Innehållsförteckning för March 2015 från Classic Boat

Can’t say I was a fan of the London Boat Show graphics this year. The main image was that of a dark and stormy day at sea; the few shards of hopeful far-off light disappearing downwind of some ugly black lowering front. It’s the sort of day you don’t want to get caught out sailing; barometer dropping like a stone, crew disappearing down below like white skittles in a ten-pin bowling run; deck already heaving too much to be reefing comfortably; forcing yourself to eat bread because you know it might be a while ’til you see food... and with a dry mouth too. I know sailing is not all dreamy stuff, but for me this shouted “BE AFRAID, BE VERY AFRAID”. The theme continued at the entrance – which…

The Fife schooner Altair added another feather to her cap when she crossed the fi nish line of the Panerai Transat Classique in Martinique in fi rst place (elapsed and corrected) on 20 January. Her crossing from Lanzarote, about 2,800 miles, took just 13 days and 3 hours – an incredible east-west performance by a vintage schooner, and possibly a record. As we went to press, the last boat had just arrived. In this third iteration of the race (it was run previously in 2008 and 2012), conditions were near-perfect for record-setting runs by most of the fl eet. CB’s Guy Venables was there at the start in Lanzarote on 7 January. A VOLCANIC START TO THE RACE “It was Spain, so there was a festival. This time it was…

Nice weather here it is, yes?” shouted the taxi driver with his head craned backwards while driving like he was trying to warm up a new set of slicks. As I flew from the back seat to the front footwell of the Moskvich Russian taxi to the noise of breaking glass and the heavy thump of bonnet smashing against a rusty 30 ton tram, my mind slowed down enough to think: “I hope I don’t die, because I’m on my way to a Russian Wild Sailors Party and it sounds like something you shouldn’t miss.” I was in St Petersburg and until this moment I had been having a pretty good time of it all... The L6 class were designed by Anatoly Kiselev in 1958 in Leningrad, predominantly as offshore…

Writing in late 1907 the editor of Yachting Monthly said of the bermudan rig that there were “exceptionally few” in the country, and despite the fact that they were “most strongly represented on the Clyde” he could list only five small boats there. Just six years later, for the 1914 season, William Fife alone designed bermudan rigs for nine of his racing yachts. It was a remarkable change in fortune for a rig that is actually as old as yachting itself… Like many aspects of yachting, the origins of what we now know as the bermudan rig are pretty obscure; in fact, some are not even sure how to spell it. Bermudan or Bermudian? Neither, according to C E Nicholson, a very successful proponent, who waged a (largely unsuccessful) campaign…

RUSTLER 24 Rustler’s baby daysailer Like the Tofinou 7 (below right), the Rustler 24 is a traditional, long-keeled yacht for daysailing – albeit in GRP and with everything bar the shape modernised. So the Rustler 24 is not about rocketship performance, but when we tested one (in CB227), we found her lively, pointing high, driving through tacks and nimble on the helm. The R24 started life as the Piper One-Design, drawn by David Boyd in the mid-1960s. It was marketed for a number of years by Select Yachts (now Cornish Crabbers). Rustler’s Adrian Jones fell in love with the lines and bought the moulds, but spent a long time simplifying the boat, creating a cleaner look, bigger cockpit, but retaining enough tweakability in the rig to satisfy serious sailors. The…

The designer C Raymond Hunt is probably best known for his design of the 39ft 10in (12.1m) Concordia Yawl, which was first launched in New England, USA, in 1939, as well as his innovative powerboat designs. But during the 1930s and 1940s, he also produced a number of successful double-ended racing designs that proved very popular with club and junior sailors. Among these were the International 110, launched in 1939, and one of the first designs to be built in marine ply, and the bigger International 210, launched six years later. The International 210 was introduced in 1946 following a meeting involving members of Massachusetts Bay’s yachts clubs, who were keen to find an inexpensive class to adopt so they could enjoy some inter-club racing. Classes, including the Alden Triangle,…

YARD VISIT Bristol’s historic Underfalls Yard sparkled under a clear, cold sun this January as CB made the trip there to sail Tim Loftus’s latest triumph from Tim Loftus Boatbuilding – the 25ft (7.6m) junk-rigged, carvel-built Leaf of Bristol, a nominee in our awards this year. But more of that later. Tim’s neighbours – Star Yachts and RB Boatbuilding – have also been busy. John Raymond Barker (RB Boatbuilding) is on an extraordinary roll with his pilot cutters. Not only is he leading a complete rebuild of the 1887-built Breeze, but as soon as she is in the water, he will start work on a new, 41ft (12.5m) lute-sterned pilot cutter for a customer as Breeze is finished o. . Breeze is the oldestknown transom-sterned pilot cutter (the only other…

At the end of World War Two a large number of German, government-owned yachts were allocated to the victors and some found their way into various Service Yacht Clubs around Britain. These became known as the Windfalls and introduced service personnel into the world of sailing in larger boats. The influx of over 100 of them into Britain was also instrumental in revitalising the racing scene after the lapse during the war and in particular in introducing sailing in yachts to a large number of people whose social class and income level would otherwise have precluded them from this “luxurious” pastime. This story is about the beginnings of the British Kiel Yacht Club and about Flamingo, the last Windfall. EARLY HISTORY Germany always had a strong tradition in sail training…

Classic Boat’s address: Jubilee House, 2 Jubilee Place, London, SW3 3TQ For phone numbers, please see page 7 SANDEQ RACE 2014, INDONESIA A classic fast boat race The sandeq is a 40-50ft (12–15m) all-wooden trimaran with a crab-claw mainsail of around 2,700sqft (250m2) that can easily exceed 30 knots. Every part of a sandeq is connected with fishing lines to create a flexible craft without a single solid joint. They have a crew of eight: a helmsman, two mainsail trimmers (the sail has no means of cleating off) and five ‘pattimbang’ or trapeze crew. Being on the wire is particularly hard because there is no harness and the crew have to balance on a 6in (15cm)-thick bamboo ama for up to two hours. The Sandeq Race is a 300nM ‘raid’…

Toplicht bronze halyard cleat An extra-heavy halyard stopper to securely hold halyards or backstays, made from heavy cast bronze, polished or chromed. The brake jaw is operated using the lever or with a winch handle with standard 11/16in socket. With the winch handle it is also possible to ease the line exceptionally precisely. A good-looking and functional addition. Bronze polished £170; bronze chrome £224 toplicht.de Mighty mug Acting rather like a limpet, this innovative vessel has a thermal casing for lengthy warmth and suction bottom that pulls itself down on to flat surfaces including all varnished wood and some decks (Fife, yes. Thames barge, no). You really can’t knock it over but you simply lift it upwards and there’s your cup of tea. It’s right up our street. £13.99 www.themightymug.com…

Few everyday feats of skill entail such dramatic consequences of failure as striking a nail with a hammer. At one fell swoop you can bend the nail, damage the work or necessitate a visit to the first aid box. The cross-peen hammer, used by yacht joiners and cabinetmakers, was developed to avoid these pitfalls. The cross-peen is the wedge-shaped projection behind the round striking face and its job is to start a panel pin or tack that is too short to stand proud of the finger and thumb holding it upright. Here, for example, you can see how the narrow end of the peen will strike the copper tack to start it, landing cleanly on the head without hitting the fingers. Once the tack has pierced the surface and is…

Let me introduce you to Lenka. Later, but first a reminder of last month’s column which contained a plea to try something different, not simply for the sake of it or to be contrary, but in a genuine search for better ways to build boats – in my case small boats, the kind of I enjoy building. This month the column becomes an unashamed plug for one of those ways. In the course of my small career in boatbuilding I have come across many old clinker boats in solid timber and for most of them time has not been kind. Broken steamed timbers, split planks, weeping seams, the list is long, and for know-alls who pipe up and tell you to leave her in the water for a few days…

Pat Crockford first came across the Falmouth quay punt Matahari in December 2003 when she was lying in a forlorn state at Martin Heard’s yard at the top of Mylor Creek. She was built – not as a working boat but as a yacht – in 1930 by RS Burt at his yard in Flushing, giving Pat an instant connection with her: having served a boatbuilding apprenticeship with a cousin of RS Burt – EJ Burt, just across the Penryn River – he subsequently worked at Falmouth Boat Construction which had taken over the Flushing yard where Matahari first came to life. Richard Stevens Burt served his apprenticeship with his father Charles, completing it in 1891. He subsequently took over the family business, which was based on the Bar in…

Dodds on form We’ve long been a fan of the work of the (living) British artist James Dodds. Dodds trained as a shipwright before becoming an artist of broad repute and his boatbuilder’s love of form has been apparent in nearly everything he has done. We are featuring these two works on the eve of his latest exhibition (details below). The first work, Danish Eel Boat is an oil painting on linen canvas measuring 35 x 59in (90 x 150cm). The subject is a replica boat from Roskilde Viking Museum in Denmark that latest exhibition (details below). The first work, Danish Eel Boat is an oil painting on linen canvas measuring 35 x 59in (90 x 150cm). The subject is a replica boat from Roskilde Viking Museum in Denmark that…

+44 (0)207 349 3758 Email: steffan@classicboat.co.uk The 84ft (25.6m) 1923 Fife III gaff ketch Kentra arrived at Fairlie Yachts last autumn, 20 years after her initial and comprehensive restoration at the yard. The main reason she is there is to have her bottom re-coppered. Kentra has always been copperbottomed, so it was partly for authenticity that Fairlie re-coppered her after her major rebuild two decades ago. It turned out to be as effective as it was authentic: the copper lasted the full 20 years that included a serious cruising programme, much of it spent in the warm, teredoprone waters of the world. The process is “good oldfashioned stuff”, as Fairlie’s Duncan Walker put it, referring to the Navy custom of copper-bottoming the British fleet, more than 200 years ago. The…

1 Mast fittings The bead-blasted hounds and spreader bracket on the impressively sound mast possess a functional solidity. 2 Glueing the spars Wooden masts specialist Collars built the six new spars at its factory in Dorchester-on-Thames, using traditional adhesive: Resorcinol glue to join the sections of Douglas fir together 3 Conduit for wires Plastic conduit for the instrument and light wiring was initially laid by Collars inside the hollow sections of Kelpie’s spars before they were glued together. Originally built as a gaff schooner, Kelpie over the years was given a series of modifications to allow her to be sailed more easily with a smaller crew: early on she was given a bermudan mainsail; in the 1960s a bumkin was added so that the mainmast runners could be replaced by…

YOUR EVENTS Send us details of future events Things to do in the next few weeks 28 FEBRUARY – 1 MARCH RYA Suzuki Dinghy Show Alexandra Palace, London Tel: +44 (0)20 8365 2121, alexandrapalace.com The best boat show you’ve never been to: the venue, the 1863-built Alexandra Palace with its views over London, is worth the visit alone, but if you have an interest in dinghies and dayboats, it’s absolutely not to be missed. About 8,000 visitors normally attend making it a minnow of the boat show world and all the better for it. There’s also usually plenty of vintage dinghy interest besides the last word in modern high performance. 27 February – 1 March CYANZ Classic Regatta Auckland, New Zealand One of NZ’s biggest classic regattas, which is no…