So how does a lug rig boat go in club racing? My designs won’t be outclassed in club racing. I’m really keen to find out how the yardstick (handicap) changes as George and crew get used to the realities of course racing making the boat sail faster. We end up with an estimate of PY – Portsmouth Yardstick for the Goat Island Skiff.
Slightly arrogant I!
I visit the Philippines then Malaysia and also find a large community of Filipino boat builders there. I find they know much more than me about boat design and varieties. Stunning mix of different boats from curvaceous to plywood and boxy.
But Gosh … the shapes they come up with!
Malcolm Eggins, boat builder and designer has passed away.
A small tribute to one of the many people that has influenced me and many other sailors and designers. He was a part of the development of Moths, NS14s, VJs, VeeEsses and many other Australian racing dingies as a builder and designer along with his son Darryl. He won several State Championships.
BETH sailing canoe – The designer has lots of fine things to say about the sailing performance of BETH – but Andrew Barclay has been racing his against mixed fleets in British Columbia where she sails equal with Laser Radials in light wind and gradually outclasses them in stronger.
I provide some tips about getting a bit more from the boat.
Fyne Boat Kits has an excellent reputation for customer service and quality.
I am happy to announce that they will be gradually phased in as the UK Agents for storerboats kits, plans and materials.
Eureka Canoe on Hungarian TV. Csaba Mezai, storerboatplan’s agent in Hungary translated my plans into Magyar (Hungarian). He also runs by far the biggest website in that language – www.hajoepitok.hu which includes a very active forum.
A small collection of the many videos of the Goat Island Skiff Planing fast in different places around the world.
This OzRacer mk2 has a number of changes from the original design, but Bob has pulled it off. The biggest risk is that the windsurfer mast might break because it is not meant to be supported in this way – it is meant to be held up higher by the arms of the sailor.
David Graybeal of Harbor Woodworks in Portland, Oregon built a pair of my wooden paddles from the free plans
See the link in the left column. Simple, but look way nicer than other simple paddles.
I am in the Philippines at the moment.
I took five days out to go to the area where one of my Australian Filipino friends has her hometown. The general area is Laguna, I was staying at Lumban and nearby was a canoe trip to Pagsanjan falls.
I was really interested to see the local boats and to see how they might relate to the timber boats that existed previously. The boats are elegant and very well suited to their environment. Paddling and motor canoes are used on a daily basis.
A few photos and a short report from Hungary.
They held their first wooden boat messabout. 30 people, 10 boats and a big pot of homemade goulash!
I used to work at DuckFlat many years ago.
I visited them in Adelaide. Photo and text of a fast plywood trimaran, 40ft steam liveaboard boat, kayak, rowboat and a Hartley Powerboat restoration
List of Kit suppliers for Storer Boat Plans. UK and Europe, USA, Australia, South Africa. Kits make building a Storer Boat even easier.
Gyula, who built the first European OzRacer in 2008 wants to modify it for an outboard motor or an electric trolling motor – calculate output
The new OzRacer RV is a much simpler build of the original OzRacer concept. It also is a direct relative of the slightly larger and much faster OZ Goose
The Finn Dinghy has been one of the most important of the racing classes over the past six decades.
It was always in the forefront of sailing developments.
One fellow contacted asking if there were plans to build a Finn dinghy … and I was able to find a partial answer.
The Quick Canoe Electric is a simple to build cartoppable square back canoe.
It can be quickly and simply built in plywood.
Peter Caspari’s boat is shown here.
The rudderbox design I use has distinct advantages over normal swinging rudder setups. Once you try this design you will never be satisfied with a swinging blade again. But some of the details are important!
In the late 70s as a sailing teenager I drew boats on every available paper surface.
A new book “a lighter ton” describes the exciting development of racing yachts to create newer, lighter, faster and cheaper and FUNNER boats.
Many of the developments were from New Zealand designers such as Bruce Farr, Paul Whiting and Laurie Davidson. A new book by Richard Blakey covers this exciting experimental period in yacht design
The above photo was taken on the third day of our Canoeing trip on the Loire River in France. The two black canoes didn’t even exist a week ago.
When I wrote the original article on Disposable Canoeing I had no idea at all what it would lead to me and a bunch of adventurers, wine and cheese connoisseurs. Most of us didn’t even know each other! The picture above is the result of this adventurism, but what happened to make it happen?
What technology was involved to make the boats faster to build than most stitch and glue boats and what weather conditions did we have to overcome to make it all happen.