Sword in Stone

Merlin hauled out in front of my office this morning

Many changes since it was built in 1977

Merlin is, perhaps, the most famous racing yacht ever.  With justification, it has its own Wikipedia page: S/V Merlin. Designed, built, owned and campaigned by Bill Lee (The Wizard); Merlin held the TransPac record for an amazing 20 years.  

It's been changed over the last 40+ years: new keel, new rudder, new bowsprit -- generally, it looks even sleeker. Merlin is still an amazing boat...still fast, still competitive, and still fun.

Age of Russia

Here's a cool boat that hauled out next door a few days ago. Age of Russia is a familiar sight in Richardson's Bay, where it is usually anchored, well offshore, due to its thirteen plus foot draft.

1992 ACC cruising conversion

Richardson Bay, Sausalito

The port of hail is "Leningrad, USSR", which could confuse someone as neither Leningrad or the USSR still exist. The short history of the vessel is that nascent St. Petersburg yacht club built it in hopes of competing in the 1992 America's Cup, shipping it to San Diego in one of those giant Antonov cargo planes in 1991. Well, the Soviet Union collapsed, they never had the money, and in spite of an injection of cash from an American sponsor (Stolichnaya "Russian" Vodka), the boat was never assembled and languished in San Diego for many years. Another group then trucked it up to Vancouver, BC where, after doing some work, it was abandoned again.

Proud owner

Tyone (above) then bought it, built the cabin, installed an engine, etc. He's put up a website about the boat and his experience owning it. Apparently, people often coming zooming up alongside and yell at him in Russian, which Tyone does not speak. Before he messes with the keel, he should probably learn enough to say, "It's my Dad's boat...I don't speak Russian!".

I can see there is a great temptation to buying an old race boat and converting it to cruising, but...it's a temptation that (IMHO) should be resisted.

Over 13' of draft

A gigantic, steel mermaid fin

Well, that's just a bitter, jealous, old man ranting. Because whatever Tyone's doing, he's doing something right 'cause he's got a cute GF...although, maybe she's just a painter at Bay Ship.

BS&Y painter in protective clothing

Zdravstvuĭte, tovarishch! YA iz Sankt-Peterburga. YA hochu piva. Mogu li ya kosnutʹsya vashyeĭ zhenoĭ?

Five ply challenge

A few years ago, Joel Welter had the bright idea for a developmental class of sailboats with a low barrier to entry. By low he imagined boats that could be built in seventy hours and cost less than 300 bucks...he did it! Joel and his coworker, Brooks Dees, came up with the "5 Ply Challenge". Last night at the Northern California SNAME section meeting the first (and, to date, the only) contestants showed their stuff.

Joel and his lake scow yawl Les Affames de Porc

Brooks with his FJ variant 64 Valient

Niko and the Cal student team aboard the unnamed proa

Here's a link to the class rules, but the main feature is that "All parts of the vessel’s hull, foils, and cross members (for multi hulls) must be made from no more than 5 sheets of 4’ x 8’ x ¼” thick plywood". Interesting idea (followed by the emoticon for a studiously blank expression combined with raised eyebrows).

Very fun meeting, although there were no takers for the offer of rides as the possibility of total immersion seemed too great. There was a little suppressed tension during dinner as Niko's proa disappeared down the busy Estuary with no running lights ("They prohibited by Class").

As a connoisseur of events of this type, I'll give full marks to Niko for innovation and speed potential...hampered by control issues. Joel clearly won the cheapskate award (and the honors attendant to it)...his floation was bags of trash lashed to the gunwales. Brooks apparently is the overall sailing champion. He (pussy) did not put 64 Valient in the water last night, so we had no way of verifying it. And although there was no evidence of rule evasion, I suspect he must have cheated.

Plastiki

I had to post a comment about an article I read in the Chronicle this morning. My complaint? The idea that Plastiki is "made" out of plastic bottles or is "recyclable" is deliberate disinformation and self promotion.

The vessel has an engineered, composite structure built from laminated foam board. The core structure is made with a standard foam (used to make fridges, surfboards, boats) with a manufactured Polyethylene Terephthalate fabric glued and vacuum bagged to it. The voids in the structure are filled with high quality PET bottles...that's it.

Take a look at this picture:

Does that main look like it's made from plastic bottles? Or how 'bout the one below? The spars, rigging and equipment are regular sailing yacht stuff -- I suppose it can all be "recycled" at a swap meet...

Furthermore, the comparison to Kon-Tiki expedition is false. I don't know if Thor Heyderdahl really proved anything either, but it really was an expedition into the void. Kon-Tiki was a sodden, balsa raft that drifted miserably to leeward, carrying 200 coconuts for food and their water in bamboo containers. With aluminum spars, kevlar sails, aramid rigging, GPS, radar, sat-phones and an engineered watertight hull, Plastiki is a modern (although structurally inefficient) sailing yacht.

De Rothschild is a tall, handsome, self promoting rich guy...I've got nothing against him. But did they actually prove anything? Will their endeavor prevent people from buying soda in plastic bottles? Did they use less energy, or is it more recyclable than a homemade plywood catamaran? Is the "expedition" worth wasting the electrons it takes to publish this comment? (answer -- no).

I'm not dissing anyone who sails across an ocean, but hero? I don't think so. In contrast, here's the Junk Raft:

I think they actually did something...not sure what, but I'm pretty sure it's more than what De Rothschild did with Plastiki. Check out the junk raft:

http://junkraft.com/home.html

Cangarda makes it to Ellay

Cangarda got its COI on Friday and left SF Bay early in the am on the 24th. I'm happy to report that the vessel and all souls made it safely to LA. Here's a report, in its entirety, I just got from the owner:

" The first voyage of the restored Cangarda.
The restoration of Cangarda, the last American Edwardian steam yacht, 1901, has been ongoing for five years. At 126 feet on deck but only a seventeen foot she is a long and skinny boat. Built as a cruising yacht she was expected to be fast for her day and with a flashy look. It has been great to undertake this restoration. The team led by Jeff Rutherford have done a great jog on the construction. Tony Guild was the master of getting a Certificate of Inspection from the Coast Guard. Now it was time for the first open ocean voyage of Cangarda. The plan was to sail from San Francisco to Los Angeles, only four hundred mile voyage but enough to test Cangarda.

Friday at 8:00 am I arrived at the Coast Guard Headquarters in Alameda California. Presence was requested to be present at the signing of the Certificate Of Inspection by the Commander of the operation for the Sector. Quite an event. A full presentation before probably a hundred CG personal, pictures et al.! For three days previous to this the Coast Guard had been completing the inspection of Cangarda. This included the inspection of the CO2 fire suppression system for the engine room, indeed a great thing to have for this vessel, as well as all the other safety equipment. The detail to safety elements was immense. The next day was a test and verification of the system that controls the boiler and burner management. In essence this was like taking your laptop and testing each module on the backplane of the PC to ensure that it communicated accurately to the next. This was a full days effort and highly intense. The third day was sea trials which included the normal testing of the different steering systems (including the tiller) but also demonstrating the use of each of the dinghies and launch. The end included a testing of the pressure relief valves and other items. All along the way you never know if the inspectors will come up with something else they want or if they will ever be satisfied. Finally it was done. After two years of effort to clear our system with the Coast Guard (which was built so well that we did not have to change any systems except one component of the Ethernet equipment) we were to be granted the COI just as they would issue to a thousand foot ship.

Friday evening the crew assembled for a dinner. We were to depart for Los Angeles. One never sails on Friday and we intended to sail with a favorable flood tide at 2:00 am. I went into my cabin to sleep asking to be awakened when we crossed under the Golden Gate. At 4:00 the electrician came in to pick up his tools and leave. Last minute work. The first delay. Steam came up and we left the dock at 6:00 and on our way.

Outside the seas were running a nine foot swell with two to three foot wind waves. A north westerly was to blow of some ten to twenty knots by prediction. Not too bad. We planned to go right out into the sea and sail in the middle of all this to test Cangarda in the sea with consideration of roll on the boiler. The tide was flooding hard with the beginning of the ebb on the south shore so we stayed to the right. Out on the horizon one could see the seas rolling. When we were out into the seas the boat performed very well. She slides down the waves. The stabilizers make it all tolerable and while we had alarms on the drum level we had no trips (the water in the steam drum of a boiler is critical to be at a minimum level or the fire is terminated).

We sailed along through the morning until about one in the afternoon when suddenly the burners both tripped. For obscure reasons we had air in the oil lines making a foam. The burners would not stay lit. Cangarda was dead in the water, no steam. wallering beam to the nine foot seas. Finally, after rolling in the beam seas, we decided to quit the automated system and light the burners in manual and force the air out of the system so we could relight in the automated state later. We performed the task needed to achieve this and indeed we were able to light the system off and run for several hours. However finally the air/fuel mixtures made operation of the burners impossible and we decided to go back to automated firing where the mixture of air and oil are worked carefully by the computers.

But the light off did not go smoothly. We were off Santa Cruse about twenty miles, again wallering in the seas that were building as the afternoon wind was building. A series of misseps kept us from getting a good light off until we realized that a specific trip switch that we had opened when we did the manual firing had not been released. With that misstep rectified we were able to relight and again the burners operated smoothly and we stared again about six in the evening. The only item is that we had been blown all the way past Monterey.

The boat did well in the beam seas. There were a few seas that did come aboard but in a minor way. There were a couple of seas (probably doubles of some eighteen feet) that some of the crew said could have put green water on the deck but did not. In the engine room the roll was not too severe but we are near the pivot line there. The wind had built to thirty five to forty knots. Finally we were glad to be back steaming and again riding down these swells, dipping the bowsprit into the waves and then surfing down. Nothing broken, all safe but a few seasick. The team did a great job sticking to the task until we had worked the last kink out of out problem. It is good to know that the element was not the fundamental control system. Just saltheads not having full command of the highly complex automation system of Cangarda.

We have had no events since this one problem. We are not off Santa Cruse Island (Ventura) and will be in Los Angeles tonight. All is well. It is nice and quiet sailing on a steam vessel. None of the roar of a internal combustion engine. Just like sailing. Cangarda performed well in difficult conditions. Nothing broke. We understand the complications that made for our five hour delay. This vessel deserves the respect of a good sea going boat.

Next challenge is getting to Maine.
Bob"

Confusing presentation with substance

The dark side of yacht design is the desire to just make pretty pictures. I believe we would all like to make things of beauty...that applies even to engineers. Indeed, there have been beautiful bridges, automobiles, trains, buildings, commercial aircraft, and dams. Yachts, particularly large sailing yachts, are intended to be beautiful and to be admired. Unlike the previously mentioned objects, there generally lesser requirements for performance, safety or reliability. Nor is there any requirement that the designers be professionally licensed, or even show minimal compentency. Anyone can put up a shingle or website declaring himself to be a yacht designer. Here's an example from Lila-Lou Design House I found on Sailing Anarchy yesterday:

Skimming over the sea.

More skimming

Look, they even made a fully rendered video and posted it on Youtube. I know just how long it takes make a 3D model of a complex vessel, as well as how many hours of CPU time are sucked up rendering these images and making the video. Consequently, I have to give these guys extra credit for using their full allotment of electrons, as well as an overall "A" for presentation. However, I'm afraid I've had to give them "F" on both Substance, and Comprehension of Sailing Forces 101. Alas, where to start?

Arrangement of masts and keels

Perhaps I can start with the multiplicity of keels and masts...ah, screw it, it's hopeless, and I have other stuff to do. To be (more than) fair, I've emailed them and asked them to respond with their design rationale. My point is not to pick apart this particularly stupid design, but to comment on the confusion between style and substance that you often see in yacht design.

I imagine, from their website that they have some training as interior designers or architects; consequently, presentation is everything to them. One of the dangers of photorealistic rendering is that it confers plausibility to even the most outlandish concept. Okay, you may say, it's just harmless masturbation. However, there is always the possibility that they will be able to convince some poor feckless schmuck to actually build it.

10/30 update: Amazing the PR that these loons are putting out. Looks like they've acquired a handsome pitchman with some stripes on his sleeve:

In one of Sailing Anarchy's user forums they've already beat on this striped idiot. Check it out.

Cangarda and Cape James

Just back from the Cangarda (checking out the thrust bearing) and trying to avoid real work. Yes, Cangarda is still here and still stuck in regulatory limbo. I've got many emails enquiring after her including one with a nice link to the Fulford Place in Brockville, ON. (George Fulford owned Magedoma ex-Cangarda for many years).

Cangarda and Cape James

Beautiful, cloudless day at the Marina. (Ah...should go outside more and top up on Vitamin D!). Astern of Cangarda is Cape James, which is a cool little ship with an interesting history. This stout wooden (mostly Douglas fir) vessel was designed as a coastal freighter. Built in 1943 by the Martinolich Shipyard in Oakland (now closed for many years) and drafted into the US Army as the FP47 , it operated in the Western Pacific as a communication vessel during WWII. They say the rust spots in the hull that periodically appear are shrapnel (hmm...I don't believe it). For many years it has been a small passenger vessel operating in adventure tourism...which makes you wonder what they're doing in Richmond (actually adventurous in parts). They have a very nice website (although they guy labelled as Douglas MacArthur on board in WWII is really just some other white man in a hat) .

At Tri-Coastal, we try not to reinvent the wheel, unless it really needs it. Cangarda, unfortunately has been held back a little by unnecessary wheel re-invention.

Cangarda's original awning

Some ridge poles, some guy wires, a few clever fittings...the awning was protective, useful and simple to set and strike. It was a refinement of a design that probably went back to the Babylonians. I think you can tell how critical the awning was to the operation of the yacht by the number of historic drawings we have on the awning fittings. At least half of the Pusey and Jones drawings we got from Hagley Museum are of awning fittings.

Cangarda's new awning frame

I don't know what the heck they have in mind for the new awning, but then I didn't design it. The top looks like it will make a pretty good airfoil!

Pride of Baltimore

Seaforth Publishing is about (although they've been saying that for a year) to publish Sailing into the Past, which is about learning from replica vessels. Frankly, I don't believe we've learned that much; however, I did write the chapter on the ill fated Pride of Baltimore. I'm sure there are people who are much more qualified; unfortunately, they were all dead, demented or apparently wanted too much money. Hence, by default...

Pride at her zenith

Reaching down to Cruz Bay a few weeks before her end

Pride and its fatal end have been covered elsewhere. Tom Waldron wrote a book about the sinking. My chapter mostly covers the history of Baltimore Clippers in general and the construction and early days sailing it. I've already been remonstrated for one error in the chapter. I said that Pride never had a new, matched set of sails...obviously false as shown in these photos.

Post any other corrections, or email me.

Classic wooden yachts

Nathaniel Greene Herreshoff is, undoubtedly, the greatest American yacht designer and builder ever. Most notably "Captain Nat" Designed and built the five winning America's Cup yachts from 1893 to 1920. (He also built the winning cup yachts in 1930 and 1934 ...every winning America's Cup Yacht from 1893 to 1934 was built by Herreshoff). He was a fantastically prolific innovator, inventing the folding propeller, the two speed winch, cross cut sails, the modern catamaran, the streamlined bulb keel, and other devices and practices too numerous to list here.

What I admire most about Captain Nat is the way he handled relations with clients. In 1903, following the brilliant success of Ingomar, Kaiser Wilhelm (yes, that Kaiser Wilhelm, the supreme leader of the German Empire) contracted Herreshoff to build him a new racing schooner. When the model (Herreshoff designed hull forms using wooden models) was complete, the Wilhelm cabled Herreshoff and instructed him to make certain modifications to it. Herreshoff famously replied that he would build the vessel but could accept no design input--basically cancelling the contract with the Kaiser! (and thereby setting the gold standard for client management to which all yacht designer must aspire.) Anyhow, at the end of April, 1910, the Herreshoff schooner Westward crossed the Atlantic to take part in the Kiel Regatta, winning three out of four races, leaving a frustrated Kaiser Wilhelm II behind on his Meteor IV. (This was, of course, the true underlying cause of WWI).

His smaller yachts were also justly famous and are considered classics today with the old vessels patiently restored and new ones painstakingly built to his designs. Almost every issue of WoodenBoat magazine has an article about a Herreshoff restoration or new build. He was truly the "Wizard of Bristol", his designs were great and innovative, and the vessels were wickedly fast...for their era. Now, I don't relish a shit storm of angry responses on this, because NGH truly is like a god to me; however, design and technology have advanced since then.

I had this epiphany Wednesday night at the local SNAME meeting. Former TCM employee Brooks Dees was presenting his latest sport yacht design (I wrote about it previously), a GP-26. Part of the presentation was boat rides. I watched from the dock as Brooks backed out of the slip in front of the restaurant and proceeded to close reach up the Oakland Estuary at nine knots (in about 10 knots of true wind and with seven, somewhat overweight, naval architects on board). In minutes they were out of sight to windward. A moment later, a Buzzard's Bay 15 (much like this picture) dragged its classic wooden ass past us to leeward at a sedate two or three knots. The owner seemed content at the helm, wearing a Greek fisherman's cap.

Yachting in a Buzzard's Bay 15

Although the two boats are similar in size and intended use, they are separated by a hundred years of change. Now, not all change is good, and I'm sure that there are many traditionalists out there who (will rage on me as soon as I publish this)believe that one "can't improve on perfection". They would rather arrive sedately at three knots in a vessel of highly varnish wood than operate something made from carbon fibers.

I feel otherwise. Without parsing perfection, I suppose my argument is that sailing is always uncomfortable, so you might as well get it over with as fast as possible (which is why I windsurf). I don't know if Nat Herreshoff would necessarily agree with that, but I suspect (if he were alive today) he would be appalled that people still build, and claim to enjoy "racing" his 100+ year old designs.

Cangarda under way!

Cangarda under way! Coast Guard has given limited permission on the Bay for builder's trials. The steam yacht operated for Saturday and Sunday, going just outside the Golden Gate for a helicopter photo shoot.

Leaving Richmond Marina (Albany Hill in the background)

Helicopter aerial

A little bow trim

The crew is making progress with the vessel. The automation and boiler managment system are much more stable and seem to be working better. Previously, there were several problems with the steam plant. One of the big ones was maintaining the burner flame when turned down low. They've spent a tremendous amount of time adjusting the steam atomization, fuel pressure, etc. Now (from a distance), it seems to be working... for the first time both burners have operated at once.

Indeed, although Cangarda is working much better, there is still a great deal to do on the regulatory side before the USCG will let the vessel go to the East Coast. Stay tuned.

Cangarda at Bay Ship and Yacht

Cangarda was hauled last week for a bottom job (it has been almost two years since it was launched) and a repair of the shaft seal. Joel Welter, the chief naval architect at Bay Ship and Yacht, took this picture of it on their synchrolift.

The vessel is operating under automation now, and navigated around San Francisco Bay this weekend for about twelve hours. According to Steve Cobb, they reached 205 shaft rpms (~ 10 knots), which is about 80% of the theoretical maximum. So far, it looks like our propeller calculations were good (whew!)... the prop seems to perfectly matched to the vessel and the power plant. We won't be able to determine that for sure until we can conduct full sea trials.

The owner is quite anxious to move the vessel to the East Coast; however, there are still a few bugs to work out and regulatory barriers to hurdle. Stay tuned.

Cangarda haulout update

After months of labor by many expert steam and automation technicians, Cangarda is finally able to maintain combustion and operate under steam. Coast Guard permitted the vessel to move to Bay Ship in Alameda on Sunday, where it will be hauled and have a few repairs. Photos to follow!

Finite element analysis

I'm clinging on to the top of Cangarda's main engine with one hand (the crocheted glove is a style thing) while leaning back to take this picture. The point of this exercise was to get a better 'grip' on the geometry of the cylinder head for a finite element analysis of the pressure forces. Our first cut at determining the stresses in the head was to assume it was a flat plate. A simplification that was ...simple, but clearly incorrect. The stress result was ~9600 psi for the test pressure, which for an old casting of unknown quality, could be too high...it could fail.

So, we made a 3D, virtual solid model of the head (omitting the stud on the top, which is probably not important).And, after applying simplified boundary conditions, subjected it to the virtual test pressure force.

This is a plot of the Von Mises "stress" for the test pressure. The result is that the predicted stress is actually ~3700 psi...a stress which is much less likely to result in failure.

I put "stress" in quotes since it really isn't a stress. It's a numerical way Von Mises, whoever he was, developed to combine the three principal stresses into single number, which he then compared to the yield stress of the material.

Cangarda Overtime

"Hola, amigos. How's it going with you? I know it's been a long time since I rapped at ya. I been trying get through a jungle of bullshit, but it grows back as fast as I can cut it down.."*

As all the homies know, Cangarda (and Jeff Rutherford) moved out in January. The marina is reverting to the swamp and fenland from whence it came. We have a semi-resident female sea lion now, which is in a way preferrable to yachts, boatbuilding and commerce. Our landlord (of whom I must speak in the gentlest terms, lest we be kicked out as well) evidently prefers it this way as only our office and a houseboat remain.

Cangarda's new berth is on a westerly facing end tie in the Richmond Marina (Marina Bay). It's a little exposed to the West, but they have some strong fenders out and it looks in pretty good shape.


It's in a picturesque spot (across the Marina from the old Ford assembly plant), and the docks and bathrooms are way better than at 320 West Cutting, but the boat is a full seven minutes walk from the gate, making it a time/management nightmare. Still, it's a veritable hive of activity there with the owner, captain, Jeff, Steve, electricians and assorted helpers on board, as well as three super experienced steam engineers laboring away, trying to make the thing run. Here's Chief Jordan and Gary upside down in the bilge...Pull up your pants fahcrissake!
Getting it to run is still problematical, but perhaps a bigger hurdle is getting the permission to run it at all. Steam boats have been pretty strictly regulated in the US since 1871 with the formation of the Steam Boat Inspection Service (merged into the Coast Guard in 1942). The law, still very much in force, regulates all vessels, even yachts, greater than forty feet in length with a steam pressure greater than 50 psi, i.e., Cangarda. In general, yachts are only subject to very weak oversight by the Coast Guard. As an example, a lunatic could quite well have the idea to build a fifty foot sailing catamaran, out of disposable plastic bottles, attempt to sail to Hawaii, and the Coast Guard would do nothing to stop him. But steamboats, even privately owned pleasure yachts, are subject to all federal regulations. Period. That's why I stopped by Cangarda on Friday.

The new boiler is hotter and more energetic than the original Almy, and is currently set to run at a high pressure. Although the boiler has been tested to the higher pressure, and the piping is rated at much higher pressure, the Coast Guard has no assurance that engine itself can withstand the higher pressure.

Here are the decorative covers to the cylinder head covers. Each cylinder, and the adjacent steam receiver, has a seperate, bolted head.


This is the head of the high pressure cylinder.
The complex shape of the head makes any simple analysis of the pressure forces a little dubious. Tomorrow I will put up some images of a finite element analysis of the pressure forces on the head.

*Jim Anchower, The Onion

Cangarda cangarda cangarda cangarda

Blow a gasket is a beautiful idiom, rarely heard today. As, "if I come home late, the old lady will blow a gasket." You can visualize those old Looney Toons...Porky Pig, Wile E. Coyote, Daffy Duck, heads inflating, turning red and live steam issuing out of their ears. Of course, the idiom originates with to steam technology.

Of course today internal combustion engines have gaskets too, but they're generally pretty good, being precisely manufactured from high temperature polymers, and inset into perfectly machined grooves. It's rare to have a catastrophic failure. Oh, the occasional hopped up race car blows a head gasket spewing hot oil on the track, but it can only spews as much oil as is inside the engine...a few quarts. In contrast, the head gaskets on olde timey steam engines are comparatively weak, and fragile. And when one blows, the entire content of the external boiler erupts through the gap until the brave engineer can fight through the steam and shut it off. Yosemite Sam with 453 F steam whistling out of the top of his head.

In this picture you can just barely make out Chief Pete Jordan exercising the whistle Friday afternoon. He was warming up the boiler prior to a celebratory trial in the Channel planned for Saturday. Well, evidently they didn't drain a cylinder or something, because they blew a gasket and couldn't go. Makes you wonder though...blow a gasket racing your Porsche around town, you just call the tow truck. What happens at sea?

To all the Cangardaphiles who have bombarded me with questions as to why, for gods sake, is it not running yet, here is a picture of Henry I took today wiring up the automation panel. Maybe you can zoom in and check out what's inside that box (damn the resolution of this picture) -- there are hundreds of terminals for valves, senders, and gauges needed to control the steam plant and engine. Only about a third of them are hooked up. I'll take a closer picture tomorrow before he gets to work.

Here's a final note. My neighbor, Jeff Rutherford, who restored Cangarda, has a new webpage. Check it out.

Cangarda all the time

The film makers have posted a new trailer:
http://www.kailuna.com/ultimate_restorations.html
It looks all done and ready to go -- oh, hang on...I guess it's still out there.

Schooner racing

Is the name of this vessel Virginia or Schooner Virginia? Better check the website. Aw, I knew the answer, since we designed and built it. Every plank, every screw, was designed, planned and built by Tri-Coastal Marine...that is, us. While it may belong to others now, it still is our creation.

Virginia winning the Govenor's Cup in Gloucester

Here are the race results for Class 1:

You can hardly read it - there a very close margin at the finish...Virginia by 26 seconds over American Eagle. Yet that is Victory! Unfortunately, the thrill of being top schooner was short lived. Last weekend Virginia was creamed by Spirit of Bermuda in the multi day round Prince Edward Island race, taking a distant third (Pride of Baltimore II was second). Defeat is hard enough, but the purse for this race was $40,000! I don't know if that was $US or Loonies...either way, it's real money. Glory is great, but money is mo' bettah.

The main problem with any kind of competition between sailing vessels is making it fair. Boats that are built to the same class, e.g., Echell's, Lightnings's, J-24's, etc, are all nominally identical and compete equally, winning by superior skill or luck. Roughly similar vessels often race on the basis of handicap. Handicapping or rating systems are based on physical properties of the vessels, previous performance, or the corrupt judgement of inept race organizers. Virginia and Pride are true historic replicas built with historically appropriate technology. Spirit of Bermuda looks like it may have been based on something old, but is really just a big, cold molded sailing yacht. Fair? Hardly. The only truly fair result is when one of our designs wins. (and all prize money is awarded to the Andrew Davis Personal Aggrandizement Fund!)

Cangarda under way!

In answer to all the angry emails demanding information, I'm now doing continuous coverage on Cangarda.

[Breaking news] Sunday the 24th Cangarda raised steam and maneuvered for about an hour in the Richmond Ship Channel. The owner was at the helm and Chief Pete Jordan (ably assisted by Alex David of Maritime Controls) was controlling the boiler and engines. I missed the whole thing (windsurfing)...if anyone has a photo of it under way, email it to me and I will post it here.

Pete came in this morning, jonesing for coffee, and reported that the engines and propulsion worked well. He doesn't have any idea where they actually went, because he and Alex were so busy controlling the boiler, furnace, pumps and engine that they couldn't even stick their heads out the companionway.

As I wrote previously, the intention is to automate much of the operation; however, essentially none of that has been done yet. The electricians are not close to finishing their work (the vessel operated Sunday with a temporary load center), and until they do, Maritime Controls can't hook up and calibrate the dozens of valves, gauges, etc required for normal operation.

So in answer to all the emails about Cangarda's schedule...she still has a long way to go. I will keep you posted.

Lake Champlain Sail Ferry

Here's an odd little vessel we designed and built in 2001:

Weatherwax from port quarter

Ha, ha. The first caption was fake -- it's double ended, and the rig is on one side (the leeward side, duh)! It's stange, but we didn't just invent this thing up in a caffeine fueled weekend, in fact, the double ended sailing ferry is a historic type that was unique to Lake Champlain. Bordered by New York and Vermont (and maybe Quebec), the prevailing wind on the long and narrow lake is along its narrow north/south axis, which let the double ended sailing ferries reach back and forth across it.

People used to wear nice hats

Weatherwax is licensed by the USCG to carry passengers and now lives at the Champlain Valley Transportation Museum. Find out more about the vessel.

In the first sentence, I wrote "we designed and built...", which I suppose is strictly true, but doesn't give Douglas Brooks, the project manager, the credit he deserves for getting the contract, motivating the project, and then actually building ~90% of the vessel himself.

Douglas caulking the bottom

Since the fery project, he's kept himself busy. Here's his latest creation, a glued lapstrake replica of a Henry Rushton Catboat.

Under way

Douglas is an interesting mix of scholar and practical, Yankee boatbuilder. Without a doubt, he is the living expert on the tarabuine (japanese tub boat). Go to your local bookstore and ask for his book, The Tub Boats of Sado Island: A Japanese Craftsman's Methods. Yeah, well that's supposed to be a joke too...let's say you won't find it at Barnes and Noble, but you can get it through his website.

As far as being an excellent, completely no-fake, Yankee boatbuilder, I will now bestow upon him the highest praise that a Yankee boatbuilder can give to another, "Boy, you are clever. Why you are good enough to make a set of false teeth."

CN 55 Eager

Fiber reinforced plastics, FRP, transformed boat building more than any other single technology. Prior to FRP, small yachts were built individually, mostly from wood. The earliest fibers used in FRP were fiberglass, which was discovered serendipitously by Owens Corning in the 1930's. The first frp composites production molding followed soon thereafter. Although today frp can be made with fibers made from different materials (eg., graphite, polyester, boron, etc), fiberglass is still used as a shorthand for anything made from frp.

'Fiberglass' was the perfect material to meet the nascent demand for mass produced pleasure craft back in the 50's. The first successful molded frp production sailboat was the Pearson Triton, which started production in the early 60's. Twenty eight feet long, the Tritons were relatively small and easy to mass produce (there are over 700 of them), and were so solidly built that most of them are still around today (in fact, Bobby Botha, one of the workers on the Cangarda project, recently attempted to single hand one back to Kiwi). Like the Triton, many other old production boats were very solidly built...they still look great and can function just as well as they did when new. There's even a name for them, Plastic Classics.

Eager (ex-Lutine) is undergoing a total rebuild in Jeff Rutherford's yard (which we call Tire Barn for the faded logo of a former tenant). It is a Camper and Nicholson 55, one of the first large, production fiberglass sailing yachts built in quantity. The Nic 55 was a popular and successful ocean racer and cruiser through the 1970's and has a cult following today. Unfortunately, Eager, like many yachts of that era, was built with a plywood core in the deck and cabin trunk ... it's amazing it lasted as long as it did. Hence, the vessel is getting an all new deck and cabin. Here's the deck mold, which Tony and the crew built using the old deck as its core:


With the deck removed, it's a whole lot easier to build a new interior from the top down, rather than passing every little bit in through the companionway. This is how any new custom yacht would be built today. Unlike a house where the roof is put on as early as possible, the deck is put on after the interior, wiring, plumbing, mechanical systems, etc are largely complete.

It will has entirely new interior and deck arrangements. New bathrooms, new staterooms, new engine, mechnicals,new carbon rig...everything new, new, new. Here's our new exterior arrangement. Underbody will be unchanged, except for a new (improved) rudder and skeg.

Is it worth it to renew/rebuild a plastic classic? Well, people choose to do different things with their money (some people may choose to pay the rent, or buy canned goods and medicine instead), but, in spite of the new rudder and rig, it's probably not if measured by cost/performance measure.