Earwigoagin

Sunday, July 31, 2011

Music Whenever; Black Moth Super Rainbow "Sun Lips"

Follow the adventures of the road kill clean-up crew (I like the DIY hazmat suit)..........

Dinghy Design; Big Guy Singlehander Update

A reader response to my first post about a hiking singlehander for a very big guy pointed out my lack of knowledge in regards to the Phantom dinghy, which, at second look, is an eminently sensible choice for a big guys singlehander.

The Phantom can be home built, in fact was originally designed to be homebuilt. Plans are available though a quick search doesn't turn up an address to get them (strangely, even the class website doesn't seem to have an address).
The ideal helm weight for the Phantom is about 210 lbs (95 kg) with reader "Rudderman" commenting,
"I am also 6ft5 and over 18 stone and have absolutely no problems sailing a home built wooden Phantom which I took to runner up position in the UK Nationals. As I recall there are a couple of Phants being built in the US from plans provided by the Designer's daughter"
Longer at 4.42 meters, wider at 1.64 meters, the same hull weight as a Laser, and over 105 sq. feet (9.75 meters) of sail area, the Phantom must be a very lively sail.
Class website is linked here .
Joe over at the blog "Horses Mouth" did a fantastic post on the Phantom which can be viewed over here .

Some pics I stole from the class website showing the developed ply hull shape (the hull looks very similar to the Classic Moth Shelly design) .............

A good video of a Phantom sailor blasting back and forth, forth and back, hitting over 14 knots - great fun.

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Dinghy Design; A Singlehander for a Really Big Guy

I got this in the inbox about a week or so ago.........

"I got in contact with Bill about the Classic Moth he built based on your station molds. I too am looking to build my own sailing boat, with looking to start on a smaller project first (~200 hours), and fell in love with the Classic Moth design, especially the curved tanks in the cockpit.

I'm 6'5" and around 260 pounds (118 kg) so not sure if the boat would sail ok with me in it! Do you have any suggestions on an appropriate design and where I may be able to get the plans from?"

C

And my reply.............

"Your size will make it hard to make it work in a Classic Moth. You need a design with some displacement and nothing like some extra length to give you that.

There's no stock design in a 14 to 15' length, easy to build, that immediately comes to mind. One of Chesapeake's Light Craft's multi-use sailboats/rowing dinghies might do the trick.

I probably could draw something up that would fit, but boat design is a hobby and I have no time for it right now. I would think that something like the US1 sailboat class (no longer built) that was a singlehander based on the Windmill hull would fit you nicely."

R

An interesting design problem as "C" is looking for a racy singlehander, easy to build and a design that would float a guy the supersize of an American football player.

There are singlehander classes that have been designed for the larger sailor; the Finn Olympic dinghy, Bruce Farr's MegaByte, and from England, the Phantom dinghy and the SuperNova. But all these classes are production glass hulls and still not big enough to fit Mr. "C".

The US1 mentioned in my reply was an American class, built by Advance Sailboats. The Internet says 450 were built out of fiberglass and a quick Google shows one or two for sale even as I write this post. Advance took the simple V-chine, easy to build Windmill hull, cut some freeboard off the hull, added some rolled tanks and a large (90 sq. ft) main. Since the Windmill was sized to carry two adults (at say 300 lbs combined), it would be safe to say that the US1 could probably handle one at 260 lbs. And, since the Windmill class was designed for homebuilding in ply, an enterprising boat builder could replicate the US1 concept in plywood.

The US1 class is no longer active. The best webpage on the US1 that I came across was an ad selling a US1 ...even had a movie.

A picture of the US1 I stole from the ad......

What the US1 doesn't completely solve for a big guy is lateral stability. When you weigh 260 lbs (118kg) small dinghies have a tendency to lean radically into the skipper, particularly when the wind eases up. A big scow, say the MC scow, with less of a tendency to roll around might be a more pleasant sail for Mr. "C".

Here's a picture of the slightly larger C-scow........

In Internet browsing for this post, I also discovered a California builder who is supplying part build Windmill hulls .

Music Whenever; U2 "Angel of Harlem"

Performed at Slane Castle, Ireland.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

Swedish Archipelago Raid Revisited

Been catching snippets of the Tour de France and I always comes away shaking my head in awe at the athleticism and grittiness of the world's top bicyclists (I'd rank the Volvo Round the World and the Vendee Globe sailing races as, in the own way, just as grueling a sporting competition).

In the sport of small boat sailing, the cats are the one segment of the sport that treasure their multi-day endurance competitions. I've covered the Swedish Archipelago race before but this is another excellent video covering Day 3 and Day 4 of the 2009 Swedish Archipelago race. (Note the pre-dawn start and competitors camping at night!)

Archipelago Raid, Day3&4 from Pure Archipelago on Vimeo.

I have to reiterate what I said in my previous post on the Swedish Archipelago; a five day, multi-stop cat race would be a top notch Olympic event.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Two of my Favorite Classic Dinghy Photos

(As always, click on the photo for higher resolution.)

The first photo is a Classic International 14 sailing, an Uffa Fox design, probably 1950's.

Second one is an Australian dinghy in big breeze; guessing 1940's or 1950's. I would think she's a skiff type, either a 14 or 16 footer but the bow doesn't look plumb like a skiff should have. The name TRIAD is attached to the file.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Music Index 2; The Next 59

For the first Music Index, click here.

This is mostly for my benefit. Here is the index of the next 59 "Music Whenever" selections starting where the first Music Index (cataloging the first 59 music videos on Earwigoagin) stopped.