Circumnavigation

Richard

Richard

Final Approach
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Ack...city life
My lil brother wants to sail around the world in 2010. Next year he and I will start a Transpac...maybe we'll finish too. His questions to me make me realize I have been away from sailboats for too long. Heck, I hardly remember what to look for in a boat. Here's your opportunity to chime in.

What hull/rig would YOU buy?
 
Richard said:
What hull/rig would YOU buy?
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My only real blue water experience has been aboard an Island Packet 38, which my friend has been sailing throughout the Caribbean. Cutter rig, full keel, and overall a stoutly built, stable platform, IMO.

Outside of that, I can't really speak from experience, other than about a couple little things I tend to get in arguments about:

  1. Don't skimp on auxiliary power (and, of course, go with inboard diesel). 3hp per ton minimum... After a long passage, you don't want to be wrestling the boat into a slip or a tight anchorage. Plus having sufficient power to make good way while motoring or motorsailing is nice.
  2. Windvane. I know the arguments against it (they're expensive, they break, and once they're broken it'll likely be a long time before it can be fixed, etc.) but even on short passages (3-4 days) and 6 hour watches, that much time at the helm holding a course is profoundly exhausting. And it's a better option, IMO, than relying solely on an autopilot (why use that much battery if you don't need to?)
  3. For most people it's a no-brainer, but... Radar. Throwing it on for a couple passes every 15 minutes during night watches makes for a nice little extra added peace of mind. The "Bah, they'll see my lights!" argument doesn't fly with me. And you can get good arrays cheap these days.
Sounds like fun!

Edit: Ahh... I missed the Transpac part there. Not much of a racer myself. :redface:
 
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Oyyyy, is he talking about singlehanding long legs? Eeesshh, besides, it's illegal. For me, the perfect boat would be an old wood 47' Sparkman Stevens yawl with a mule, a spinnaker rig and various chutes set in socks. It's really a long trip and you want a fast, balanced and sea kindly boat. Other options, less comfortable and roomy, but faster and weather capable is a Hobie 33. That is a fun little rocket to sail, and she has handily won the Transpac in her class. Another option would be a big wood schooner, 75' on the water or more. Now I can take 6 people comfortably, and that is minimal crewing for sustained all weather function capabilities. You need 6, 4hrs on 8hrs off 2rotations a day for 3-2man watches so no one has to steer the boat more than an hour at a time in heavy weather.

One more option, a fast, large, ocean racing catamaran or tri-maran running a 3 man crew.

Much more important than the boat itself is the outfitting. This is where most people find their dream comes to an abrupt halt. The information is so overwhelming in quantity, and often contradictory, that most people just throw up their hands in defeat and walk away from it, often leaving a boat in a slip that is a cocktail condo on the water three weekends a year. The 10% that do make it come true are the ones that set a realistic budget, do what they can within it stretching every buck, and leaving when a predetermined point has been met. You can outfit a boat forever, but eventually you reach a point of diminishing returns and even liability.

If he has any questions, feel free to put him in touch with me.
 
ReverendSlappy said:
Windvane. I know the arguments against it (they're expensive, they break, and once they're broken it'll likely be a long time before it can be fixed, etc.) but even on short passages (3-4 days) and 6 hour watches, that much time at the helm holding a course is profoundly exhausting. And it's a better option, IMO, than relying solely on an autopilot (why use that much battery if you don't need to?)
  1. For most people it's a no-brainer, but... Radar. Throwing it on for a couple passes every 15 minutes during night watches makes for a nice little extra added peace of mind. The "Bah, they'll see my lights!" argument doesn't fly with me. And you can get good arrays cheap these days.
Sounds like fun!
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You bring up a couple good points. Windvane, I completely dissagree, most sailing is done in light to medium airs and off the wind. Windvanes prove less than adequate in these conditions, and they are expensive. You are going to have an electric autopilot anyway, I'd take the windvane money and spend it on a good Simrad AP and a trolling/wind generator set up. If I was building the boat up, I'd get that traction motor/generator unit and then you can have your propullsion genset in the most ballast/space advantagous spot, and even on a set of rails for trim. But you can get generators to hang in the rigging at anchor with a propellor for wind, or mount on the rail and drag an axial impellor in the water. That provides enough juice to power the A/P and refridgeration if you have good iceboxes and cold plates.

Radar, don't skimp, and don't buy a closed array "flying saucer" unit, they are completely different in mode of operation than an open array (the one where the big rod spinns on the little base). Buy an open array, biggest and best you can afford. Don't worry about the top ranges that you won't use, you'll use them. It's way more than the height of eye can see, but you'll see rain squalls & thunderstorms a long way out, and sailing shorthanded at night, that's what lets you know when to reef early. Thing is, when you get to the power levels you want for detail and clarity in the 1-12 mile range, it's going to to be a 96+mile radar. Lot's of littoral and harbor navigation is done by radar since the charts rarely keep up with the changes. I would suggest Furuno Black Box at this point, and then integrate it with either of the Nobletec (by Jeppessen), VNS or Admiral programs, unless there were no budgetary restrictions, then I would go with Transas. If you buy the right hardware, a trolling generator on a boat doing 6-7 kts would keep up with everything.
 
S&S is the first that came to mind. I have some great stories there. Right now he's stuck on the Columbia models. He's also thinking ketch or yawl rig. He'll have a learning curve with either rig.

He and I are on the same page AFA outfitting. In fact, I'm glad to hear that he's allowing 2 years for the planning and acquiring the gear.

AFA radar I already decided he'd want Furuno. My experiences there support that.

For the Transpac it would be he and I. I've done two passages (NOT Transpacs) with a two man crew so I know it aint a reach (pun) to be 'short handed'. The 'round the world would be us two as well.

I'm fairly against multihulls for long legs. Plus they don't beat as well. But my experiences there are +20 years old...maybe something newer is out there.

No vane for me. They suck and as has been pointed out they are next to worthless.

To bring us both up to speed I would suggest a couple Baja HaHa and a Newport to Ensenada in full race mode.
 
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Henning said:
You bring up a couple good points. Windvane, I completely dissagree, most sailing is done in light to medium airs and off the wind. Windvanes prove less than adequate in these conditions, and they are expensive. You are going to have an electric autopilot anyway, I'd take the windvane money and spend it on a good Simrad AP and a trolling/wind generator set up. If I was building the boat up, I'd get that traction motor/generator unit and then you can have your propullsion genset in the most ballast/space advantagous spot, and even on a set of rails for trim. But you can get generators to hang in the rigging at anchor with a propellor for wind, or mount on the rail and drag an axial impellor in the water. That provides enough juice to power the A/P and refridgeration if you have good iceboxes and cold plates.
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Certainly I have to defer to your expertise... and without a doubt you raise a valid point. My hypothetical trip has always been an Atlantic crossing, with the assumption of decent northeasterly trades throughout. Windvanes aren't effective for light winds, no, but in the above conditions, my belief is that the trade-off would be worth it; if it allows a watch or two here and there to pass without having to rigorously hold course in a breeze, I think that alone would likely make it worth the cost. And if it breaks? Ehh, well crud, there's always the AP and I guess you run the fridge a little less often. ;)

Also, a good point in favor of your argument is that in light wind the autopilot won't draw much power; an autopilot works in all conditions, with the only difference being how much power is needed. I also agree with you that a solid AP is a must, and that it's really hard to have too much power generation.

Henning said:
Radar, don't skimp, and don't buy a closed array "flying saucer" unit, they are completely different in mode of operation than an open array (the one where the big rod spinns on the little base). Buy an open array, biggest and best you can afford. Don't worry about the top ranges that you won't use, you'll use them. It's way more than the height of eye can see, but you'll see rain squalls & thunderstorms a long way out, and sailing shorthanded at night, that's what lets you know when to reef early. Thing is, when you get to the power levels you want for detail and clarity in the 1-12 mile range, it's going to to be a 96+mile radar. Lot's of littoral and harbor navigation is done by radar since the charts rarely keep up with the changes. I would suggest Furuno Black Box at this point, and then integrate it with either of the Nobletec (by Jeppessen), VNS or Admiral programs, unless there were no budgetary restrictions, then I would go with Transas. If you buy the right hardware, a trolling generator on a boat doing 6-7 kts would keep up with everything.
Click to expand...
Very good points that I hadn't previously considered about the radar, and I can't say I disagree at all. :cheerswine:
 
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Richard said:
S&S is the first that came to mind. I have some great stories there. Right now he's stuck on the Columbia models. He's also thinking ketch or yawl rig. He'll have a learning curve with either rig.

For the Transpac it would be he and I. I've done two passages (NOT Transpacs) with a two man crew so I know it aint a reach (pun) to be 'short handed'. The 'round the world would be us two as well.

I'm fairly against multihulls for long legs. Plus they don't beat as well. But my experiences there are +20 years old...maybe something newer is out there.

To bring us both up to speed I would suggest a couple Baja HaHa and a Newport to Ensenada in full race mode.
Click to expand...

The Bill Tripp Columbia 50 isn't bad, and one of the originals of the design built IIRC as the Oceana 49 was a yawl. Here's the deal though, you'd really, really really like a wheel house, pretty easy to do with a Columbia 50. Thing about those boats though, they're slow, brutally slow. I used to beat them in races with my Catalina 27.

I've done a few multi hulls. In the very begins of my career at sea back in San Diego there was this big circus came to town looking 75' catamaran, Fairweather One, that was built in the early 70s out of what looked like construction site scraps in AZ and was built by a bunch of hippies using a National Geographic article for the plans, s--t you not. That was my first delivery job from SD to PV, and I had been sailing about a month at this point. Boat was complete POS we got into weather, I had to go up the mast in weather, we had no winches (I did have Chuey though, and Chuey was better than any damn winch), one engine blew up(port), the opposite rudder broke, ughhh, just ugggg. I slept in my wetsuit several nights. We got there just fine, and even though we had a filthy bottom (didn't want to risk peeling the plywood) we maintained 12 kts the whole way.

When I was in Aus, I delivered a high performance 12 meter cruising cat from the Perth area around Cape Leewen and over to Adelaide, and we were surfing nicely in 20-30' following sea. It would start getting noisy at 14 kts and be deafening at 18kts as the bow wave starts beating into the cross deck, but dude, we rocked and were perfectly stable in 50kt winds in the Southern Ocean. (I have done the S.O. in mono and multi hulls, and if I'm going back under sail, it will be multi and big)

We did have an issue with the anchor point for the headstay was poorly designed and executed, and nearly broke and did so only after sitting secured to a dock.
As we pulled in:
2781459042_4c4b4b3d0d.jpg


Notice the entire side is cracked loose, and it's a tab that is only surface welded, and this was a fresh repair and new headstay.

A few minutes after I took that picture which was about 15 minutes after we tied up, this happenned:
2783708338_d2a6e5887c.jpg


Notice the press swage, I objected to that when I arrived at the boat in Perth. Also, all but about 5 strands show prior damage and fracture. Those five strands held a hell of a lot, and they held till we were tied up.

This is the bow fitting I built for the boat:

2780601711_babf02f9a8.jpg


That's what things need to look like for the Southern Ocean.

Double handing around the world? I'd be all about an 80' wave piercing tri. Here's the thing, speed is your friend, especially in the quest to chase the beam reach winds around the world. You need to be able to do sustained runs at 15kts to keep yourself where you want to be in regards to weather. If not, you've got to be ready to button up tight. That, and 18kts gets you around the world and across oceans quickly. I'd rather be on an ocean racing style multi for 7 days than a 70' mono for 30. Lot less supplies required. Big spaces at sea are wasted and hazardous, and slow you down. Small spaces are more sea friendly as you don't get thrown, at least not too far.

Just remember, if you're double handing, and you get caught in heavy weather, the odds say you or your brother or both will sustain serious injury or death. Thing is, in heavy weather you have to drive to the wave coming, and the autopilot can only drive to the one it's on, so you have to hand steer the boat. In heavy weather you can only steer for an hour at a time, it's physically demanding, and after about 12 hrs as you're in the heart of the storm, neither of you will be able to drive anymore and that's when the trouble is going to hit. So for you guys, I say get the fastest freakin boat you can so you can keep the weather where you want it, and that means multi. Y'all can build one. An 80' ocean racing tri is a remarkably small and simple to build boat, and there's probably a few out there for sale pretty cheap. Build out as much interior as you need and no more. Remember, you're gonna sleep, eat, read and stand watch mostly, do the crossings fast and use the money you save for rooms at resorts. There was a Sydney Hobart race around a decade or so ago where heavy weather hit. It shows quite succinctly what happens to shorthanded boats in heavy weather.


Oh yeah:
2780603171_88d7243653.jpg
 
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Ah gee, I was looking more for advice on hull plans than a primer on how to sail. Thanks though.

Funny, Henning.
 
Henning said:
Hull plans are predicated by hull type which is predicated by hull use.

Here's a boat perfect for y'all.
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As stated, use is blue water long passages, ketch or yawl rig. Shoal draft for coastal...maybe.

I know I just described a multi...except for ability to point.

BTW: the cat in that pic I believe I was on her a couple years ago. Port San Luis....
 
Here's the deal you don't want to point too hard anyway even in a mono unless you're bouy racing. Cruising cats with a full cross deck, forget going to weather at all, just too slow and rough. Speed is the key, and the ability to receive weather charts, the more detailed and timely the better, but a NOAA weather fax receiver works. With those two things, you can keep yourself in a position so the wind will be where you want it.
 
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