for a flying jib, outer jib, inner jib and forestaysail to be carried. Both masts carry triangular topsails with small gaffs at their head. If you took these topsails off you would say the rig was "bald headed." Note the way the masts are extended with topmasts that are doubled over the main spar section. This is an impressive rig that will give everyone on board a string to pull. Remember, it takes braces to trim the yards in addition to the sheets used for trimming the square sails. Certainly getting all these sails trimmed properly will be like tuning a 12-string guitar. It will be very photogenic when it's done right. The hull is very traditional, and the comments accompanying the drawings say the hull has "tumblehome, an Olivier van Meer Design signature." Phooey! Tumblehome goes back hundreds of years and was used recently and extensively in the early days of the IOR. It can also be seen on all the Valiant 40s, 42s and Hinckley Picnic boats! Tumblehome rolls the topsides inward and looks very appropriate on vintage-type designs. The sheerline is attractive but flattens off a little too much aft for my eye. Still, the computer-generated perspective views of the hull show an exceptionally handsome vessel with a beautiful heart-shaped transom. The keel is full length and there is no salient fin. I suspect that "on the wind" for this vessel will mean apparent wind angles around 50 degrees or more. I've never sailed a vessel like this. Presumably the square sails will be furled when the boat is on the wind, allowing it to point higher. The D/L is 138. I'm not sure it's relevant, but for fun I calculated the following ratios for SA/D. Using only the fore and aft sails, the on-the-wind rig, I get an SA/D of 18.4 and that's using a displacement of a million pounds! If I use the sail-area figure provided by the designer (all the sails shown) I get an SA/D of 25.83. Both of these numbers indicate a serious sailing vessel capable of good performance. Stability will be enhanced by water ballast tanks located below the DWL. The accommodations are ar-ranged around a huge main saloon and lecture room, which is itself flanked with 10 pilot berths. There is a "hospital" aft and a large workshop for student projects. The crew's messes are forward, and the officers' mess and accommodations appear to be in the deckhouse aft. Given the size of this ship, the accommodation plan is complex and artfully wrought and deserves a larger scale drawing if it is to be better understood. With its deep bulwarks and flush deck, this design will have the look of an authentic vintage schooner. The main deck is broken by a raised foredeck and raised quarterdeck aft. The person at the helm will have an obstructed, sweeping view of the entire ship. That's got to give you a real sense of power and responsibility. "Pay attention kid!" I'm pretty adaptable but I think I could fake a "difficulty in adaptation" if it would get me a ride on this spectacular sailing vessel, sans the "cat."

Sunday, 06 February 2000 | Print | PDF |  Email

63-foot ALCA

Talk about different flavors. About 25 years ago the door to my small office flew open and in burst George Buehler looking wild and woolly smoking a pipe with a broken stem repaired with a wad of black electrical tape. Under his arm was a large can of Sir Walter Raleigh tobacco. After brief introductions George launched into a tirade based upon the premise that “your boats are silly. My boats are sensible.” I was new in business, not tremendously secure and genetically a little on the combative side, but we managed to end our meeting before coming to blows. George harangued and puffed on his crippled pipe while I puffed on one of my cherished, immaculate Dunhills probably packed with imported Escudo cut navy plug. Yep, we certainly were two different flavors.

Sunday, 06 January 2002 | Print | PDF |  Email | Read more

70-foot Research Vessel

Bluewater Cruiser But let's say you don't want to fly around the warm bay in your catamaran. Instead you want to join the International Fund For Animal Welfare and go to sea on various research projects. Simon Rogers has designed a vessel for this group, and it's being built with a steel hull and composite superstructure. This is one of the few dedicated marine mammal research vessels in the world, and it's based on experience with the group's current 46-foot fiberglass sloop. This hull displaces 101,200 pounds. That sounds very heavy, but remember, we have a 70-foot boat here with an approximate DWL of 58 feet, so that works out to a D/L of 257, which is textbook medium. Also consider that this boat will be loaded with gear and tankage and needs displacement for both volume and weight considerations. The transom is cut off vertically. This is not the prettiest way to deal with the stern, but it is the most practical. The vertical transom ensures the maximum sailing length and the maximum length on deck. This vertical transom has no camber, making it easy to install the big, flop-down boarding and working platform. Given the tough life this vessel will lead, I find it interesting that the designer has chosen a short, partial skeg preceding the rudder. I don't disagree at all with this feature. It will give the rudder good foils, some balance area and the support of a three-bearing system. Note the location of this rudder. It's been pushed forward. I think rudders work best well aft, but in this case the rudder was moved forward to open up the volume of the lazarette. The drawings show Whitlock steering. The keel also appears to be well forward, and this would be indicative of the amount of weight this vessel will carry aft. The accommodation plan is unique and again conveys the working nature of this vessel. Galley and dinette are aft. The galley is big with an athwartships stove. The dinette is immense and designed to allow the entire crew to dine and socialize together. This is very important. We see so many designs where there are too many berths relative to the dining area. There are two heads and five staterooms, including the pipe berths in the fo'c'sle. There is also a laboratory area aft of the galley. The pilothouse has an enclosed computer room, a huge navigation station, a large wet locker, a pilot berth tucked under the side deck and a mystery bench seat. I have to blame the computer drafting for this confusion. If this drawing were done by the hand of man it might be capable of conveying exactly what this athwartships bench seat and the three "boxes" in front of it are for. Cryptically drafted by a machine, however, it leaves me wondering. I'm going to assume this is some type of inside steering position. Despite the intention of this design, it would make a great cruising boat for a family of 10. The rig is pure sloop with two headsails, and the headstay is pulled aft of the stem. The staysail, as drawn, shows a head angle of only 14 degrees, which will provide a shape challenge for the sailmaker. I would prefer to see a head angle closer to 20 degrees. I like to get a good sailmaker involved in the very early stages of a custom design. The short boom obviously works well with the observation tower aft of the cockpit. Using the sail area figures supplied, I get an SA/D of 17.28, but I suspect if we had I,J,E and P dimensions, this number might be lower. Note the crow's nest above the lower spreaders and the outriggers for towing hydrophones. I'm sure this was a fun project for the designer. When the intended use of a vessel is pinpointed, the designer can focus on specific solutions. This design crosses the line from yacht to workboat and does so with grace and panache.

Sunday, 06 February 2000 | Print | PDF |  Email

A31

T he Archambault boats are quickly making a name for themselves as quality-built race winners in Europe. The new A31 should also be a very fast boat and it is interesting to note the similarities between this design and that of the 9.5-meter Nacira. In this case the target is the IRC racer-cruiser class. This means that the A31, designed by Joubert, Nivelt and Mercier, will have accommodations designed to make it fit into that category, ensuring that it will be a dual-purpose boat. In profile the hull is pretty normal. There is plenty of freeboard and quite a bit of overhang aft when you compare it to the zero-overhang Nacira. I don’t have a DWL length but I estimate it to be 27 feet, 10 inches. With a displacement of 6,710 pounds the D/L is 139, and this is in keeping with the heavier displacement favored by the IRC. Beam is 10 feet, 7 inches for an L/B of 2.95. Like the Nacira, the max beam is carried aft, resulting in an extremely broad transom. With this type of D/L planing performance is not a primary goal, so there are no chines on this hull. For low and moderate speed, chines add wetted surface. The A31 shows a relatively soft turn to the bilge aft with plenty of flare to the topsides. Draft is 6 feet, 3 inches with a cast iron fin with a lead bulb. The layout for the A31 has the head aft and to starboard. To port there is a double quarterberth. The galley to port is small with the icebox on the starboard side next to the chart table. There is only one hanging locker on this boat. It’s not a bad layout for a 32-footer. If you look at the outboard edge of the quarterberth you can get an idea of just how much flare there is to the hull aft. The deck design shows a large cockpit for racing with the helmsman sitting well forward and the carbon tiller ahead, being forward of the mainsheet traveler. There are molded-in foot Bensons to help you maintain your footing when the boat is heeled. Seat backs appear to be a comfortable height. There is a well aft for the life raft. The cabintrunk is very narrow as it goes forward but that is to allow for an 11-degree sheeting angle to the jib tracks. This results in nice, wide side decks. I can’t tell from the drawings but I presume the chainplates are well outboard. Looking at this deck layout, i.e. winch placement, I am struck with how we have come to this one basic layout for both racing and cruising boats. In 1974 I raced on a 40-footer with all lines led aft, but we had a total of 10 winches. It was quite efficient in terms of line handling but heavy and expensive. With line clutches and line organizers the same job today is done with four winches. The fractional rig with double swept spreaders features an aluminum mast and boom with Dyform rigging. Using the listed numbers for mainsail and genoa areas I get an SA/D of 23.43. If I had and used I, J, E and P, I suspect the number would be closer to 22.3. Compare that to the 43.02 of the Nacira. The drawings show no provision for a bowsprit and a standard spinnaker pole is shown with a masthead chute. I like the look of this boat, although the bend in the bottom of the big window seems to imply a kink in the sheerline. In fact, I thought that was the case until I covered up with window. I suspect this is an artifact of the 2D drawing and it will not show up on the real boat. Construction uses the resin infusion method. The auxiliary is a Nanni diesel with a saildrive. There is an eight-gallon fuel tank and a 27-gallon water tank. The A31 will make a good all-around family race boat and I think it will do well under any handicapping system. LOA 31’4”; LWL 27’10”; Beam 10’7”; Draft 7’10”; Displacement 6,710 lbs.; Ballast 2,684 lbs.; Sail area 538 sq. ft.; SA/D 23.43; D/L 139; L/B 2.95; Auxiliary Nanni 14-hp; Fuel 8 gals.; Water 27 gals. Archambault Boats, 234 Spinnaker Dr., Halifax NS, B3N 3C6, Canada, (902) 476-5200, www.archambault-boats.ca. OBE: $176,500 Our Best Estimate of the sailaway price

Monday, 04 May 2009 | Print | PDF |  Email

Aerodyne 38

Racer-Cruiserr Here’s a very interesting boat designed in America and built in South Africa. Rodger Martin brings an eclectic approach to yacht design and seems to excel in very fast, handsome yachts. (After working with Martin for about four years, Steve Koopman has been added to the firm’s masthead.) The builder has been active in the aerospace industry and offers extensive experience in high-tech composite construction techniques. The new 38 is built with epoxy and directional E-glass, vacuum-bagged and cooked at elevated temperatures. All bulkheads are composite panels, and interior structures are all bonded to the hull to increase structural stiffness. The keel fits into a pocket recess in the hull and is then horizontally through-fastened. The displacement of 11,250 pounds on a 38-footer is evidence of the care taken to keep this boat light and strong. Aesthetically I like the springy sheer of this design. It adds character. The snubbed-off ends are certainly fashionable and produce a boat that’s all effective sailing length. You could find plenty of 50-footers that don’t have the effective sailing length of this 38-footer. Early race results show the designer’s ideas to be working quite well. The sectional shape of this boat is rounded and soft, very arclike. BWL is narrow and the topsides are gently flared. Just for fun, I put my circle template on the midsection and I can almost make it fit. Then I tried a 60-degree ellipse template and that’s almost a perfect match. I like hulls like this. There are no surprises for the water. The heeled hull is nearly as symmetrical as the upright hull. This can produce a boat with beautiful manners and steering characteristics. Cruisers often assume that all race boats are bears to handle, but I’ve found it’s usually the other way around. The broad stern and low-wetted-surface shape of this design will help it surf and scoot past the competition off the wind. Of course, you need horsepower to get the most out of any hull, and the 38’s rig is on the big side for a cruising boat. The SA/D is 30.5. The mast is stepped well aft, and the mainsail shows a lot of roach, clearly overlapping the backstay by almost 2 feet. The spreaders are swept 15 degrees and no runners are carried. This is a three-sail rig; no genoas will be used. The chainplates are out on the deck edge. This is better for sheeting the jib and keeps the side decks clear, while also reducing the loads on the mast. A watertight, retractable, carbon fiber pole will carry the big asymmetrical chute. The jib furling drum is nestled below the foredeck in a well that also holds the anchor. This is a good interior layout. The berths are not pointed at the toe end. The galley is big and efficiently wrapped around. The nav area is generous. It looks to me like the designers have put just as much attention into the comfort components as they have into the performance components. How can you lose? This boat is a real hybrid. The hull form is derived from racing types but owes its form to no specific limiting rule. The deck is a real sailor’s deck with a big cockpit shaped for both sail-handling efficiency and cruising comfort. One of my old bosses accused me of having "a pink-slip mentality." He’s right. I’m always racing. It’s the only way I know to sail. Boat speed is fun and it’s really fun when you don’t have to bust your fanny to get it. The Aerodyne 38 appeals to me.

Wednesday, 06 January 1999 | Print | PDF |  Email

Aerodyne 47

Performance Cruiser This is a very well-thought-out boat, and I really don’t have the space here to do it justice, so if you find it interesting why don’t you write for Aerodyne’s substantial and informative promotional package. I’ll focus on the elements of this Rodger Martin-Steve Koopman design that I find interesting. The idea behind this boat was an “ultimate cruising boat” for a couple. We could sure argue over the definition of ultimate, but let’s just acknowledge that it’s a very subjective term. Aesthetically this is not a classically beautiful design. The ends are truncated, the sheer is flat and the transom goes on forever. Then again we don’t see too many classically beautiful boats anymore. Just look at the boats in this month’s reviews. Overhangs are a thing of the past. Every designer wants to maximize sailing length for a given LOA. While we can wax on about the contribution that overhangs make or do not make to sailing length there is no argument over the benefits of waterline length. The photos of the Aerodyne 47 show it to be a very handsome if not beautiful boat. I’m certain the owners of this boat will find it beautiful. The 47 is moderately beamy with an L/B of 3.25, and the beam is carried aft. The bow does not appear to be very fine, at least not on deck, and that will help keep the boat dry. Fore and aft rocker is flat and the D/L is 152. We could have a long and drawn out argument over “ideal” D/Ls for cruising boats, but it all comes down to sailing style and individual approach. Heavier boats have their advantages as do lighter boats. In most conditions the lighter boat will be the faster boat while the heavier boat will be the most comfortable. It takes a skilled builder with a dedicated approach to lightweight construction to produce an offshore cruising boat with a D/L as low as this one. The cruiser needs to balance weight against durability. Lightweight structures can be extremely strong, although strength and durability are not necessarily synonymous. The rudder is huge and the long fin has a bulb. Draft is only 6 feet. Martin likes nearly circular hull sections with a fairly narrow BWL. The 47 is laid out for a couple with another couple as guests. It’s a good layout with a huge galley and lots of counter space. Remember the cook is the most important crewmember. It’s better to be lost and well fed than it is to know where you are and be hungry. You are going to be very comfortable on this boat. The rig is unusual in that it combines a big main with the mast set well forward with a nonoverlapping, self-tacking jib on a Gary Hoyt-type jib club. This type of club is far better than other types of self-tending jib arrangements. With this club you don’t need to vang the club or move sheet leads or adjust clew boards to maintain proper trim as you bear off. Of course, you do have this thing obstructing the foredeck, but I suppose you could swing it to one side when you are anchored or at the dock. It’s not a pretty feature, but having a boat with this style of club myself, I can assure you that it is very efficient. The promotional material goes to great lengths to prove the point that a moderate SA/D is better than either a low one or an overly ambitious higher number, and I would agree. It’s great to have a big rig when everything is nice, but on a boat like the 47 you should be able to see at least 20 knots apparent before you are forced to reef. With the forward mast location of this design you can probably sail it effectively under main alone. A unique track system allows the self-tacking jib to be reefed while staying on the club. Drawings and photos show a loose-footed main and about 15 inches of roach overlap on the split backstay. This deck style is the exact opposite of the deck on the C&C 99. This deck is all soft shapes and radii. This does reduce windage. The hard dodger covers about half the cockpit. Halyards are all led aft and the photos show sissy bars at the mast. There is deck access to the huge lazarette and forepeak areas. The self-tacking jib club wipes the deck clean of genoa tracks and associated gear. A short, pipe frame-type bowsprit gets the anchor away from the nearly plumb stem. The transom opens to the large swim step.

Wednesday, 06 February 2002 | Print | PDF |  Email

Akilaria Class 40

Racer Here is another Class 40 design. This time the designer is Marc Lombard. The Akilaria is built as a stock, production boat and available in both “standard” and “race” versions. I assume that there is a difference in the two versions in the interior accommodations but I do not have interior drawings for the standard version. From the specs the race version has a more exotic deck layout, more complex electronics package and a carbon boom. We have already discussed the why of chines in the Antrim review. The Lombard design also has chines aft but I see no indication of a forward chine below the DWL. The sectional shape at the transom is very similar to that of the Antrim boat but not quite so slack in the bilge. The design is also at the class limit for beam at 14 feet, 8 inches, and the transom beam is 93 percent of beam max. These boats are bizarre looking in plan view. They are so beamy and so broad aft, but there is a distinct difference between the two 40s in plan view. If you look at the deck plan of both boats you will see the Antrim boat is much finer forward. At the deck, the half angle of “entry” for the Antrim boat is 20.5 degrees, while the Lombard boat is fuller at 26.5 degrees. One thing I noticed about both designs is that they both have rather attractive sheers for all-out racing boats. Most rules dictate minimum freeboards at certain locations so sheers tend to be functions of the rule. The Class 40 rule is different. It gives an average freeboard of 1.1 meters. It’s up to the designer to determine how he is going to get that average. The Akilaria has a very handsome sheer spring. Note that in both designs the mast is quite far aft. The rule dictates the max upwind sail area, mast height and prod length, but does not limit downwind sail area. So it pays to have as big a foretriangle as possible so your spinnakers can be bigger. The Akilaria’s asymmetrical chute is 2,052 square feet, while the Antrim has an asymmetric area of 1,889 square feet. By using the fat-head main shape the mainsail can be a more effective off-the-wind sail. If you took the fat head off the mainsail and added area to the jib you would be reducing the downwind sail area. The chainplates are right at the sheer and, in fact, are external. These designs are not about accommodations, they are about huge rigs and very carefully thought-out deck plans. The cross-linked twin rudders are small so they don’t require long tillers. With the rudders well outboard the two tillers are also well outboard, making it easy for the driver to sit high on the weather side. The Antrim 40 has a single, centerline tiller. On centerline aft, between the two tillers, is a tall console where the mainsheet and traveler controls are located. Primary and secondary winches are located very close to the helmsman. Halyard winches flank the companionway hatch. I really like the jib sheeting arrangement on this design. It comes from the Volvo 60s. It uses three widely spaced pad eyes with blocks arranged in a triangle: two on the deck and one on the housetop. Control lines lead from these pad eyes to a titanium rig that the jib sheet passes through. This way you have total freedom of positioning the clew on the jib without any track at all. It’s effective and it’s very light. The Akilaria is built on the coast of Tunisia by MC-TEC. The hull, as per Class 40 rules, is low-tech with a balsa core and laid-up with the infusion method. The deck is PVC foam cored with hardwood inserts in high-load areas. Vinylester resin is used throughout. The keel fin is steel. Again, in keeping with the “no exotic materials” part of the rule, the rudders have solid stainless steel stocks. Even with the “full cruise interior” version you may not think this is a cruising boat. I know the racers out there will recognize the race potential of the Akilaria. I have always thought a “cruising boat” was a boat you went cruising in. But I recognize room for argument there. If you value boat speed above creature comforts the Akilaria should be on your short list. I would certainly like to take a test sail. LOA 40’; LWL 40’; Beam 14’8”; Draft 9’11”; Displacement 10,628 lbs.; Ballast 4,594 lbs.; Water ballast 1,650 lbs.; Sail area 1,242 sq. ft.; SA/D 41.11; D/L 74.14; L/B 2.72; Auxiliary Nanni 3.100; Fuel 23 gals.; Water 13 gals. Maine Yacht Center, 100 Kensington St., Portland, ME 04103, (207) 842-9000, www.akilaria.com. OBE: $560,000 Our Best Estimate of the sailaway price

Sunday, 01 March 2009 | Print | PDF |  Email

Alden 55

Bill Cook designed this Alden 55. It’s actually five inches shorter than the Hallberg-Rassy. We don’t see much work from Bill Cook these days but there was a time when he designed some very fast race boats. Mr. Cook’s new design is leaner, lither, than Hood’s Little Harbors but with the same controlled, conservative styling that I guess has become the earmark of the American Northeast school of yacht design. I love classic styling. I also like styling that challenges the eye to accommodate what the composer Robert Schumann used to call a “Sphinx,” a surprise element that stretches the observer to rethink traditional solutions without abandoning them.

Wednesday, 01 October 2008 | Print | PDF |  Email | Read more

Alden 59

Auxiliary cruiser Here's a design from the Alden design office that is the styling antithesis of the Rondo. This boat is pure American classic yacht styling and beautifully done. The boat was designed for a Great Lakes client and is currently being built by the Hinckley yard. The combination of Alden design and Hinckley execution should result in a spectacular goldplater.

Wednesday, 06 November 1996 | Print | PDF |  Email | Read more

Alerion Express 28, Originally reviewed July 1992

Coastal cruiser As I look back through all the volumes of SAILING Designs one of the thoughts that strikes me is where are all these designers today? Some, like my old drinking buddy Gary Mull, are dead. I didn’t know Carl Schumacher well but I knew him and I was saddened when I heard he had died at such a young age. Carl had a good eye and he knew how to draw a fine sailing boat. His Express 37 remains one of my all-time favorite boats. I have no idea where some of the other designers went. I know where German Frers went. It seems that many of those confident yacht designers that were going to set the world on fire and show us how it’s really done have just gone quietly away. Maybe they found real jobs. In the mid-1990s the typical small family cruiser-racer or racer-cruiser had become a complex boat. Vendors were convincing sailors that they had to have everything in order to be happy and enjoy sailing. Ralph Schacter had another idea. He knew that most sailors went out for a day, sometimes just an afternoon or evening, and did not need things like shower stalls, refrigeration, windlasses with all-chain rode and hot-and-cold running water. But they did need a head and a place to sleep on weekend overnighters. Picking the name of Nate Herreshoff’s own daysailer, Alerion, the Alerion Express was born with pretty hull lines drawn by Carl Schumacher. The era of the big, comfy daysailer had begun. I say “big” because at that time my own idea of a daysailer was a Thistle class or any number of small dinghy one-designs. Schacter’s idea was that these new daysailers would be big enough to be keelboats with near the level of comfort found on the majority of production cruiser/racer types. The look of the new daysailer would be traditional, with low freeboard, some overhangs, a svelte cabintrunk that gave slightly less than full standing headroom and a long cockpit. But below the DWL this traditional appearing boat would be modern with flat rocker, a moderate aspect ratio fin keel and a partially balanced spade rudder. The D/L of the Alerion Express 28 is 168 and the L/B is 3.46, putting it on the narrow side of “medium.” The focus on this design was the cockpit and the laying out of the running rigging so that one person could easily sail the boat. There is nothing revolutionary here except the fact that most cruiser/racer types put more emphasis on interior comfort and this resulted usually in tight, cramped cockpits. The Alerion would be tiller steered with the mainsheet led to a barney post in the center of the cockpit. The rig is fractional with swept spreaders and a self-tacking jib. In 1994 Garry Hoyt became involved with the project at the invitation of Everett Pearson, president of TPI. Hoyt worked to refine the boat, adding his Hoyt jib boom. I really like the Hoyt boom. It is a huge improvement over the self-tacking track just so long as you don’t mind this big pipe living on your foredeck. I could live with it. The SA/D is 20.97 and that’s enough to keep you ghosting along in the light stuff. Hoyt also changed the keel to a fin and bulb. I couldn’t begin to tell you the boats that this design inspired. In fact, I think the Alerion Express gave birth to a type—daysailers—that today is well established and does not mean what it meant 30 years ago. Read the original review at: http://www.sailingmagazine.net/component/content/article/3-perry-on-design/1097-alerion-express?directory=138 LOA 28’3”; LWL 22’10”; Beam 8’2”; Drat 4’6”; Ballast 2,000 lbs.; Sail area 352 sq. ft. Original sailaway price $60,000

Wednesday, 21 September 2011 | Print | PDF |  Email

Alerion Express 38

Performance cruiserr Carl Schumacher is on a roll with these Alerions. I was lucky enough to see this boat at SailExpo at Atlantic City this year. It is indeed a handsome boat and it's fun to see the yawl rig being used. "What's with the yawl rig?" Yawls came into prominence under the CCA rating rule in the 1950s because the CCA rule did not measure the sail area carried between the main and the mizzen. This meant that the added sail area of the mizzen staysails and mizzen spinnakers was free of any rating penalty. In that light, you could consider the ultra-traditional-looking yawl rig as a simple aberration of a rating rule. Yawls did dominate the racing scene. Do you remember Ondine, Figaro, Maruffa, Escapade, Dorade, Sabre and my all-time favorite Carina II? All yawls. Bill Luders created a yawl that had no mainsail and sailed under genoas and mizzen flying sails. It was called Storm and, without a mainsail, she had a very low rating and won everything in sight. This upset the rule makers, so they changed the rule to require a mainsail. Next season Luders showed up with Storm--at 44 feet LOA--sporting a mainsail the size of a Laser's. He won again. Today we tend to look at yawls as very traditional rigs. There are two very distinct advantages to yawls. The mizzen mast is a great place to locate the radar, and a fully battened mizzen sail can be left up at anchor as a riding sail, keeping the boat head to wind. I don't think the Alerion will see much drive out of its 66-square-foot mizzen. After all, it is operating in the mainsail's dirty air. I can almost hear it gasping for breath. Note that this mizzen is unstayed. If you put your finger over the mizzen, the boat looks like a well-proportioned sloop. The fractional rig has an SA/D of 21.76 even without the mizzen. So this will be a sprightly sailer in light to moderate air. The working jib is set on a Garry Hoyt-designed pivoting jib club. This arrangement keeps the clew of the jib from rising as you ease the sheet, maintaining good sail shape. The hull shape is clean and modern with a traditional transom. The D/L is 170. Beam is on the low side at 10 feet, 9 inches. I like boats on the narrow side. If all else is equal, the narrow boat is the better boat. Narrow boats may give up a little in initial form stability but they feel better, steer better and, in general, have better handling characteristics than the fatsos. This design has a generous beam at the waterline and very little flare to the topsides, resulting in excellent initial form stability. The interior is a pure "basic A" layout and is close to ideal. Don't let the overall simplicity and 90-degree angles fool you. This layout is versatile and comfortable for a couple with kids. I would prefer to see a sit-down chart table, however. Why not sit on the head of the quarter berth and turn the chart table 90 degrees? I'm not crazy about the galley, but a boat of this size does have its limitations. TPI builds these boats and the one I saw at Atlantic City was a dark blue sparkling gem. It sure is nice to see boats that buck the Euro-styling trend. It's also nice to see a designer who isn't afraid to buck the maxi-beam trend.  

Saturday, 06 May 2006 | Print | PDF |  Email

Alerion Express Cat

Daysailer Garry Hoyt and the Alerion team bring us this updated version of the traditional Cape Cod catboat. Catboats are older than Bill Wyman and may be an acquired taste. Certainly the styling, with its snubbed-off ends and superbroad transom, gives the catboat its distinct look. However, we are seeing more boats today with minimal overhangs and broad sterns, so the catboat does not look as foreign as it did to me in the early '60s. Garry Hoyt can't leave anything alone. The catboat came with a number of genetic weaknesses or "personal idiosyncracies" and Garry attacked these with his typical innovative attitude. Catboats have too much weather helm. Catboats don't go to weather. The solution to this was to renovate the rig using a free-standing, carbon-fiber mast and the independent, deck-mounted, patented, Hoyt free-standing self-vanging boom, known as the PHFSSVB. The beauty of this rig-and I do own a boat with this rig-is that you can roll the mainsail up around the mast. This allows you to reef effortlessly to any increment of mainsail area and it also allows you to get rid of the main quickly when you get to the dock. You put this boat to bed in 30 seconds. You get under way in 30 seconds. This is good. It allows for those impulse sails when half an hour of presail preparation might be enough to convince you to stay home. Consider that this squatty little boat has an SA/D of 34. This hull looks remarkably like that of any other catboat. Even some of the old cats had hollowed entries. The Hoyt catboat pushes this hollow farther and reduces volume forward. I suppose the turn of the bilge aft might be tighter than the older models, but I don't have hull lines so that's just a guess. Traditional catboats had big, triangular, flat-plate centerboards. These workedÑsomewhat. Garry's board is a higher-aspect-ratio board that is shown with two different shapes depending upon the drawing. Note how far aft the board is. This will help with weather helm. The Express Cat's rudder is quite unusual. Catboats traditionally had big, barn-door rudders, long in chord and short in span. Moving the center of pressure of the rudder exacerbated the cat's proclivity for weather helm. Heel an old catboat over and this rudder blade acted like a speed-brake drag device. Excessive chord length was intended to make up for lack of span, as shoal draft was a requisite of these boats. The basic catboat rudder has become a classic-looking shape and Garry retained that while using an innovative pivoting blade that drops out of the big rudder cheeks. This gives the cat a modern, high-aspect-ratio rudder blade. The rudder blade swings up when you bump the bottom. An important part of sailing for me is independence. I see this catboat as a way for the less-than-athletic sailor to get away by himself and to sail safe and dry in any weather. I hate outboards, so I'd give it a try without auxiliary power for a while. I'd just fit a tiller-operated autopilot, pack a generous lunch, take a few issues of The Audiophile Voice and enjoy a day of relaxing sailing and reading. If this sounds good, don't overlook Garry Hoyt's new catboat. Sailboats don't have to be complicated to be fun.

Monday, 06 July 1998 | Print | PDF |  Email

Alerion Sport 33

Back in the mid-1960s the Islander 36 set the standard for medium-sized boat interiors. Then the race was on to put more and more accommodations into production “racer-cruisers” or “cruiser-racers.” A quick look at today’s typical production 33-footer of that type will show you where that got us. All the comforts you had on shore were shoehorned into the boat—or at least tried. In the early 1990s the Alerion Express line was born with an idea to return us to simple boats designed for daysailing and short cruises with a minimum of complication and an optimization of performance. The trend was off and running. Today the term “daysailer” means more than a 17-foot Lightning class sloop. It generally means any boat under 50 feet designed to optimize comfort for afternoon sailing on protected or semi-protected waters. Building off their previous series of Alerion Express models the designers at Pearson Marine have come up with this new series called the Sport series. The first in this line is the new Alerion Sport 33. The hull is identical to that of the Alerion Express 33 but weight has been taken out of the build with the result being a lighter, faster boat. The keel and rudder are also identical to the Express 33 model. This is a very pretty boat. It looks good from every angle. The freeboard is low. There is shape in the ends coupled with modest overhangs. Beam is on the narrow side of moderate with an L/B of 3.57. Draft is modest with a fin and bulb keel drawing 5 feet. The D/L is 196, with 800 pounds taken off the original Alerion Express 33 displacement. This design has a nice spring to the sheer. The overall look reminds me of a few boats that I admired when I was young, including the Kettenburg 38, the Owens cutter and of course the Concordia yawls. The deck for the Sport 33 is totally different from the Express 33. The cockpit is long and features only tiller steering. I was talking to a lady about her next boat and I suggested a boat that came with a tiller. A week later I got a letter from her telling me that she thought I was the type that would tell her to buy a car with a manual transmission too. Tillers are great on small boats. You feel every nuance of the boat’s action through the tiller. It’s the thermometer on the health of the boat at any given time. And you can hinge it up and get it completely out of the cockpit when you don’t need it. The seats adjacent to the tiller are removable in this model, so someone could sit aft facing forward if they didn’t mind the tiller cracking their knees during tacks and jibes. There is a Barney post for the mainsheet in the cockpit and a traveler aft of the coaming. The mainsheet gross tune is at the Barney post and the Harken fine tune tackle is at the traveler. I have a similar arrangement on my own boat. I bought it because I thought the fine tune looked cool. I never use it. There is a well in the foredeck for ground tackle and a small hatch in the cabintop. The coamings wrap around forward along the cabin bulkhead to form line bins. This is a clever, useful and stylish detail and it will hide the lines that spill down from the cabintop winches. There is a self-tacking jib track just forward of the mast but you also have the option of getting standard jib tracks on the deck if you want the ability to fly a jib with some overlap. If that’s the case then you also get primary winches located on the coaming about halfway down the cockpit. The rig with an SA/D of 24.4 is pretty simple and this rig comes with a masthead asymmetrical chute and the option of overlapping headsails of small LP. The interior is very simple but does have an enclosed head. It would be nice to have a rudimentary galley but it is not standard. Given the semi-custom nature of this shop I’m sure a small galley could be devised if you insisted on one. With that small custom galley the Alerion Sport 33 would come pretty close to my ideal as the ultimate boat for me. LOA 33; LWL 26’4”; Beam 9’3”; Draft 5’; Displacement 8,000 lbs.; Ballast 3,300 lbs.; Sail area 609 sq. ft.; SA/D 24.4; D/L 196; L/B 3.57; Auxiliary Yanmar 20-hp; Fuel 10 gals.; Water 8 gals. Pearson Marine Group, P.O Box 328, 373 Market St., Warren, RI 02885, (401) 247-3000, www.alerionexp.com. OBE: $199,900 Our Best Estimate of the sailaway price

Tuesday, 01 June 2010 | Print | PDF |  Email

Alerion-Express

Yesterday’s romance, today’s performer I t is easy to get caught up in Mega yacht fever. Rare and exotic materials punctuated with gold fixtures and objects of art for ambiance work skillfully together to remove any feeling at all that you are on a boat. Wait a minute! I thought we wanted to feel like we were on a boat. I wonder what goes through the head of a mega yacht owner as he sits on the upper fantail and watches Russell Upsomerup zoom around the bay, singlehanded in his Alerion-Express. “Gosh, I wish I had one.” There’s a lot to say for the feeling of power and megalomania that comes with steering a huge yacht in a breeze, but the best way to appreciate the joys of sailing is to reduce it to its basic elements. If you are a beginner, an El Toro dinghy can do quite nicely. I have to drape myself across the little eight-footer with my feet usually dangling in the lee wash. Take it up a notch and you can tackle a Laser dinghy. You will get some wet lessons on how to jibe in a breeze and your tummy muscles will spring back to life. When the Laser begins to bore you I suggest a windsurfer. Now you are physically part of the hardware of sailing. The slightest change in body attitude will result in performance changes that you will feel from head to toe. These simple approaches to enjoying life under sail will reacquaint you with the basics that probably were responsible for your initial attraction to sailing, i.e., working with the elements, self-sufficiency and that strange feeling that comes� with having mastery over wind and wave. I’m going to try over the next few months to bring you some smaller boats and the Carl Schumacher-designed Alerion-Express is a great example. The general aesthetic model for this design is straight out of Nat Herreshoff’s 1916 design Alerion. The gentle sweep of the sheer is balanced by moderate overhangs and freeboard that is low by today’s standards. Beam is narrow, and the hull shape looks to be moderate in all aspects. The D/L ratio is 168. Below the waterline the design shows a modern fin keel and a semi-balanced spade rudder. To me this is the most exciting mix of design features. Take an attractive, dated topsides look and blend it with performance characteristics below the waterline. The result is a boat that has the romance of yesterday and the performance of today. You could cruise the Alerion-Express. The accommodations are quite spartan, but there is a w.c. tucked under the V-berth. The first step into the cabin is the top of the icebox and a camp stove would do nicely. A Yanmar diesel is available as an option. The rig is a fractional rig with self-tacking jib. The mainsheet leads forward from the Harken traveller to a barney post in the middle of the cockpit. The SA/D ratio is 20.97. I think that this sail area coupled with a healthy ballast-to-displacement ratio will result in a stiff and fast ride. The Alerion-Express is currently being built by Tillotson-Pearson in Rhode Island. All gear is first rate and the overall look is one of a sophisticated and refined small yacht. Tillotson-Pearson, Inc., Market St., Warren, RI 02885. LOA 28’3” LWL 22’10” Beam 8’2” Draft 4’6” Displacement 4,400 lbs. Ballast 2,000 lbs. Sail Area 352 SA/D 20.97 D/L 268 Auxiliary Yanmar JGM 10

Tuesday, 07 July 1992 | Print | PDF |  Email

Amaryllis II

Traditional cruiserr When I was a kid I collected so many old yachting magazines my parents thought the floor of my bedroom was going to fall through. My favorites were the oldest ones. I can still vividly remember their smell. If you go back to before the ‘60s you will find the world of yachting populated with a tremendous variety of vessels. Today, science has eliminated the oddballs and given us a bland world of near-look-alike racing yachts. The same thing threatens the world of cruising boats. In my perfect world the harbor is full of varied yachts of individual, pronounced and proud character that in most cases echo the character of the owner. One of my very favorite designers was Laurent Giles of Britain. His designs always carried a unique stamp that was best exemplified by his Channel cutters. In 1937 Giles designed Amaryllis for a retired sailor. The boat was raced and cruised, and when World War II started, used to smuggle French resistance fighters across the English Channel. The boat was cruised through the ‘50s and eventually, in 1987, was bought by veteran sailor Simon Phelps and restored. Phelps was so taken with his restored yacht that he commissioned the Laurent Giles firm to redesign the boat in fiberglass. The Giles company made the boat bigger, but retained the original character of the lines. The boat is currently being built by Rock Run Yachts of Plymouth, Devon, England. This review puts me in a tough place. Sometimes old is just old and being old doesn’t make it good. I have never sailed this boat and perhaps Amaryllis has sailing characteristics belied by her general appearance. I’ll leave room for that. But, with so many fabulous looking boats back in the ‘30s, I don’t think this is the one I would have chosen to resurrect. I wonder what good old dead Laurent Giles is thinking? While the look of Amaryllis is certainly that of a traditional Bermuda yawl, I don’t find the lines that attractive. It’s hard for me to put my finger on why. I just don’t see the level of harmony I need in a hull shape here. Maybe it’s in those anemic ends. Okay, wash my mouth out with soap. The bow of the original is almost straight in profile, which was unusual in a day of exaggerated spoon-bow profiles. This straightened stem would give Amaryllis a finer entry. Curiously, I see that on the redesigned version the designers have added some fullness to the bow sections. I prefer this aesthetically, but I can’t help thinking that fine bow had something to do with the performance of the original. The stern overhang about equals that of the bow overhang. The LOA is 43 feet, 7 inches and the DWL is only 30 feet, 9 inches. When you couple this with a displacement of 30,240 pounds you get a D/L of 464. Beam is narrow by today’s standards at 11 feet, 10 inches. The rig has a large mizzen that is stayed independently of the mainmast, i.e., there is no triatic stay connecting both masts. The long stern overhang makes sheeting the mizzen easy and keeps the sail out of the cockpit. The SA/D is around 15.5. The mizzen makes a great riding sail for when you are at anchor and the sail should be built with full-length battens. This may look out of place, but will prolong the life of the sail. The layout for the new Amaryllis is very conventional with quarter berths and V-berths. There is one head, a big wet locker, a large nav center and a nice galley. The doghouse has port and starboard seats. It’s a very workable interior and it would look great outfitted in wine-colored, velvetlike upholstery. Sure it will be dark below, but to some of us that's the appeal of this type of boat. Going below should have that "back to the womb" feel. A wee nip of a good single malt should brighten things up sufficiently. The vintage look is so seductive—it’s hard to resist that abrupt doghouse with its squared off windows—but I’m afraid it will be hard to carry off in fiberglass. The new, boxed cockpit coaming will not help. That’s the rub with these resurrected antiques. When you take away the traditional timber detailing it’s easy to end up with an aesthetically awkward hybrid. I hope the builders of Amaryllis II can avoid this. I can still taste that soap.

Tuesday, 06 March 2001 | Print | PDF |  Email

Andrews 28

Racer-cruiser Here’s a new fast looking racer-cruiser from one of my favorite designers, Alan Andrews, who has his office in Long Beach, California. Over the years I think all of Alan’s boats have been excellent performers and I don’t see why this little dual-purpose design should be any different. “Dual purpose” might be a bit confusing. Is it a racer or is it a cruiser? I spoke to the builder, Ivan Ivandic of Sylvana Yachts Inc. up in Penticton, British Columbia, the heart of Canada’s wine region, and he said the boat is a “sport cruiser.” That’s a new category for me but I like it. This boat combines the performance of a sport boat with the comfort of a family cruising boat. It would be hard to ask for more out of one boat.

Thursday, 30 October 2008 | Print | PDF |  Email | Read more

Andrews 50

Racerr Alan Andrews has given us a long string of race winners. I always look forward to reviewing his designs. They are meticulously detailed. Alan is the type of designer who will show up on the dock for the first race and insist on weighing each and every tool on board. "No socks. All else being equal, the crew without socks will win." Races are won with this type of detailed approach. Alan's client for this 50-footer wanted a boat he could race in events up and down the coast of California and Mexico. The boat would go from Olympic courses in San Francisco Bay to downwind Mexico overnighters. This makes the design challenge for the designer a balancing act. Fifteen years ago the potent downwind boat was generally not competitive upwind and vice versa. The heavy-air threat did not have the power to win in light air. Fortunately, the difference in purpose-built racers has been narrowed dramatically due to developments in keel, rig, hull form and structures. That about covers the design spectrum. We have all gained from this through the trickle-down from the racing classes into cruising boats. Let's take a look at this gorgeous hull. Note the subtle and attractive sweep to the sheer accentuated by the short ends. This hull is all sailing length. The half angle of entry (HAE) is 12.3 degrees, indicating an extremely fine entry. Remember that 20 years ago we considered 19 degrees to be fine. The prismatic is moderate; Alan says it's somewhere between .54 and .55. He doesn't want to divulge the location of the LCF (longitudinal center of flotation) or the LCB (longitudinal center of buoyancy). It's top secret (TS) at this time. I think we can safely assume from the location of the keel that LCB and LCF will be well aft. Note the distinct lack of rocker to the hull profile. The D/L of this design is 75. Bulbed keels are back. "What comes around goes aground." Alan's fin is iron with a large lead bulb. The bulb has a delicious, organic-type shape based on Alan's Whitbread research. In this case the rudder planform appears greater than 50 percent of the keel fin planform area. The rig is fractional. This has the advantage over masthead rigs in giving superior acceleration out of tacks. This is probably due to a far greater proportion of the total sail area (the mainsail) being closer to optimum trim right out of the tack. The fractional rig also has the advantage of allowing the mainsail to be depowered and powered up quickly. Headsails will be a blade-type 100-percent jib and a PHRF-friendly 155-percent genoa for the light-air, lumpy-sea powering requirements. The SA/D of this rig, if you include the area gained through the generous roach (about an 8-inch overlap on backstay), would be 32.5. However, we still try to use I, J, E and P for sail area in our calculations; that way the SA/D is 31.85. Either way, this is a high-powered boat. We see so many boats now that have extended roaches that we may need to modify our approach to SA/Ds in future issues. There's really no interior layout on this boat. Alan was not designing a cruising boat. There is nothing in this interior most of us would call privacy. There is no dining table. You would just have to nurse your cold slab of Spam in your lap. The berths are all pipe berths and are as soft as they look; with a 1-inch foam layer, they are hard as a rock. This is a racing boat. Work hard enough trying to generate boat speed and you will sleep anywhere. Usually I fantasize about incredible golf shots. But if I wanted to fantasize about sailing, I think I would have fun imagining a cruise on a boat like this. I'd fantasize about 4-inch-thick foam cushions for sleeping, and nobody would ever pass me.

Sunday, 06 September 1998 | Print | PDF |  Email

Andrews 72

Performace cruiserr This spectacular design from Alan Andrews was built by Scorpio Yachts in Exeter, Ontario, for an experienced Great Lakes couple who wanted a big, fast boat that could be sailed by a small crew. All efforts were made to build an ultralight boat, including the use of carbon fiber skins over a Divinycell foam core. Gougeon Pro-Set epoxy was used throughout the whole structure and post cured at an elevated temperature after all the bonding work was completed. The entire interior is composite panels painted white and trimmed with solid mahogany, Herreshoff style. Traditional-looking deck beams are carbon fiber over foam. It's immediately obvious that this boat is good-looking, from any angle. The ultradelicate sweep to the sheer combines with the low wedge of the cabintrunk to give us a very contemporary-looking yacht in the classic style established by the Swan line. There is not an ugly line on this entire design. The simplicity of the deck lines are as effective as a frugal four-note symphonic theme. Nobody said it had to be complicated to be good. With 71.5 feet LOA to work with and one couple to make comfy, Alan had no problem designing a great interior layout. The owner's stateroom is almost palatial with a settee opposite the large double berth, a desk and an adjoining head with tub. The saloon features a huge dinette with centerline seat. A pilot berth is outboard of the port settee. The galley has my name all over it: "Braised veal chops for dinner tonight." The nav station opposite the galley is also copiously proportioned and the wet locker has enough room in it to actually allow the wet gear to dry. Aft, there are two nearly mirror-image stateroom-head combinations. They share a centerline shower stall. If you study the layout carefully, you will note two ladders aft that fold away against the bulkhead to allow access to the deck from the aft cabins. There is certainly no shortage of locker space. This boat could accommodate three couples comfortably and with an unusual amount of privacy. Ventilation comes partially from built-in Dorade boxes that use the corner of the cabintrunk as part of their water trap. Gary Mull was the first designer who I remember using these. Gary called them "sunshine boxes." They save both weight and windage. The sail plan shows a very tall, multiple-spreader rig (spreaders not shown) on a carbon fiber spar built by Offshore Spars. The total headsail inventory will be one 130-percent furling jib, one asymmetrical chute and a staysail added for heavy weather. Note that the headstay tack is well aft of the bow, allowing the asymmetrical chute to tack to the stem well ahead of the headstay-and not requiring a bowsprit. The SA/D is an aggressive 30.95. With a D/L of 70.98, I think we can safely call this design a ULDB. A waterline length of 62.6 feet and a 140-horsepower Yanmar give the boat an effortless 10 knots under power and I would think that, with some retuning of the prop's pitch, you would see speeds in excess of 10 knots. We have gone from a time, 20 years ago, when 6.5 knots was a healthy speed under power for any sailboat to today, where we want every tenth of a knot we can get out of our boats under power. The underlining philosophy is that motoring is a drag so let's get it over with as fast as possible. We are very lucky this month. I called Alan and asked him to provide us with hull design data that most articles are not privy to. "Give us the meat, Alan." The half angle of entry of Attitude is 12.6 degrees. You get this number by measuring the angle between the DWL and the centerline. Twenty-five years ago, when I designed the Valiant 40, I thought I was getting radical for a cruising boat when I used a half angle of entry of 18 degrees. Attitude has a very fine entry and you can be assured that this boat will knife through the water. Look at any of today's fastest boats. Bow waves are well back on the hull and there is no evidence of any vertical flow or "mushing" bow wave. The prismatic coefficient is a textbook .54. The midsection shows an attractive shape with no deadrise (tangent at centerline) and a rather soft turn at the bilge. The BWL is moderate. The keel is a 9-foot-draft fin with a bulb and wings. Alan relied upon Dave Egan of Egan Tech to optimize the keel design. Dave uses Computational Fluid Dynamic analysis to refine fin, bulb and wing geometries. The bulb is a horizontally squashed shape more radiused on the upper half and more elliptical on the lower half for a lower center of gravity. The wings have an average chord length of 10 inches and are a highly cambered asymmetrical wing section in a slightly nose-down configuration. Total span of both wings is 10.26 feet. The marked dyhedral angle is similar to the wings on the New Zealand America's Cup winner. The target in this exercise was to develop an overall keel configuration that would offer the least amount of drag in the downwind condition while preserving low VCG and upwind lift. The rudder has 16-percent balance area and a near-vertical rudder post to relieve helm pressure at high heeling angles. Alan Andrews has quietly become one of the most successful race boat designers in the United States. His projects, ranging from Whitbread boats to Transpac record holders, have always been state-of-the-art fast and, more importantly, predictable winners. The dark blue-hulled Attitude shows that Alan has brought both the performance and aesthetic elements together with extraordinary results.

Friday, 06 February 1998 | Print | PDF |  Email

Anna

January 2007 Classic cruiser In the 1930s yacht designers wore white shirts, ties and vests to work. They smoked pungent pipes and they took long, flexible wooden splines and sprung bold sheerlines with impunity. The art and science of yacht design was still mostly art. But we have come a long way. Haven’t we? The 56-footer that used to go to weather at 7 knots now goes to weather at 9 knots. Heck, that’s a 2 knot increase in the last 76 years. But for some sailors it isn’t all about boat speed. Stormy Weather was one of the most admired early Sparkman & Stephens designs. An agile ocean racer of her time, Stormy Weather was once described by Uffa Fox this way: “Stormy Weather is one of Olin Stephen’s favorite designs, and her lines show her to be beamy and powerful, yet easily driven and therefore fast. A type that should gladden the hearts of those who go down to the sea in such small boats.” It doesn’t surprise me that S&S was approached and asked to do a modern version of Stormy. Anna, at 56 feet LOA, is slightly scaled up from the original 53-foot, 11-inch Stormy Weather. The character of the sheer has been maintained along with freeboard, tumblehome and the contours of the cabintrunk. The look is pure vintage S&S. It’s hard to imagine a better looking boat if you like these kinds of boats, and I do. It’s not that easy to marry a modern underbody to antique topsides. Anna’s stern has to be narrow with a hint of concavity to the counter. The U-shaped bow sections of that new Baltic would look hideous drawn out into Anna’s spoon bow profile. A compromise shape must be found that allows the designer to maintain the original end treatments. The D/L is 254 and the L/B is 4.3, indicating a narrow boat of moderate displacement. The rudder is a deep carbon spade type and the keel is a moderate aspect ratio fin drawing 8 feet, 3 inches. Back in the day when the designers were burning holes in their vests with their pipes they liked to put the galley forward. I have heard this was because the paid hand did the cooking—when he was allowed out of the fo’c’sle. Anna’s interior was designed by Martha Fay Coolidge of Round Point, Maine, and the first thing she did in Anna’s layout was to move the galley aft to a position adjacent to the companionway. It’s a small galley. It’s a small interior given the LOA, but consider that this design gives away 14.67 feet to overhangs. The rest of the layout is very traditional. There are settee berths and pilot berths in the saloon. There is one large head forward and there is an owner’s stateroom aft. There are two companionways so you can enter the saloon area without going through the owner’s stateroom but I think most of the time the aft companionway will be used. There is very little elbowroom in this layout and it will have an overall feel similar to the original Stormy Weather. If you are going to carry off the vintage look you have to apply the aesthetic to the deck layout. In this case the cabintrunk and cockpit coamings are pretty much identical to the original. The dorade vents feature tall, pipe segment, old-fashioned vents on oversized boxes. Al Mason once paid a visit to me. I knew he worked for S&S back then so I asked him the formula for dorade box volume. He said, “Just draw it so it looks good. Then make it twice that big.” There is a butterfly hatch over the saloon. The anchor is stowed in a well forward on a tilt out arm so that it will be hidden when stowed. The most fun part of this deck layout is that Anna will be tiller steered. This will be a test of the boat’s balance under sail. Stormy Weather was tiller steered, as was Dorade originally. Stormy was a yawl but Anna will be a sloop. This is a big change and the design brief I have says this was done to improve performance. I don’t know. Yawls can look pretty good and you can always furl that bitty mizzen when you are beating. Anna’s SA/D is a healthy 19.1. Anna does make a beautiful sloop and I see no reason that the rig should not be thoroughly up to date. The Brooklin Boat Yard is building Anna in cold molded construction. Anna will have a saildrive and some find saildrives a bit too non-conventional. I like them and what I find funny is that Stormy Weather had a V-drive and Uffa Fox felt that V-drive was a bit too radical. Anna’s beauty will certainly enhance the waterfront environment.

Saturday, 06 January 2007 | Print | PDF |  Email