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ScottWidmier

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Everything posted by ScottWidmier

  1. That is a cool read, Thanks! I have wondered about rebuilding the daggerboard on a M26D with significant weight on the bottom and it is interesting to see what they did. Of course, I am just theorizing with no actual plans to do that. I like the beachability of the boat and how low it sits on the trailer.
  2. That is actually Lake Allatoona and they draw it down every winter. Still have 35 feet under my keel at the slip! That boat across the way is actually a 19' powersailer. I hate to admit that I had fallen for all of the anti-mac retoric spouted on the web especially about the newer models with higher-powered motor. However, I have come to admire MacGregor's business model and boats. The powersailers definitely have benefit for folks as pointed out by a friend of mine who just bought a boat for his house up a river from a bay. He pointed out that the speed under power means he can get out to the bay and have more time sailing. Doesn't matter that there are better performers out there under sail or power. The combination is perfect for his needs. Still, I wish Mac would also produce a pure sailing version and, who knows, they might also turn out a good pure powerboat. Then again, that violates their business model and may impact the price of their boats.
  3. Nope, I bought mine from Snug Harbor boats and it is a Mac 26 classic, 26D for daggerboard model to be exact from 1987. Been a very fun boat particularily since it is a very fast sailor. The 26D is the fastest Mac sailor other than the catamaran they used to make. I have beaten a J24 several times on adjusted time and a few times on unadjusted time! :shock: This is my first year racing sailboats. Of course, I could never beat the M and X's under power even if I had more than my current 6hp.
  4. I am planning on a cruise in my MacGregor 26 on St. George's Sound down in Florida starting probably on the 28th and launching from Carabelle. Let me know if any of you will be in the area! In order to get the boat ready for a family of four cruising, I need to work on storage and organization. MacGregor's are nice basic boats but not much money or effort are expended in finishing out storage spaces. My first project was a storage rack to replace the mirror over the galley counter. I designed it to store cups, dishes, cutlery, my butane stove (hopefully Santa will bring me the exact model I got dimensions for), and CD's. Here is a picture before beautifying: I decided to finish it natural so as not to darken the cabin much: I decided not to sand while the varnish was drying so did my next project with a sewing machine and some duck cloth. Found plans for a hanging duffle in a book called "101 Fast and Easy Boat Projects" or something like that. The duffle attaches to the side of the boat with turnbuttons (I am trying velcro instead) and you are able to open it and access everything while it is hanging there eliminating something that normally winds up on the berth during the day and has to be moved at night. I have made five and plan on a sixth after I get another zipper. Duckworks magazine sells these and below is a picture from their website of one in use: http://www.duckworksbbs.com/gear/duffel/index.htm
  5. There are designs out there for clamps cut out of plywood that might help with things like putting on the rubrails as shown in Charlies pictures. Clamps are expensive!
  6. There is a tradeoff between seaworthiness and ease of building. Of course, you need to ask yourself how often you really want to go out into high winds and waves. Otherwise, you just need a boat to get you in when the weather turns nasty. The CK17 with her flat bottom will be easier to build than the CS17 but the latter will be more comfortable in waves or chop than the former. The CS17 has such a nice V shape to the forefoot but this makes for a little more complex build. Here are a couple of suggestions for boats with cabins starting with the most capable Adelie 14 ( http://www.boatplans-online.com/studyplans/AD14_study.htm ) and 16 ( http://www.boatplans-online.com/studyplans/AD16_study.htm ) form Bateau.com. The 14 is a bigger boat than the CS17 because of its beam and capacity. It is self-righting from a knockdown and has a self-draining cockpit of sufficent size for 4 adults. The cabin is cozy but sensibly arranged for a boat this size. Of course, safety and capacity comes at the price of a more complex build. Another source of plans you should consider is Jim Michalak who designs a whole series of boats following the style of Bolger. His boats are probably the easiest to build of any designer but yet show some sophistication in hull shape and even in the use of water ballast for the larger boats. http://www.duckworksmagazine.com/r/plansindex/trailer_sailor_cruisers.cfm . For a beamy boat with cabin look at Fatcat. For a simpler build, take a look at the AF3. Michalak uses leeboards rather than centerboards or daggerboards primarily due to ease and shallow-water sailing capability. Don't have to cut a hole in the bottom of the boat or worry about making a waterproof well. Whichever boat you build there are a couple of SE homebuilders that get together to sail our boats including a CS17. In fact, some of us are thinking about meeting an old friend from Ohio around the 26th to go sailing on Lake Hartwell. Most likely we will be all getting aboard Keith's Vacationer since my boats are all being worked on in the winter boatshed.
  7. There are so many good designs out there it is hard to know where to begin with suggestions though the cs17 is a good one. The V bottom on the cs17 will make your build more complex over a simple flat-bottomed boat but the V bottom will handle chop better. A narrow boat like the cs will be quicker to heel but take less force (oar or sail) than a beamy boat. However, a beamy boat sails more flat (no heel) so how comfortable are you with sailing and how relaxed or excited do you want to be when sailing? Also, are you mainly looking for an open boat which has plenty of cockpit space for additional folks or do you want a cabin which gives storage for stuff on and off the water, someplace dry to get out of a sudden rainstorm or a secure place to overnight in. Anyway, look at the Stevenson boats at www.stevproj.com which are flatbottomed and very easy to build, or another designer I have been happy with is www.bateau.com . WARNING, BOATBUILDING IS ADDICTIVE!!!
  8. I get better windward performance than I would have expected with the rig but it isn't a marconi and I have a feeling a leg-of-mutton might beat it to windward. It doesn't seem to have any problems on a broad reach and, with a rotating mast, if you let the sheet go the rig rotates away from the wind even if the wind is coming from directly aft. Similar in some ways to heaving to except you don't have to be at any certain angle to the wind. Pull on the brailing line and the sail is bundled to the mast. One challenge comes from the boomless sprit which puts amazing amount of pressure on the mainsheet because you are having to hold to dimensions (for-aft and port-starboard) versus letting the boom take for-aft. That is why I switched to thumb cleats (shown below) on my dory where I simply flip the mainsheet over the leeward cleat when tacking. Has more resistance than a pulley so helps hold. Dory Sailing Thumb Cleats The PD racer is an 8' long beamy boat and the dory is a 12' long narrow boat. Funny how the same sail worked for both!
  9. You might find this picture interesting. It is of two boats that I have built (in the picture one is being finished). The boat on the left is the C12 which has plenty of capacity to take on my family of four and enough stability to let the kids wander about and hang over the sides to look at the water. The other boat is a 12' dory of my own design. It cannot take my family of four and may only have capacity for on adult and one child. It also is much more tender. All of this is determined by the different beams (width) of the boats. The c12 is 63" wide and the dory is about 42" wide. Of course, the dory is much lighter (less material), less effort to row, and requires a smaller sail to go. Tradeoffs!
  10. The CABBS group (Cleveland Ameture Boatbuilders Society) does a week-long messabout at Jamestown Campground on Pymatuning which several Stevenson builders attend around fathers day. Contact Jim Stumpf.
  11. I do love the C12 with all of the advantages of a beamy V bottomed boat, however, I really wasn't suggesting it as a primer for the flat bottomed Vacationer. Not only is the hull shape different but the C12 goes together stitch and glue while the Vacationer uses stringers. Daydream is more similar in construction to the Vacationer except for the order of the build. On the Daydream you attach the sides first then attach the bottom and trim to fit. On the Vacationer, you attach the bottom to a keel which gives it the shape, then attach the deck and finally the sides and trim to shape. Similar but different. As for size, it is nice to have a boat that the whole family can on paper go on. However, it is also nice to have two similar boats that the family can use independantly. Two boats make a race and/or parents in one adults in another and/or can split up seperately to explore or do whatever. It is also nice to have both large and small. However, boatbuilding is a disease and once started you can never stop building them. I have built six and have plywood for two more small prams just for the kids. Unfortunately, my wife will only let me keep so many at a time :cry: . One more note on size, the c12 is actually fairly close in size to the Daydream 16. You are forgetting the effects of beam where the general rule is each additional foot of beam is like adding 5 additional feet to the length of the boat. The c12 is about 8 inches wider than the Daydream and has more displacement thanks to the V bottom. Going with the rule of thumb and equalizing the beam to that of the Daydream, the c12 is more like a 15'4" boat by my very crude estimates. That is why the Pocket Cruiser is actually a bigger boat than the Weekender with cockpit space approaching that of a Vacationer and a very roomy cabin even though it is, on paper, a shorter boat. It is also a lot more stable than the Weekender and you can even walk easily on the side decks. Fun stuff the differening effects of dimensions!
  12. Put some up underneith the deck in your cabin. It gives buoyancy up high and added insulation. Also, put some behind your seatbacks.
  13. Again, the variability is what makes it fun. I am itching to cut out some sail shapes and start playing with paper. Have to do it when my daughter is in bed or she will accuse me of playing with paper dolls. Of rigs, the absolutely most versatile rig for small (1-2 person) boats has to be the squarish sprit rig (not to be confused with the more triangular leg of mutton sprit which most people seem to call a sprit). I mean the rig with the sprit going from midway on the mast to the top aft corner of the sail. I rigged one boat with a loose-footed version with simple thumb shaped cleats to hold the mainsheet. Most important was the brailing line that went from the mast through a grommet on the luff back to the mast. One pull on this line and the sail is held tightly to the mast out of your way for rowing or paddling. Jerk the line out of the jam cleat and the sail instantly fills up with wind and away you go. I mention this rig as an alternate to a lugrig on smallboats. I like the lug but when you drop the sail it comes down in the cockpit and in the way. Also, raising the lug when there is a lot of wind out can be an adventure of flailing spars. On a boat with limited space and stability, I found the sprit rig to be better than the lug. I borrowed the sprit from my 12'dory to use on my puddleduck racer. Here it is on a good tack: A bad tack: With the brail line pulled and mainsheet tucked around the mast. Wish I had a better picture but I will tell you that at the beach start of the PD racer I was the only one to not have my sail in sailing position. I launched easily without the sail pushing me around or getting me tangled in adjacent boats, yanked the brailing line out of the jam cleat and was off to place third in my first race ever!
  14. How much sailing in rough water do you want to do anyway? I think the weekender will get you back to shore, a thought backed up by what is posted. However, most sailors tend to stay in when the wind gets up above 20mph and waves work up to 2+ feet.
  15. You mean the DayDream. I remember when he first came out with that plan. I was planning on building it but decided on the C12 from Bateau.com instead. I think a smaller boat might serve as a primer for the Vacationer and give you a more useful fleet of boats as well. The small boat will be an easy one to grab and go for one person sailing being easier to rig and tow than the Vacationer. How about a pram or small skiff.
  16. I was thinking about the Opti for my kids but you need to be so exact for it to qualify for racing that I am afraid it would chase all of the fun of building for me. I selected the flying mouseboat which has a V bottom which is better for chop and it is a board boat which means the kids can hike out on the flat deck a few inches above the water for a lot more exciting sailing. Besides, it only has a little footwell cockpit to fill up with water in case of a capsize so easier to recover than the opti. Plans are free, in English, and easy to follow. Also, I like the low freeboard of the flying mouse as it will sit better on the foredeck of my MacGregor 26. http://www.duckworksbbs.com/plans/gavin/fmouse/index.htm I would go with a regular rudder rather than the steering oar. Regular rudder details are in the plans. Here is a picture of an unmodified flying mouse (right) sailing behind an Opti (left). Both kids look happy but the flying mouse kids looks more comfortable hiked out. You can also see the safety in all of that built-in floatation and small footwell. I plan on putting in oarlocks for my son and having my daughter use a double-bladed paddle based upon their preference.
  17. Do you mean the 12' Summer Breeze? Nice and easy boat to build that would serve as a primer for the Vacationer. Only problem with having another boat while building is that you might play hookie to much in order to go sailing!
  18. Which raises the question of the "ideal" sail proportions brought up in "a Sailmakers Apprentice." What makes these the idea proportions? Shouldn't it be based on the boat?
  19. This is what I love about boats, particularily the variety you get from homebuilt boats and plans. There are so many interconnected variables that you can get wonderful boats with completely different characteristics. No right or wrong answer! My PC was perfectly balanced and I could leave the tiller unattended and she would keep going straight when the wind was 13mph or under. However, when the wind started piping up and the chine started digging into the water the weatherhelm would build. Ideally, I would reef the sail and get her balanced again which was a wonderful aspect of the gaff rig. However, sometime I was lazy or the conditions were right with only some gusts going over 15mph. I am having another experiment in balanced helm with one of my boats I am modifying. I am going from a standing lug to a gaff. In addition, I am moving the mast foward by about 16" on a 12' boat. The gaff should move the CE back but may not be enough. So, I plan on making the first couple of sails out of polytarp until I get the right sailshape for the boat. Should be interesting! Worse comes to worse, I could make her a catketch rig.
  20. A balanced rudder basically uses the force of the water on the part of the rudder forward of the pivot point to help you hold the rudder straight. The only problem of a truly balanced rudder is it also eliminates feedback the boat may give you through the tiller such as being overpressed. So, instead of straining against weatherhelm and having a sore arm at the end of the day, I was able to control the tiller with a few fingers even when there should have been strong weatherhelm. Now, there must have been something else in the rudder design I used on the pocket cruiser because it also eliminated the need to oversteer against the weatherhelm meaning the tiller was centered. The endplate prevents water from slipping under shallow-draft rudders forcing it to run off the back edge instead giving greater controll even with shallow draft. I still think a deep foil shaped rudder is more efficient but as it swivels up for shallow water you loose that efficiency. So, if you sail in ankle deep water, a shallow draft rudder with endplate would be the best option. If you sail in water over 3' I think a deeper draft foil shaped rudder is best. Of course, asthetics and tradition should be taken in consideration to. One of the fun things about building your own boat! Rocker is an interesting topic that I am sure someone can discuss a lot better than me. The longer the water line the faster the possible displacement speed of a boat and rocker shortens the water line on a given length boat. So, rocker does slow a boat down...on perfectly flat water. However, rocker alows a boat to easily rise to the waves, bow goes up and stern goes down, so a boat with rocker is better able to take waves (more seaworthy). That is why river dories have so much rocker. The mouseboat is a V bottom pram with a small amount of rocker for the type of boat. I have one and love it but when chop builds up she can easily be stalled by a wave hitting the bow transom (and showering me with water). Welsford Sherpa and the Nutshell Prams are designs intended for tenders to larger boats so are designed for rougher water either when being towed behind or transporting people to shore. Again, it all depends on what type of water you anticipate sailing or boating in regularily. Will you have to contend with waves, chop, or will the water be relatively flat? How much wind will you have on average? How steady is the wind or is it fluky? All of these factors can influence the hull and sail arrangement that is best. All of the above is from an amature based upon experience with some different homebuilt boats and some reading. So, take it for what it is worth!
  21. "Bad manners under certain conditions," are mostly caused by skippers not understanding the sailing characteristics of a beamy hull. The beamier the hull the greater the curve to the side of the boat. When the boat heels, this curve up near the bow digs in and tends to thrust the bow towards the wind thus increasing weatherhelm. This is either a great safety feature (rounding up when overpressed) or a pain depending on how much heel the skipper wants or expects out of a sailboat. As a result, a beamy hull (like that of a catboat) should be sailed flat and the mantra "reef early reef often" should be applied. A skipper used to a narrower boat might not feel like the are going fast unless there is a decent angle of heel so will overpress the boat creating turbulence as the rudder resists weatherhelm actually slowing the boat down. Now, I did experiment with a balanced rudder on a catboat and that rudder counteracted weatherhelm (the water helped me hold the tiller) and I was able to get my catboat to heel rather well. A truer "bad manner" is that of the greater force needed to punch the beamy hull through waves. When tacking, a wave hitting the bow can cause enough loss of momentum to stall the boat and let her be caught in irons. More likely to happen when there is little wind but big waves (motorboats!!). A rounded or V bottom hull will help alieve this a bit. Another "bad manner" is the tendancy of a beamy hull to fall off the wind when tacking. However, experienced sailors of beamy boats are used to this and allow the boat to fall off, gather speed, then bring the boat back up to the wind. Again, a matter of what your are used to sailing. The good manners include greater capacity for length, ability to walk or move around the boat with ease (great when stepping from shore or dock to boat), and finally much more relaxed sailing especially in gusty conditions. A beamy boat isn't as quick to heel as a narrow boat. Some mention needs to be made of the advantages and disadvantages of a pram hull. Prams are increadible for their carrying capacity on such a short and light boat. The only big negative is when a wave hits the forward transom which can both make for a wet ride and bring the boat to a stop. A well designed hull is very important for this reason so look at Welsford's Sherpa or the Nutshell pram both of which have a lot of rocker and a strong V up in the bow to cut through the waves. Of course, more rocker makes for a more tender boat to move around in... One of the things I love about boats is that there is no perfect boat. Every design is a set of compromises and you must consider how you plan on using the boat and the water you will spend most of your time in. One of the sad things about the fiberglass boats (and I own one) is how generic they are ignoring the utility of different rigs and hull shapes. Here is my Bateau.com C12 (12' catboat) which is capable of carrying four adults and which I have cartopped with an extended rack. I also have put it on top of my camper. However, I much prefer to use my 8X10 Harbor Freight folding trailer to get her to the lake. This picture was taken on a blustery day and you can see how fast I am going by the way the spray is coming off the back of the boat. You can also see how level the boat is sailing despite the wind and the speed. Here is another picture so you can see how much the hull was digging in. That is my then 7 year old son sailing while I take it easy. Blustery day but he is easily able to handle the boat even when heeled due to the design of the rudder.
  22. You have got several different issues in the question you posted which tend to contradict eachother in terms of what hull proportions are best. For cartopping the boat has to be really light for ease of lifting or you will soon find yourself buying a trailer just for ease of launching (like I did). Also, longer boats like canoes or dories are better for cartopping IMHO because you can lift the boat up and put it on the cartop without bumping into the car. I have a flying mouse that is actually harder to put on the cartop than my 12' dory (see the photo gallery on this site for my boats) despite being lighter in weight. The car gets in the way with short boats and you find yourself reaching to put it on and take it off. Duckworks awhile back posted the niftiest system for one-person cartopping I have ever seen and it was so simple! Basically, your cross-bars on top of the car are hollow and another bar slides out one side from inside of them. Put the boat upside down next to the car, lift one end, slide out the bar so the boat is resting on it, go to the other end, lift, and slide out the bar as well. Then, all you have to do is slide the boat over then slide the bars back in. Haven't yet put this on my car but plan on it. In oder for this system to work you need a longer boat. Narrow boats main advantage lies in cartopping and the easy with which they are rowed or paddled. They don't need as much sail to propel so the spars can be shorter. However, I find the lower initial stability of narrow boats makes them more tiring to sail in variable winds with gusts like we have on inland lakes. Also, having more than one person on a narrow boat can be challenging with the lower initial stability especially if the other person likes to move around a lot. All of this applies strictly to lightweight boats you can cartop. I do love my skinny 12' dory though and find it to be a nice set of compromises. I once heard adding one foot of beam is equivalent to adding five feet of length and my experience bears this out. Beamy boats are excellent sailors if well-powered with plenty of stability to stand up to variable winds. They are most comfortable for all-day sailing and can comfortably accomodate more than one person since the captain and crew don't have to be concerned as much with moving around. However, beamy boats need a little more effort (read "a little") to row and longer spars to move the beam through the water. I still row my 12' catboat but it does take a bit more effort than my 12' dory. As for cartopping, really beamy boats can overflow the sides of the car rack and/or the width of your roof. Short beamy boats, like prams, can be difficult to get up on top of the vehicle as mentioned earlier.
  23. Not to gripe but where are the most recent picts?? She looks like a beaut!
  24. Problem occurs when you try and select a preexisting event. So, I just signed myself up but didn't associate with the BYYB event.
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