Category: Racing sailing craft

Boat Building Academy students Martin Nott and Alistair Munro build a 6.5m Charles Sibbick Half-Rater

Victorian Half Rater built in strip plank Victorian Half Rater built in strip plank - Martin Nott - DT

Photos by Derek Thompson and Emma Brice

Two students at the  Boat Building Academy have built and launched this remarkable skimming dish designed by Charles Sibbick.

The story began in 2006 when after a 30-year career in sports magazine publishing Isle of Wight-based Martin Nott decided he needed a new challenge and restored a 1902-built boat  Sibbick boat, Witch.

When he became the proud owner of the National Register of Historic Vessels-listed boat, he enrolled on the  Academy’s one-week boat restoration course to gain more knowledge and skills relating to the construction of traditional boats.

He then became increasingly fascinated by wooden boats and joined the Boat Building Academy in September 2010 to start the 38-week boat building course during which he was able to build another Sibbick design, Diamond, a 6.5m fin-and-bulb keel carvel-built skimming-dish half rater dating from 1897. He worked from an old set of lines and from photos.

Alistair Munro, who helped Martin build Diamond, was previously managing director of an advertising agency. The boat building course was the start of a major career change.

A mixture of traditional and modern construction methods were used in building Diamond: she has a red cedar strip-planked hull with a yellow cedar deck and mahogany coamings. She is partially decked, has a cockpit and is fitted with a traditional lug rig, and bronze fittings, many of them custom-made. See Martin’s weblog of the build here.

Diamond is now on the Isle of Wight, where Martin plans to race her, and to build a 30ft Sibbick Rater. He is currently working one day a week for Classic Boat and Yachts & Yachting, while looking for work as a shipwright or boat builder.

The first volume of Rudder online

Rushton ad The Rudder magazine

The first year’s issues of the famous 19th century stateside boating magazine The Rudder placed online by Mystic Seaport is liberally sprinkled with strongly expressed views that seem deliberately calculated to offend someone or other.

Today, it all seems quaint but slightly crazy – yet many magazine editors will wish they could be so forthright today.

‘In a paper I saw the following wonderful what is it offered for sale : “A keel sloop, cutter rigged.” We shall soon hear of keel schooners, sloop-rigged and cutter-rigged catboats being bought and sold. How a yacht can be both sloop and cutter at one and the same time is something beyond me. The truth, sad to relate, is, very few if any of our large single-masted racing yachts are sloops; many of the best of them are cutters or that bastard rig which is so far nameless.’

I guess the writer means the rig with a single foresail on a jib. What is that called?

Again:

‘One thing strikes the buyer who reads the catalogue of J H Rushton: it is the perfect way in which everything is described. The most minute details of construction and finish of his craft are put down in plain English so that a purchaser knows just what he is going to get for his money. For that reason it is one of the best tracts for the suppression of profanity we have ever seen: he leaves the worst cranks no chance for a growl.’

And again:

‘The black-blight that invades and destroys the racing spirit in yacht clubs is the steam yacht. What quality of blood runs in the veins of a man who will willingly exchange the exciting and exhilarating pastime of sailing for the monotonous privilege of being driven around in a kettle? With obligations to the late Lord St Vincent, we remark that a yachtsman who descends to running a steam yacht is d——d for the sport!’

Thanks to The Good Old Boat Redwing weblog for the linking to these entertaining sets of scans.

David Seidman’s Sailing: A Beginner’s Guide is available again

David Seidman Sailing: A Beginner's Guide David Seidman Sailing: A Beginner's Guide
David Seidman Sailing: A Beginner's Guide

Some typical pages from David Seidman’s book. It’s not all about modern boats and racing

I’m pleased to be able to say that our favourite sailing tutor is available again, and now in its second edition in its current version from Adlard Coles.

In a much earlier edition David Seidman’s Sailing: A Beginner’s Guide was the best how-to sailing book on my shelves when I was learning how to sail, and many years later it’s now also become a favourite with both my wife and daughter.

I gather the main addition to the new edition of the book is a section on GPS and some new stuff about roller furling, and I’m happy to report that the rest of its contents seem unchanged.

One of the things that makes Seidman’s book special and will likely make it a recognised classic in years to come is that he doesn’t assume that we all have the latest boats and wish to race them.

Most sailing tutors seem to have been made in conjunction with one of the manufacturers and often feature whichever of their models is exciting them at the time. But that approach leaves out most of us. It may be most of the points relevant to the latest boats apply to old boats too, but this focus on shiny new boats can be off-putting for learning sailors, many of whom are likely to be learning in older boats and are also likely to choose an older boat when they come to buy.  It’s true that many of the points relevant to the new boats will apply to the older boats also, but that’s not necessarily obvious when everything looks so different.

If an analogy is needed, it’s rather like the situation where you buy a basic model car and read the manual only to discover that most of it is taken up with added De Luxe GL gizmos and luxury designer features that don’t apply to your bargain basement jobbie with the barest floor covering: it’s deflating, and in a strange way makes you feel oddly wrong.

And then there’s the issue of racing. Seidman doesn’t ignore it, but he does recognise that there’s much more to sailing that rushing round the buoys and arguing about it all afterwards, having a drink and handing out pots. Actually, there are many kinds of leisure sailors, including potterers, picnickers, RYA-style club racers, thrill-seekers, explorers, adventurers, not forgetting the absolute beginners who don’t yet know which way sailing will take them.

Overall, probably most of us are non-racers or once a year racers, and part of Seidman’s charm is that he doesn’t make you feel that you’re inadequate of wrong if that’s not the way our sailing instincts run.

Seidman covers the broad spectrum of sailing, including Bermudan sloops and Marconi single-handers as well as traditionally rigged boats, and makes his intentions clear through his sweetly drawn illustrations. There’s even a practical section on rowing, and he also sneaks in quite a lot of context and history. Sailing doesn’t seek to rival more specialist books like Tom Cunliffe’s Hand, Reef and Steer: Traditional Sailing Skills for Classic Boats, but he does reflect sailing as many of us encounter it. He also has an infectious enthusiasm and is a good, clear writer.

If you’re looking for a book that explains how to sail, I recommend Sailing: A Beginner’s Guide. It’s available in its second edition from good bookshops including Amazon.