Fin v Bilge

Allan

Allan

Well-Known Member
Joined
17 Mar 2004
Messages
4,750
Location
Lymington
Visit site
I plan to buy a boat of approx 30-33ft and I feel that due to my sailing area, the Bristol Channel, I need bilge keels. Is there some way to quantify the difference between fin and bilge keels while sailing? I'm not into racing or placing too much stress on any part of my boat but, as I plan to do some longer passages, I feel I need something that will look after me if the weather turns nasty. I don't plan any Atlantic crossings, just SW England, Wales and Ireland.
 
If you want to quantify the differences you can look at the different ratings for fin and bilge keel versions of the same boat and that will show you the difference. Most of that can be attributed to the upwind difference as downwind there wont be much. Try the RYA or Byron software site for some PY ratings.

Mind you sounds like you don't have a choice anyway from where you sail.
 
A bilge keeled boat shouldn't be a problem at all for the sort of sailing you describe. You will lose a bit to windward both in speed and pointing ability and maybe a little speed off the wind, but modern bilge keelers are much more efficient than the old Westerlies and Moodies. The Hunter range is good in this respect while the new, wood-epoxy RM range imported by Portway also looks promising. For ultra-shallow draught don't rule out a lifting keeler such as the Parker 31 or 325 or something from the Feeling, Southerly or Ovni ranges.

Of course there is also the catamaran option such as the Prout Quest 31
 
Thanks for that unfortunatly, due to my budget, it looks like Moodys and Westerlys are the sort of boats I will be looking for.
Allan
 
How about a bilge keel Sadler 32 (around £20-25k)? I didn't notice any marked difference between a bilge keeled Sadler 29 and one with a shallow fin keel so I suspect the same might be true of the 32.
 
For the Bristol Channel you want not just any old bilge keels, but external iron keels, not encapsulated ballast GRP keels. With iron bilge keels you can dry out in lots of interesting harbours where fin-keelers are difficult/near impossible and GRP keels are getting damaged by drying onto stones.

If a bilge-keeler has vertical GRP bilge keels, the designers/builders were thinking about cheap construction, and sailing performance will suffer a bit. Angled-out external keels mean more expensive build but generally better performance.

In the Bristol Channel tidal flow is so great that even slow boats can make useful passages to windward, as long as they work the tides.
 
I've had a look at Byron and RYA and see that the difference appears to be around 10% (Moody 333, fin 1008, bilge 1107) I think I am right in saying they expect a bilge keeler to take approx 10% longer for an average passage. I assume, from what has been said above, that this will be more when beating and less when running. I know it is a difficult question but is there any way to quantify the difference in safety and comfort?
Allan
 
I'm afraid my experience with Sadlers suggests the opposite and the bilge-keelers, while perfectly good boats in their own way have distinctly inferior performance compared with deep fin. According to a YM review of all four fin types on the 32 the deep fin was slightly better than the centreplate and both were much better than twin-keel, with the shallow fin nearly as bad. My impression was that the same applied to the 29 and probably other boats of that generation, with the difference being most marked with a bit of a sea running.
 
Safety and comfort, I don't think there will be any real difference, the balast ratios of bilger and fin keelers are normally fairly similar. In terms of comfort, again not much in it although bilge keelers sometimes slap their windward keel. Not a problem though.

Not sure what size you are looking for but the Hunter Horizon 26 would be a jolly nice starter boat.
 
Sorry, I didn't mean to run down Moody's etc. I just meant that I could not afford the modern designs mentioned in one of the earier posts.
Allan
 
I am moving from the 22 footer I have sailed for the last 6 years to 30-33 footer, which I plan to spend a lot more time on. I have sailed a hunter, just for a day and with little wind and enjoyed it very much, 26 feet is a little small for my plans.
Allan
 
I've owned a fin keel Westerly Renown and a bilge keel Westerly 33. I sailed the latter for 10 years in the Channel, Biscay and Med. Strongest wind Force 10, but not a big sea, biggest sea in a F8 off Cherbourg with a spring tide. Sailed the boat with young children and short handed in all sorts of conditions and never, for one second, have I doubted the boat's ability to bring us through safely. I'm sure the other posters are correct in saying that a bilge keeler will lose out to a similar fin keeler, particularly on the wind. However, I have had no regrets with this boat. Sent you a pm.
 
We sailed a W33 Fin keel for 14 years and one summer sailed in close company with a bilge keeled version over some 300mls with winds varying from very light to F8 gusting F9. Upwind the bilge keeler would let us sail ahead and when we were about a mile ahead would motorsail to catch up again, I would guess the overall difference was 0.75kt VMG (0.5kt boatspeed and 0.25kt from narrower tacking angle/less leeway). Off the wind the difference was about 0.5kt even when they flew a mizzen staysail and we didn't and later we were still faster even with 45kts over the deck, 8kts SOG downwind, and both of us stuck with full mainsails unable to round up in diabolical seas to reef or drop them. In light conditions they were motoring when we could still sail regardless of wind direction.

That said the W33 is a superb boat, we had a ketch but they did do a sloop version and then of course the aft cockpit sloop rigged Discus. There isn't a huge advantage of shallow draught with the bilge keeler, I think it drew about 4ft to the fin's 5'6" but of course you could run aground upright /forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif, even if you couldn't heel her to get off /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
i recently aquired a 28' jaguar with twin keels moved up from 22' pandora twin keel.
i am so far verry happy with the jag and lots of room for 28' at a verry reasonable price "less than a mk1 moody 33" and nice lines also.
with regard to performance design is everything the cast iron swept back fine profile of the angled from vertical keels of the pandora prooved to be exeptional. i hope the jag performs as well as the pandora, so far i havent realy tested the performance of the jag i will have to wait for the spring.
/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
As far as I know all Hunters, Moodys and Westerlys, also Cobras and Macwesters, have external iron keels. The most common bilge-keelers with encapsulated ballast in GRP keels are the Colvic and Vivacity ranges, though you may find exceptions.
 
I'm afraid that, having had years of experience with bilge keelers, before trading to a fin, I cannot support the bilge concept. If you want a boat that can sail and push ahead to wind - and in your part of the world you have that and tides to contend with - you have to go with a fin. Bilges slam in any kind of sea, and this gets you down after a while.

And the case for bilges? It all comes down to this ideal of a sailing boat that can sit in mud/on a bank for a tide before floating off. What's that for fun? I started with bilges for this reason - it was an illusion. Deliberately putting aground has lots of demerits - need I elaborate? And the difference in draft (maybe one foot?) in your part of the world is almost meaningless.

If you just have to have bilges get a Westerly Fulmar - the best of the crop (sailed one 9 seasons)

PWG
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top