The A-Z of ????

[Guest]

Horses for courses

I'd entirely agree that to survive 'The Perfect Storm' you need a boat of medium/heavy displacement. However, let's take a reality check here most of us don't go more than 30 miles from shore and don't need the kit we drive. Very few of us drive Landrovers because we need the capability of driving out of a bog. Similarly, most of us choose our days to sail and avoid just those evil conditions that would cause trouble. I love my Rival 38 but would galdly swap it for a modern lightweight design when once again we are making our pedestrian way downwind.

Chris Enstone, Rival Spirit

 

[billmacfarlane]

Re: Seaworthiness in general

There's nothing to stop you lashing the helm and putting out a drogue on ANY boat not just a medium/heavy displacement job. Yes the motion will be different on a lighter boat, but both will survive. We also seem to be equating heaviness with strength here. A properly designed lighter boat can be a very strong structure. Since the majority of us are Channel crossing/coastal sailors it makes sense to but the sort of boat designed to do just that i.e a modern design light-medium crusier. It's one reason why they sell in droves. For my own part while admiring some of the heavier designs I wouldn't want one for the sort of sailing I like - I find them a bit boring.

 

[Twister_Ken]

Of Land Rovers and Bogs

Appreciate your comparison but don't think it works:

Assuming you don't own a Land Rover, on land you have the choice of sticking to the two-lane blacktop. At sea, even a trip with the met office's blessing can go pear-shaped because of unforecast weather. If your ordinary car does somehow find itself in a bog, at least you can pull on your wellies and walk away. Same's not true of a boat.

I take this rather personally, having spent an entirely unlovely 4 hours trying to work a Jeanneau 36.2 with a dodgy engine a few miles upwind into shelter in a sudden F7-8 Meltemi. To make matters uglier, she wouldn't heave to so that I could try and sort out some of the problems that developed.

 

[Guest]

Re: Seaworthiness in general

Please look back at the Fastnet Report, and I think that you'll find that (most of) their conclusions directly contradict what you're saying. You're right however that most yachts will survive. Another question which way up they will survive, and whether their crew will. Unfortunately the moral of the Fastnet has receded in people's memories.

You couldn't be more wrong about the modern lightweight boats being more fun to sail. Having sailed lightweight Jeanneaus etc etc for many years, my (I guess, medium weight) Contessa 32 was a revelation. Modern lightweights have a steering position so far above the water, and with wheel steering, any sensation of actually sailing the thing is lost.

I also find my Contessa is faster in most UK wind conditions than more modern lightweight cruiser-racers of the same LOA. But with few exceptions modern lightweights start to head for home when the wind gets above 20 knots, missing out on some of the best sailing.

Fairly recently I took a Beneteau out and was appalled when at every decent puff of wind the boat rounded uncontrollably into the wind. The owner (an RYA instructor) told me that this was inherent in the design and he hadn't been able to eradicate it with sail trim etc.

So modern lightweights only redeeming features are: impressing landlubber guests with the amount of wasted space inside, and being quicker in a light breeze, especially downwind. I think you pay too dearly for those dubious pleasures.

 

[jamesjermain]

Call me a wimp..

Call me a wimp Nigel, but I have no intention of waiting for a Force 9 gale before I test a boat.

For one thing we would test no more than a couple a year, for a second, we would be able to say nothing about the boat's handling which would have any relevance for 95 per cent of owners or potential owners and for a third thing, I don't fancy it.

And if we don't sail a boat in Force 9 we can't comment on how it would perform.

A lot of the postings in this thread compare the seaworthiness of modern designs with that of boats designed and built before, I presume, about the 1960s. Without getting heavily into an enormous subject, there are many very seaworthy modern production designs but I am prepared to admit that there are also ones which are designed for, and are suitable for, no more than English Channel cruising in winds up to Force 7 or eight. Fortunately for the boat building industries on both sides of the Channel, the vast majority of owners want and need no more.

I wish apologists for tradition designs whould be equally honest. There are, of course, lots of very seaworthy older designs, but also many which are a nightmare for their crew and downright lethal offshore in heavy weather.

You only have to read some of the early accounts of cruising in the Channel and beyond to realise how uncomfortable and unsafe some of these boats were. Not only were planks being stove in and frames broken by seas which wouldn't cause a star craze on a modern yacht, but keel bolts pulled through mushy keelsons, wooden masts broke like matchsticks, galvanised wire rusted through, there were no guard wires, lifejackets, self-draining cockpits etc.

Crew arrived at their destination soaked because the boats rode like half-tide rocks, their clothes and bedding were soaked because of deck leaks and they were exhausted from having to pump for 15 minutes in every 60. Adding to their exhaustion was the fact that all the sail handling gear was much heavier and less well designed, and they probably spent a third to a half as long again out there compared to their modern counterparts.

With unreliable engines they were reluctant to motor into tricky anchorages and often had to lie off waiting for a storm to abate before seeking the safety of a sheltered haven.

I could go on - no guard rails, little or no safety equipment, heavy, inefficient, short lived cotton sails, cramped, head banging accommodation, no proper sanitation (how many people drowned with their zips undone), rudimentary facilities for preparing hot food etc.

For any number of reasons, far more people go cruising offshore and even across oceans today than ever did in 'the good old days'.

Modern design and construction allowed a 24-year-old of diminutive stature to sail a 60 foot yacht around the world at speeds which would have left the class of '69 breathless.
Present Knox-Johnston or Chichester, or even Moitessier with a 60 foot 1960s design and instructions to race round the world non-stop singlehanded. Stand back 'till the expletives have been deleted.

Yes, many production cruisers today have glaring errors and omission when it comes to offshore comfort and safety in heavy weaher, but they also have many improvements over older designs. Faced with a beat across Channel with a Force 8 forecasts and a choice of a pre-war 35 footer or, say, a Bavaria 34, I would probably choose the Bavaria. Al least I would be a bottle of Gros Plant and a plate of Moulles ahead by the time the long keeled made harbour.

JJ

 

[billmacfarlane]

Re: Seaworthiness in general

Does the Fastnet report mention the 24' French cruiser who survived the storm in the epicentre where most of the fatalities occurred ? He did it by trailing a drogue and battening down the hatches. I've sailed a Contessa 32 and enjoyed the experience. When it comes to enjoying whatever type of boat you like to helm , it's down to personal preference. You like one thing and I prefer another. Vive le diference and let's hope we both enjoy it. Mind you you'll enjoy it more than me this summer as my brand new 36' lightweight boat that won't fall apart in a gale isn't arriving until October.
PS I actually tested it in a gale and it was fine.

 

[alanhanson]

Re: Worse than useless

i keep readig about these plastic caravans from france etc, but these boats are regularly taken accross <sailed> the atlantic for the carribean season & back for the med summer
the thought that weight = sea worthiness is interesting i wonder what the actual stats are for lost boats in % terms
french v english old v new etc i would love to know as i am taking mine accross at the year end. but as most are saying its the crew not the boat

 

[Guest]

Re: Seaworthiness in general

I'm sure that you'll really enjoy your new boat, and it's good to hear that you tried a similar boat out in challenging conditions beforehand. Not many buyers can say that, I guess. Of course handling is subjective, and (almost) everyone just knows that their own boat is the bees knees, including me. I don't think that everyone should be forced to sail Contessas, though.

I don't know whether the Fastnet report mentioned the 24' cruiser. If I remember correctly (my foggy memory may be misleading me), the tank testing by the Wolfson(?) committee interestingly showed that beamy lightly built craft with narrow keels in some circumstances were less likely to be "tripped" by a breaking wave than say a long keeler, so it's not all bad. The consequences of being tripped were much more dire however. And battening the hatches and lying a-hull increased the chances of being tripped compared to active tactics. The general tenor of the report was I believe to criticise beamy lightweight designs. The 24 footer may just have been lucky not to have been caught by a breaking sea abeam despite its (apparently) passive tactics.

Do you think that the Fastnet report was wrong?

Apart from the question of extreme survival (glad to say I've never sailed in a steady F10), there's also the question of ENJOYING sailing in strong winds. Case study: recently I took my Contessa out in a steady 30-32 knots, gusting 38. We were two handed and tacking against the wind, wind against tide, so it was choppy. A couple of other boats, fully crewed, slightly bigger than us were trying to beat to windward, too. Think they were a Westerly and a Sigma, or similar. They seemed to be doing about 2 or 3 knots, but looked like they were struggling. We on the other hand were doing over 6 knots close hauled and at a good angle to the wind, and having a fantastic time.

 

[Guest]

Re: Just ABC

I have truly enjoyed this thread but regardless of the boat I try to keep my A/B/C in mind at all times.


A person who says "I respect the sea but it doesn't frighten me." is either terminally stupid or has yet to see what the sea can do when it gets really rough. I have - and "respect" is not a word I would use to describe the experience.

Better to be in here wishing you were out there - than out there wishing you were in here.

Chinese proverb "He who is not afraid of the sea is soon dead."


Best regards and whatever you sail - avoid terra firma at all costs.

Ian D

 

[Mirelle]

\"Really? What is it, and what is it for?\"

is about the best I can come up with at the moment. Yes, breathtaking, isn't it!"

 

[Mirelle]

try that the other way round....

Imagine yourself onboard a Munich Exclusive Partypit 42 which has cotton sails, old manila halyards and sheets, no guardrails, rusty galvanised rigging, unsuitable gear, a semi-rotary bilge pump, a tired wooden mast, once-galvanised bolts holding everything on, keelbolts about to pull out and a petrol paraffin engine of 7 hp, bound across or down Channel....

Now which boat would you rather be on....

You are wilfully confusing old materials with old designs.!

 

[Guest]

Re: Call me a wimp..

James,

The problem with boat reviews is the readership are reading the same reviews from different perspectives: south coast sailor who heads home in an F7 / Bristol Channel or NW Scotland sailor who finds F7 FUN / those who plan to go long distance and have a whole new set of criteria.

While it's handy to have the guide YM are running, it is serving to do little more than show us the overall lines of the boats (often omitting the keel) with a few words. Fine to capture what Benateau / Baviaria and such are all about, but there's no depth to tell the readership about the likely seakeeping qualities. Are they wet? Tankage? Internal or external keels? shaoe of keels? etc. etc.

Just before Scuttlebutt took its vacation there was a similar thread about the most suitable circumnavigators for < £125K (new or used). It was really developing but got lost in the reshuffle. I think there migt be many YM readers who would find such a series most enjoyable.

Old is not necessarily better. I sail a 1979 boat which has a fair few flaws compared to a moddern 10m design. However, she beats a Moody 42 hands down when beating to windward in 32 knots - in terms of speed, comfort and pointing ability. She's "alive" and fun in 34 knots (aparent) while delivering six knots on a broad reach with single reefed main. She will sail 28 degrees off the wind & go closer still.

The trouble is, some of us could care a less if the chart table is " a good size" - we want a boat which has a table to accept a full size Admiralty chart - or one folded in half but with some room to spare. ( beacuase a chart table serves as a desk in port, and some stilluse paper charts). Same with sea berths - does the new Moody 38 have proper sea berths with lee cloths in the cabin, or do those massive cushions have to be stowed somewhere? Ditto tankage - what use is a 38 foot boat if the tankage consumes all the space under the settees? The tanks should be down in the bilge where the weights low and the settess can be used for stowage.

Too much of what we are being served up by the builders and the yachting press is just the same tripe. The Moody 38 has a HUGE mattrress in the aft cabin -- as it is a solid mattress, can you rig a lee cloth on either side and in the middle? The articles don't tell us. Not just yours, but any articles in any magazines. You're letting the builders off too easily.

I had a good dig at Bavaria after the London Boat Show - becasue I read the review and then I saw the boats. God, I ws so disappointed by the quality - but then I'm judging by tougher standards ... and I wouldn't take a Bavaria to Australia. Therin lies the problem. Nice boats ... wrong customer.

 

[peterb]

Jeanneaus

Or should it be Jeanneaux? Whichever, I sail a 37 of that ilk and agree that she's difficult to sail in 7 or more. I tried to take her lines by measuring her while ashore, and although I haven't finished yet I was surprised how rectangular her underwater lines are. Just like a box with rounded corners. If she starts to round up and you don't catch her instantly, she heels over onto the edge of the box, her rudder comes half out of the water and she ends up almost stopped and facing into the wind. Not my favourite boat.

On the other hand, the Westerly Fulmar that I used to sail was quite docile in a 9-10, and even made slow way to windward over the ground. Yet the Fulmar seemed to have more space below for its 32 ft than the Jeanneau has in its 37. And as for the half tea-tray that Jeanneau call a chart table, words fail me!

 

[billmacfarlane]

Re: Seaworthiness in general

No of course I don't think the Fastnet report was wrong. I last read it about 20 years ago and while remembering bits of it in vivid detail, other bits are totally gone - problem of advancing age. I do remember that there was a relatively small area in which most damage was done and because it was a race , mostly boats of a similar type were in that area e.g the bigger faster boats were through it before the worse , ditto the small boats who hadn't reached the epicentre of the storm, that is of course if my memory is correct. And yes light weight beamy boats were criticised but the Fastnet was a very freaky and extreme set of circumstances which caught a particular subset of the fleet and they paid a terrible price. Also it proved that there is no one set of survival tactics that can be deemed to be successful - it all depends on the boat and the circumstances. I said I was buying a light/medium boat , not necessarily a beamy one. The beam is slightly less than 3 times the length and has a ballast ratio of 42% slung on a lead keel not like your average French/German production boat which rely on form stability through beam not ballast. I'll need to stop wittering on but one last thing I do remember is that a lot of the safety recommendations of the Fastnet were never implemented e.g liferaft design is still as crappy now as it was then.

 

[jamesjermain]

Re: try that the other way round....

Actually, no. I was drawing attention to both. You can't altogether disassociate advances in boat design and those in equipment, for the one has lead to, or allowed, advances in the other.

To take just one example: The sail area/displacement ratio of modern boats has soared. This is because lighter masts, better winches, jammers, ropes, sail cloths and reefing systems have allowed small crews to handle bigger rigs. This obviously allows the boats to be quicker on all pointsof sail in light to moderate conditions. They will need reefing earlier but, becuase of the systems installed, this is not a problem. With the proper amount of sail set they remain faster and, at their best, more weatherly, even in moderately severe conditions. In storm conditions I would not like to be out in any boat and, as I have had inadequate experienceof both types in those conditions I cannot comment. I suspect that most people on this board also have insufficient experience of Force 9 sailing in new and old boats to make proper comparisons from their own knowledge.

JJ

 

[kdf]

Re: Seaworthiness in general

Gotta disagree here. I have a Beneteau First 40.7. A modern design, lots of sail area, deep keel (2.4m) and no I don't head home when the wind gets above 20 knots. I've sailed her regularly this season, lightly crewed, in winds of 35 knots and above, and while still carrying a full main and a #3 jib. This boat handles these conditions with ease, clocking 7.5/8 knots upwind - Its a fun boat (light on the helm), dry (high freeboard), stiff (deep keel), fast (big rig) and seems well capable of handling anything that's thrown at it - I wouldnt go back to a traditional boat no matter what you paid me.

 

[Twister_Ken]

Re: try that the other way round....

James, it pains me to disagree with someone I respect as much as you, but I think you are confusing two things, systems on the one hand, and hull design and construction on the other.

Of course modern systems like roller reefing, in-mast furling, single line slab, lazy jacks, fully battened mains, control lines led aft, power windlasses, stable sail cloth, GPS, GMDSS. Navtex, radar, reliable marine diesels, et al have made an enormous difference to the yachts produced today. But all of these are also available to retrofit to older yachts.

And of course, there were some abominable hull shapes and construction standards produced in the past. Leaking deckheads and opening seams don’t appeal to any but the most perverse of us. But what is being argued here is that some of yesterday’s classic hull forms are inherently more seaworthy than the modern paradigm, if we define seaworthy as a boat that will look after her crew, rather than vice-versa. Even more so when these boats have been upgraded with modern systems.

Today’s paradigm – seemingly almost universal in the mass production market – of a straightish stem, sharply knuckled forefoot, very little rocker, flat underwater sections, high topsides, broad stern sections and a shallow run to the transom produces boats that are very good in accommodation terms, that sail quickly upwind in moderate airs, and fast downwind in almost any wind strength. Combined with a fin keel, a spade rudder and a good engine they also handle like a Mini Cooper under power. All very laudable, and as you and others have said, fine and dandy for 95% of the conditions they are ever likely to be sailed in.

However that hull shape does not take well to being pushed upwind in a blow and sometimes upwind is the only way to go. It’s happened to me twice, once in Jeanneau 42.2, once in a Jeanneau 36.2. On both occasions it was a miserable experience and the boats required lots of active intervention to keep them moving forward. Both times we were lightly crewed, and both times – fortunately – there was shelter within a few hours. For those aboard with less experience it was traumatic.

Conversely, I’ve sailed my own boat (a 28' Twister) upwind in a F7 gusting 8 many times and it’s a far easier and more comfortable job, despite being a much smaller boat. I’ve also raced a Swan 411 upwind and down with 45 knots apparent being the norm, and with gusts to over 60 knots. While it wasn't a doddle neither was it gut-busting, arm-wrenching, nerve-jangling stuff either. The Twister is a full keel Holman design with 50% ballast ratio, low freeboard and a narrow beam, combined with a moderate sailplan. The 411 is a early-seventies S&S design with a typical full fin-and-skeg underbody from that era, modest freeboard and beam by today’s standards, and a stern that looks distinctly skinny to modern eyes. The sail plan though is big. Both boats have some of the modern systems referred to above.

While I’ll happily admit that both of these designs will lose out downwind in speed and comfort (both roll like a sausage on a plate), I’d back either of them to take me upwind in a blow for hours or days on end, with one person in the cockpit and everybody else sleeping off that plate of moules, and the Gros Plant de Nantais it was washed down with. In a modern mass production boat helming would be much more active and wearing. I’d like some of the crew up on the weather rail as ballast and I’d want someone standing by to depower the main at a moment's notice. And God forbid, if either of them went right over, I’m sure either of the older designs would come back up again quickly, and wouldn’t stay inverted for long enough to threaten life.

Of course few people would deliberately sail in those conditions, but the sea being the sea, and weather forecasting still being a victim of insufficient data and incomplete understanding, sooner or later most of us will get caught out in something we hadn't expected. When that happens it's good to have the odds stacked as heavily in your favour as possible.

I seen to remember a year or two back YM and Classic had an old vs new comparison of family cruisers. maybe it's time to redo it with classic plastic vs mass production? Apart from anything else, I'd love to see how a modern 28 footer compared to the Twister!

 

[jfm]

Re: AlanHanson Carib/Med commuters

Alan hanson, I like Jeanneaus etc (have one) but when you mentioned the charter fleets that commute (caribbean in winter and med in summer), please note they go as deck cargo, not under their own sail!

JFM

 

[Mirelle]

Snap

I had a very similar experience on a Jeanneau 42.2. Quite exhausting. I do prefer my old girl; but am the first to admit that she is slower, and unsafe in marinas.

 

[alanhanson]

Re: AlanHanson Carib/Med commuters

i think you will find some are sailed, i was on one two years ago
mind you they are taken at the right time so dont generally get it really bad cheers alan