Ch-changes.

It’s usually impossible to change just one feature , structure or significant detail on a boat.

The larger the change that is made then the greater the number of side effects – and things that you haven’t thought about.

That’s one of my Steve rules BTW.

Right now my major project is to convert a gaff sloop to a Lug yawl and as the boat was almost complete as a sloop I had to take several steps backwards before I could make one positive step forward ; it’s never a good feeling to have to destroy work already done but luckily it’s on quite a small boat. This time around all that it has entailed is converting one wooden mast, altering the bow and foredeck of the boat and then building a new mizzen mast from alloy tube. In the past I was often just one worker – usually the rigger, on larger and much more expensive projects. One time, for instance, I had to walk past a maxi yacht being converted from fractional sloop to an even longer ketch and I watched, on and off, for days as the yacht’s new stern section was glassed on and faired….sadly it was still a failure as a racing boat but by then boat design and even construction had moved on a ways.

About to bore a gurt big hole through the foredeck and kingplank.

Funnily enough I grew up (as a sailor) in the late years of the old IOR (International offshore rule) period when it was quite normal to make radical changes to racing yachts – I was alongside in Cowes one time and wondering what the horrendous sound was – turns out that it was some Admirals Cupper having it’s transom and stern section being hacked off with a chainsaw of all things. The funny part of this is that I was only there to take the local hot 1 tonner back up to north Wales where we would take on the job of improving it’s IOR rating by adding measurement bumps under her quarters : all it took to do was stripping the boat of everything (sails, boom, mast engine etc) turning it over and only then actually starting the boatbuilding aspect.

Boats are, kind-of, a long chain of details, many of which are decided quite early on in the design process. The Pathfinder for example was initially designed as either a gaff yawl or gaff sloop but as a primarily open boat and symmetrical in terms of it’s centerboard. I started off knowing that I wanted an off center centerboard, a cuddy rather than a cabin and also initially as an English/Breton style standing Lugs’l yawl. Each thing that I wanted to do differently took a lot of thinking and planning – luckily John the designer gave the nod to the centerboard layout as he has done something similar with his more recent designs and generally people seem to like the cuddy on this boat. Each change on my part took a whole series of secondary changes which also needed a lot of thinking.

I should have said that all changes, like medicines, have side effects, some of which are predictable and some which aren’t : right now what i’m having to do is deal with the problems which I hadn’t predicted – even after many sleepless nights. This week, for example, I fitted the boomkin which I made and initially fitted at least 2 years ago and then put aside when the boat temporarily became a sloop. Now…having tried it again after setting the boat up to row and power it seems to get in the way of both engine and oars.

One recent change (the new mainmast) gave me what I really wanted – which is room to sleep under the cuddy with my head at the forward end. That one change also gives me the style of boat that I always wanted but that change also takes away the sheer convenience of being able to raise and lower the mast in it’s tabernacle : right now I have to work out a new system for getting the mainmast in and out.

As it is iv’e just made a simple change that may result in me having to shift the position of the boat on it’s trailer : I removed the long bowsprit which was part of the sloop set up and replaced it with an anchoring ‘stub’ which makes the whole boat about 18 inches shorter and creates less risk of the bowsprit coming through the car’s back window if we have to brake hard. It would be a useful change to be able to reduce the overall towing and turning around length of the whole rig so I might move the boat and therefore the trailer wheels at the same time and then of course deal with the altered towing/drawbar weight change. It only means about 3 days commitment of work including moving everything around the yard and lifting the boat off the trailer (by hand) one more time – what’s not to love about an extra 3 days heavy work ?.