First sail and blatant advertising

The first daysail of the season occured today. I went out to an island, anchored and had coffee. Sailed home. Made a boring video. Almost froze my hands off when I hauled up the anchor line out of that ice cold liquid I was sailing in (or on). It was quite warm and sunny, though and the wind was good.



I'm aware that I've been a little quite in here, but I can now reveal that it partly was due to me writing and publishing my second novel. It's called Miss Anna's Frigate, a spy story in Sweden in 1809 (there was a revolution here then, for those who didn't know - which I guess is about everybody...). This time there are no tiny gunboats, but a lot of snow and steamy saunas and a real frigate action, too. The book is now out at Amazon.com. See cover pic in right column.

Keep turning left at a price

Dylan Winter has posted another video in his brilliant series about sailing around Britain in a Mirror Offshore triple-keeler. However, this video is now only availabe at a cost of 0.99 USD via paypal. It's not a high price, but still it's a change in the concept. It will be interesting to see if it turns out a success or not.

All the videos are also now available through this new website.

Alacrity anniversary

Next year is the 50th anniversary of the Alacrity. I have been asked if I would be interested to be involved in a project creating an anniversary publication. I might be, but I want to check with the crowd if there would be a market as well as if there would be others willing to contribute. Please check this post on the Alacrity site and tell me what you think in the comments.

The ultimate Twin-Keel advantage list

I might just have written about this before in one of the older issues, in which case this is a reprint (or repost). However, it's worth it. Here is the ultimate list of the twin-keel's advantages, according to this study.

I am especially intrigued by #3 as it explains why my boat can go faster than its hull speed, without planing. Just about 10% faster, which is perfectly within the range below.

1. Higher sailing speeds than an ordinary cruising yacht of similar dimensions. Surprisingly, part of the reason for this is the relatively small wetted surface, which yields improved light air performance. Modern twin keels are of high aspect ratio and present less wetted area then a full keel or long fin keel while retaining the steady helm associated with full keels.

2. The twin keels become more effective with increased angle of heel, while a single keel becomes less effective. Because twin keels cant outward at the tip, the leeward keel becomes more vertical and deeper in the water as the boat heels. The windward keel is working more horizontally creating downward lift that increases righting moment giving more power to carry sail. Also with this cant outward from the vertical, leeway forces water up to the root of the fin as opposed to spilling over the tip in a single keel. Hydrodynamic tests have shown that decreasing end tip loss can double the effectiveness of a fin (the sole purpose of keel winglets).

3. The wave pattern reshapes to reduce the fore and aft crests. At hull speed a hollow forms amidship, but the bilge keels cause a wave to form in this hollow, canceling out the stern wave and giving a flatter wake. This increases the maximum speed of the hull, as much as 15 - 20%, in the same way that a bulbous bow or stern bustle works; by reducing wave making resistance at hull speed where it constitutes 85 - 90% of total resistance. To ensure the desired effect is at cruising speed the correct fore and aft placement of the keels and proper proportions must be checked by model testing. This placement is critical, as the model data shows. Too far forward or too far aft and the resistance will dramatically increase.

4. The deep plunging of an ordinary hull is avoided by the stabilizing action of the fins which are also very effective in dampening out rolling motions. The fins also provide a certain amount of lift to the stern at speed when the hull is upright. The effect of this lift is to flatten the trim angle, i.e. reducing squatting, which flattens out the wake and lowers the resistance.

5. Directional stability is markedly enhanced by the fins. This is demonstrated both by tank tests and full size yacht performance.

6. Speed and fuel consumption under power are better then usual. The prop can work in clear water without being shrouded by the keel and rudder. In the case of the motorsailer we were testing, 85 h.p. would produce 14 knots. Also the yacht can be controlled in reverse, which is seldom true of single keel yachts.

7. The rudder areas are smaller for the same reason as the keels. Each rudder is more effective as it works upright, deep in the water.

8. Both keels and rudders can be asymmetrical (more curve on one side than the other) like a wing, and tailored to work on their one specific tack. This again makes them more efficient allowing smaller appendages. Generally it is felt that both the rudders and keels can be made 25-30% smaller because of the greater efficiency.

9. Windward ability equal to that of an ordinary yacht is achieved on a fixed draft approximately comparable to that of a centerboarder without the problems associated with lifting foils. Windward performance in rough water is superior because of the roll and pitch dampening abilities of the keels.

10. Stability is equal to that of an ordinary yacht without recourse to extreme beam. Righting moment and range of stability are at least equal to those of a well designed centerboard yacht of relatively deep fixed draft, because ballast can be placed in each fin the ballast is as low as any keel-centerboarder.

11. The general advantages of twin keels include the ability to take groundings in a level position. This allows the bottom to be cleaned and painted (although the shorter and shorter keels are making this more precarious), without the cost and nuisance of a haul out, as well as being easily shipped without a cradle. When sailing in shallow water, if one should touch bottom, the boat rights and clears itself. This is possible because twin keels draw more water when heeled than upright, unlike single keel boats which when righted dig themselves in deeper.

New editions of the old PDF-newsletters

I have finally found out how to preserve the old PDF newsletters for the future without needing the site any longer. So I have created complete Volumes of the PDF:s per year and published them at Lulu's. Now they can be downloaded volume vise (and the single 1/2008 issue) as well as ordered in print.
The prints are quite expensive as they are full color and I am not really sure if the quality of the original PDFs is high enough to make them look good, but anyway the option is there!

Unfortunately I do not have high-resolution pics for the covers so they are a bit dull...but the inside is exactly as before.

You can find the new editions for free download or print here. The old site will be available for another year as well.

A little self-advertising...

I hope you will forgive me for this little advertisement as it does not have anything to do with twin-keelers. It does, however, have to do with sailing. So, for those of you who occasionally read what is commonly referred to as "nautical fiction", I have finally made my own contribution to this genre. The novel is now available as a pocket book as well as a free download. If you are interested you can read more here. And this is the teaser:

"It's 1808 and Sweden is at war with Russia. The war is not going well. On land, the Swedish army is retreating continuously and all that stands between the Russians and the Swedish mainland are the gunboats of the inshore fleet. The sea war amongst the islands of the Finnish and Swedish archipelagos is a special kind of war, fought in open boats by badly equipped men without proper training. Fighting the weather as much as the Russians, Lieutenant Johan Kuhlin commands a small squadron of three gunboats on special duty. During the short and wet summer, he learns that an independent command isn't all glory and that spies can be more dangerous than Russian guns."

Corribee website refit

The Corribee website is the latest addition to the trend of using blog software in order to make homepages more interactive. The site at http://corribee.org/ does now allow comments to be made and has an RSS-feed.

Bimini-top Vivacity

I found these pictures of what I take for a Vivacity in Texas. Now, those Bimini-tops are not pretty, but one kind of understands why they may be useful. However, I wonder how one moves around with this thing up...forward to the mast for example. Or maybe one just doesn't...

A junk-rigged Twin-Keeler

According to some, this boat, being a junk rigged bilge keeler, should not be able to go to windward at all. But it does. On this new blog you can read about its adventures. The sail handling really seems very easy. 

Tiller sail self-steering

Anyone heared of this? Might just be interesting to try. 

Sailing: A tiller sail for self-steering: Capt. W. Bligh RN

Publish at Scribd or explore others: How-to-Guides & Manu navigation sailing

Vivacity over the Ocean?

I recieved an email from Peter Jackson who is thinking about taking his Vivacity on a longer ocean passage. 
"I want to take my Vivacity 20 to sea and I want to cross blue water – I’ve been told by the old guys in my club that it’s a stupid idea to even think of sailing any real distance away from the UK in a 20 footer. By the way they only use their boats as caravans so I’m not taking to much notice of them."

So here are my views on the topic:

Thanks for your email. You raise a very interesting topic and I am sure you will be getting very different answers from different people. Most will think that you should get the biggest boat you can afford. However, most people do indeed choose boats for their creature comforts rather than their seaworthyness.

I am myself, somewhat sickly perhaps, fascinated with small boat journeys and have read about quite a lot of them. If you boil the accounts down you get to some facts that may be considered.

As for the contra side first: there are mainly three disadvantages of sailing long ocean passages in a small boat. 1. the smaller the boat, the less wind you can sail in. That means in a gale, the smaller boat has to stop sailing actively and heave-to earlier. 2. the smaller boat cannot carry as much provisions and 3. the smaller boat sails more slowly, making the passage longer.

Now, I did not include accomodation comfort here for a reason. All small boat voyager's accounts tend to agree that a small cabin is a problem only at anchor. While sailing you are either lying down in your bunk, reading or sleeping or sitting down eating, drinking or navigating. You are not, very much walking around anyway.

On the plus side the accounts list: 1. A small boat does often sail dryer as it tends to float on top of the waves like a cork instead of thrusting itself into them like a bigger boat would. This, of course is highly depending on the circumstances like wave length and height, type av boat and so on. 2. A smaller boat is more easily handled, there is less load on the rigging and sails and you can manhandle everyting without the use of electric or mechanic devices that can fail. 3. A small boat is more rigid and less prone to damage. This of course applies to standard fiberglass boats only, steel boats or wooden boats have other characteristics. But a small fiberglass boat is like an eggshell, it's compactness makes it more resistant to impact. Also it is lighter, so the force on impact is less.

This for the general facts. Individually, boats of course are different. While many small boats have crossed oceans, there have been pointed out some things they should have rather than not. Main thing is a sheltered cockpit that cannot collect too much water if the boat is pooped. Here the Vivacity is not favored. It has a comparably large cockpit and not very efficient drains. So probably, if you are going, you should modify the cockpit, making it a little smaller and also make the hatches really watertight.

Now, finally, I am not sure if you are aware of the "Vivacity Mini" website. That guy did some major alternations to his boat (adding a mizzen even) and then sailed it from the US to Hawaii. I am sure you won't really have to make that much changes to you boat to get out on the oceans, but it is at least proof that it can be done.

(Note: the pic shows Alacrity "Hotfly" in a swell).

Arctic adventure

A fast trimaran is probably the most different kind of boat than a twin-keeler. Still, given my faiblesse for small boat adventures I just have to write about American "Captain Tommy's" epic voyage from the Great Lakes out to sea and then via the Nortwest Passage to Alaska. Yes, you go it right. Through the Northwest Passage, singlehanded in a 30-foot trimaran. Now 30 feet may not be small compared to other boats, but for this trip it's not a big boat.

The trip can be followed on this website.

Wooden keel Alacrity

I have been i doubt that there were fiberglass Alacrites with wooden keels. However I may have been wrong. More here.

About stability and righting moment

There seem to be quite a few people out there who think that twin-keelers are less stable due to their shallower draft. I found this interesting thread on a boatbuilding forum. The discussion is quite technical but the consensus seems to be that twin-keelers are definitely as stable as fin keelers of the same draft and also if they have shallower draft, given the right construction.

Mast support fixes

This may be of interest for all owners of Alacrities and Vivacities or boats that have a similar mast support beam as those. Sometimes those wooden beams get damaged or crack. On the Alacrity site, two owners show pictures of how they fixed the problem.

Hard Times

Hard Times

No matter how obvious the signs look in retrospect, the arrival of hard times always seems to catch us off guard, and the harder the times the bigger the surprise.

Our current times look to be as bad as we have had in a long while, so it follows that they must be the biggest surprise we have had in a long while. Looking back, we can see all the signs very clearly. Big downturns always follow big run-ups, and, from house prices to hedge fund fees, we had some real doozies. But back then everyone seemed to think that house prices would go up forever, and that hedge fund managers had broken the code for generating outlandish returns in perpetuity.

But, to use an analogy, in the cold light of dawn last night’s party always looks like a waste of an evening – a bunch of drunks laughing at bad jokes and making fools of themselves on the dance floor, in the certain knowledge that the bar would never close and the band would never go home. Dealing with the next morning’s hangover, the erstwhile party animal has become the soberest of wallflowers, vowing never again to overindulge like that.

That ice-pack-on-the-head posture, economically speaking, is where we are now. The credit cards are cut up or stuffed in the dresser drawer, every day’s batch of catalogs goes directly into the recycling bin, and the email notifications of once-in-a-lifetime sale prices are deleted before they are even opened. At least that’s the way things are at our house.

So, in light of these hard times, doesn’t sailing look like a wasteful extravagance? If the kitchen renovation has been put off yet again, if dinners out are a distant memory, and if the trips to see the grandkids have been cut to one per year, how can we justify things like dockage and winter storage?

Well, I can, actually. Maybe it isn’t totally objective, but I can justify Greyhound in times like these. So now, I suppose I have to defend myself.

To begin with, Greyhound didn’t cost much – nothing at all when you count the money I got from selling my Alacrity 19. Going from a 19-footer to a 26-footer for no outlay has to start me off on the right foot. It makes every afternoon sail feel like a freebie, and every trip to the marina a reminder of how smart (or lucky, is more like it) I was. The times can’t be all that hard when you live like that.

Except, of course, all sailors know that the purchase price of a boat is like the ante in a hand of poker – it’s the ticket to losing some serious money. Possession of a boat gains you entry to every chandlery within a hundred miles, every boat show you could drive all night to get to, and every vendor with an attractive ad in a sailing magazine. The assumption seems to be that anyone with a fiberglass hull and Dacron sails is a sucker for every doodad and service imaginable.

Not me, and not now. There’s a time to buy stuff, and there’s a time to install the stuff you bought. The buying time for me was last year and the year before. Not that I went crazy, mind you. Every item was researched and comparison-shopped, and agonized over. But it was purchased nonetheless. Now my “boat bins” are full of goodies just waiting to make my sailing life easier, or speedier, or more fashionable, or something. Wait - did I just admit that I’m one of those suckers? Perish the thought!

So now I have the fun of installing it all. I can mount the thirty-year-old winch I removed from the mast base to the doghouse roof, along with the new rope clutch (dirt cheap, really!), so I can raise the main properly from the cockpit. And I get to put the lovely cleats I got on Ebay on the stern coaming so I can properly moor Greyhound. My new fenders (on sale, of course) will dress up the berth, and protect the topsides. And my new whisker pole (the only significant expenditure of the winter) will fill out my racing kit this coming summer.

When I go down to the boat this spring and summer, I expect a few of the berths will be empty. There will be more For Sale signs on the marina bulletin board. When I’m cleaning, or repairing, or upgrading, I’ll probably hear more than a little grousing about prices and costs and incomes. Hopefully, I won’t be listening too hard.

There’s no telling what the summer will bring, economically. Jobs may persist or disappear. The markets may stabilize or fall some more. Times may get easier, or they may stay hard as nails. All I know is that I’m going to get the most out of every minute on Greyhound, whether working on her or sailing her. Going all out is the only way I know of to deal with hard times.

Seaworthyness test

Small Craft Advisor has launched an online seaworthyness test for small boats. While it may not be the ultimate scientific proof of one boat's or another's capability to endure heavy weather it does give some indication of what is good or bad as far as seaworthyness is concerned. The test is here, and some more information about seaworthyness is here. And yes, the test does explicitly list a twin-keel option, even if it is combined with shallow keels - something that may very well be debated as twin-keels do have some advantages over them, especially when it comes to righting moments and stability.

Small Craft blog

I just discovered that the Small Craft Advisor Magazine also has a blog. It's relatively new (since October) but it seems like it gets updated frequently. Well worth a look.

Mini website

David Chamberlain is the guy who sailed his modified Vivacity 20, "Mini" from the US to Hawaii in 1992. On this website he publishes useful tips for those who want to take their small craft over big stretches of water - or at least dream about it.

On the Hard

If you live north of about 35^o north (or south of 35^o south), your boat probably spends up to half the year out of its element – on the hard. The annual ritual of getting it there is part of the rhythm of boating, at least in the temperate climates.
When I had my Alacrity, the autumn haulout was a simple, if not easy, process that became almost second nature. After one last sail late in October, I took the sails off and lowered the mast to its cradle. Next I picked up my trailer from the storage lot and brought it home. Then I motored the boat to the next marina downriver where they had a launch ramp, while someone drove my trailer there.
Then came the hard part – getting the boat onto the trailer. In order to get the trailer low enough to allow the keels to slide on, I had to attach a length of chain to the hitch, and then back all the way down the ramp until the truck’s rear tires were just short of the water. If there was any wind, motoring the boat onto the trailer was a real challenge. It often seemed to have a mind of its own, and it sometimes felt like trying to put our cat into the carrier for a trip to the vet.
Anyway, I always managed to get it on, usually after some rather sailor-like language. The moment of truth occurred when I pulled the trailer out of the water, checking to see if the forward edges of the keels were snug against the stops on the trailer, meaning that the boat was properly balanced for towing. If not, it was back into the water for some adjustments. By that time, nearly everyone in the marina had become a spectator, most had offered advice, and some had even offered to help. Once the trailer was back on the hitch, the worst was over. After a quick stop at home to take off the motor and remove the last of the equipment, it was off to the storage yard to put on the tarp for the winter. Finally, a beer, to reward my helper of the day.
This all happened one last time when I sold the Alacrity this past summer, to make room for my new Ranger 26. This time my assistant was the new owner, literally getting his feet wet with his new boat. When I dropped the boat off in his backyard, I was done with this process.
But, along with my new boat came a new haulout routine. First, I had to find a new place to store it, since it won’t go on a trailer like the Alacrity. I had to find a real marina, with a TravelLift instead of a launch ramp. The marina where I keep it in the summer was out of the question because they barely have room for a parking lot, which fills up quickly in the autumn with the most favored boats. So I went shopping for winter storage.
I found a spot about five miles upriver, at the marina where I had been storing my trailer over the summer. In preparation, I stopped by and picked up a contract. On the second page was a list of questions that reminded me I had moved up to a grown-up boat, not the teen-ager the Alacrity seemed in retrospect. Did I want them to winterize the fresh water system? Did I want a pump-out? Did I want it shrink-wrapped? I could hear the cash register gaily ringing away in the background.
Finally I had arranged everything, and it was time to get Greyhound to her winter home. I took most of the “stuff” that had accumulated in the half season I’d had her home, and made arrangements to deliver her up to Ossining. Unable to arrange any crew for the delivery date, I decided to singlehand it. That decision began to look a little suspect as the weatherman predicted a “sou’easter” for the Saturday I had to sail. However, he said it would hit late in the day while I was sailing early, and I was going north, so I took a chance and set out.
As it turned out, I needn’t have worried. Although it was overcast, the breeze was manageable, ten to twelve knots, and Greyhound galloped up the river. There was hardly another boat to be seen, we outran the following swells, and I successfully avoided the little island in the river that I’d never seen before. I was exhilarated, and was a little sorry to reach the marina entrance in about two hours.
I was a bit worried about docking, since I’d never done it in this marina singlehanded, but the gas dock was just inside the breakwater so I managed to slide in. The management assigned me a temporary slip in the middle of the marina, and I was able to get in there with no bumps or bruises, in spite of the freshening breeze. As I rode home in the car with my wife, I was more than a little pleased with myself. Mission accomplished! Later in the day things really kicked up outside, so much so that a large tree came down just up the street, so I was doubly glad I had made the trip when I did.
This past weekend I found out that Greyhound had been hauled, so I went up to finish the winter prep. I found her in the middle of an aluminum forest, packed into a collection of sailboats, looking like a flock of swans ready to fly south. I had built a PVC pipe frame to support the tarp over the cockpit, so I muscled that and the tarp up the ladder in the drizzle. The hardest part of the job was wrestling the outboard off the transom and into my car. Funny, it didn’t feel this heavy when I was putting it on during the summer!
I ran the motor at home to flush out the salt water, inflated the sorry looking fenders, stowed the docklines, and headed upstairs to watch some football. Greyhound’s ready for winter, and so am I.