Thread: Cool stuff

So easy to use my decidedly non-nautical 70yr old in-laws have them on their kayaks and love them.

From watching the vids I wish I could sail Sydney harbor, and that place they are sailing the sharpie - Metung, Victoria
Shallow Water Sharpie II - YouTube

Originally Posted by callsign222

Where have you been man!?
Vic Harbour Pedal composite - YouTube
I included a video from this guy because he also built a 18' sharpie from Parker, and he has some really nice videos of it if you look.

That sharpie is really nice. One thing I have been wondering when I checked the videos, how is the center board working (Or is there at all a center board?)? It looks like the boat would be able to sail in very shallow water, including driving up on the beach: Shallow Water Sharpie II - YouTube I can not see them raising any center board (except for that 10-15 cm that is visible in the video).

I also think it could be built very light when I looked at the pictures: Building a Sharpie

Still that boat is too much work for me (and money).

Most of Parker's designs have a pivoting board. It would just ride up as you hit the beach.

Sent from my cell. Please excuse brevity and typos.

I am still a bit confused in how the pivoting is happening as the "hole" on the case is so far aft: http://mackhorton.com/Sharpie%20web/...port%20aft.jpg

For me it would be logical with a long box and the hole as much forward as possible. Now it looks like it would pull down the board when it hits something.

The pivot point is all the way forward in the box. The hole is only for a small bit of the tail of the board. When I get home tonight, I'll post a scan of the drawing from Parker's book.

However, I can say from experience on a much larger Parker sharpie that running up on the beach is a risk. If stones get in the case, the board can jam. Then you have a real problem.

Sent from my cell. Please excuse brevity and typos.

If the pivot is all the way in the front of the box, and just the tail coming up, there is another thing I can not uderstand: How do they keep the board down? I mean, wood floats, and add a bit of speed and also the water will push it up. Having friction there is not solving as then it would never fall down if you hit a stone. If they would have the hole in front, they could have a handle sticking out and tie it with a rubber, allowing it to kick back once there is deepth enough.

Here is a drawing from Parker's book:


IMG.jpg

The pivot point is the smudgy dot far forward on the centerboard. The board drops down only about 45 degrees, not straight down.

If the board does not sink under its own weight plus the weight of the hardware (some wood is dense enough), you can embed a hunk of lead near the trailing edge.

Traditional sharpies had a metal rod attached near the trailing edge for raising and lowering the board. Modern ones tend to use a rope, although this also can jam inside the case if the board is raise suddenly by external forces, such as a rock or sandbar.

Thanks!
EDIT: Now when I am thinking about it, as it is only falling down 45 degrees, that drawing is not optimal. That drawing will create a huge gap behind the board. By changing the angle of back side of the box and making the trailing edge of the board slightly round you can have the gap pretty small

It is surprising how well the boat still performs as it has a such small pivoting board. I would have been thinking it would need bigger. It is not a GIS in performance, but definitely a nice looking boat with some good features too.

There is a lot of sharpie in the GIS design. And with good reason. Sharpies won so many regattas back in the day that they tended to get banned from the racecourse.

Oh boy now you did it. Cuing Mik and PAR in 4...3...2...1...

Okay, call it "convergent evolution" then. Good ideas tend to re-surface even when the lineage is independent.

This with that sharpies (nearly) got banned from racing I have heard several times repeated in different forms. I wonder if it is true or not, as the claims acts a bit like urban lengends. Is anyone having any trustworthy reference, or been witness in person to this?

I like sharpies, but I have also noticed some zealot-ism when it comes to sharpies, and some people adding a bit to the truth. This modified truth is then again spread forward (and maybe having something added again).

Clearly sharpies are a boats to love, and I want to learn more about them (and not just rumors).

Also I wonder why sharpies are not so common anymore? Around where I am living I have never seen a sharpie.

Originally Posted by engblom

Around where I am living I have never seen a sharpie.

I'm not surprised. While the basic shape has probably been discovered independently many times in many places, a true sharpie is an American style. Or "style family". The classic New Haven sharpie was developed and refined for the local conditions right where I'm standing as I write this, the northern coast of Long Island Sound, east of New York City. Variants on the basic design were developed for other local environments south and west of here. But I don't think they got very far from the east coast of the US.

The style was highly refined for a particular niche: a stable platform, able to carry a very heavy load, for use in very shallow, protected water. Like all fishing boats, the rig had to be simple to handle, so the crew could concentrate on the fishing rather than sail handling. The sail plan had to be adaptable to a wide range of conditions, so the crew could go out every day. The whole thing had to be fast, because the first boat back to the dock usually got the best price. And it had to be cheap and easy to build by amateurs.

Change some of the design constraints and you get a different boat. The local fishing schooners which went out to Georges Bank, where the water is deeper and not protected, had a completely different hull shape. Sharpies built as yachts had more complex sail plans. Etc.

The legends of sharpies being banned from races may be exaggerated. But they are not completely made up. They mirror the endless arguments which go on today about very lightly built boats, which are fast but dangerous in a blow, versus heavier, more stable designs, which are safer but slower. And I've sailed on a 32 foot classic New Haven sharpie which goes like greased lightning in any sort of breeze.

Parker's "The Sharpie Book" has a lot more detail on most of this. It is cheap and available everywhere. I just happen to know much of it because I grew up near New Haven harbor, where small sharpies still race on Saturday mornings.