Category: Racing sailing craft

The Royal Navy’s small sailing craft of 1937

Seamanship

Naval 30ft gig – the RN’s fastest service boat under sail in 1937

These pages describing the Navy’s small sailing craft and how to sail them come from the Admiralty’s Manual of Seamanship, dated 1937. Many of them will be familiar to ex-Naval personnel, and to those who worked in boat and ship building in years gone by.

There’s some fascinating stuff here, including the information that the lugger was the fastest small sailing boat that the Navy had in those days – and that its rig was pretty well identical to Cornish luggers from up to 100 years before. There’s also some sail dimension information that people who work with traditional boats might find useful and interesting today, and instructions on sailing that still seem relevant, at least to me.

There are other chapters on the construction and the naming of parts of small boats, so if this post proves popular, I’ll put that material up at some point.

Seamanship Seamanship Seamanship

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For more pages: Continue reading “The Royal Navy’s small sailing craft of 1937”

Bob Telford’s first race sailing a dinghy with a standing lug

standing-lug-sail1

Standing lug sail from W P Stephens classic Canoe and
Boatbuilding for Amateurs

Bob Telford called by the yard currently restoring his impressive Maurice Griffiths-designed Idle Duck (type the word Idle Duck into the search box top left for more on this boat), only to find himself roped in to what sounded like an interesting round-the-buoys outing. Instead, though, it turned out to be a learning experience…

‘I knew something was afoot when I trundled into the inner sanctum known to some as Alan’s Community Center, for Retired Shipwrights, Dockyard Mateys and Associated Layabouts, and saw him and Peter look up, saying ’just the man…d’you fancy sailing in the Swale Match in me dinghy?

‘”Yes,” says I, without thinking.

‘The boat is a 10-ft lug rigged clinker job, so there I was, on my own, in a dinghy I had never rigged, let alone sailed, heading for the line for a race against four 16-ft fully crewed gaff-rigged dayboats.

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Read the rest of Bob’s story: Continue reading “Bob Telford’s first race sailing a dinghy with a standing lug”

Bristol Channel pilot cutter and yacht Carlotta is being restored

Carlotta

Carlotta Carlotta

The Bristol Channel pilot cutter Carlotta was built in 1899 by William H Halford of Gloucester, England for the Cumberland Sea Fishery Committee for use in patrolling the fisheries in the Cumberland area. She was nevertheless built to the same scantlings, materials, design and layout as two pilot boats built previously by the Halford yard, St Bee’s and Brittannia.

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She was converted into a yacht in 1907, and from then on had an extraordinary history Click here to read more: Continue reading “Bristol Channel pilot cutter and yacht Carlotta is being restored”