Redback's got wings

[Daddles]

The wee boatie was launched eighteen months ago and has served ... sort of okay as a rowboat. Well, I've finally :rolleyes: finished the sailing gear. Got her rigged successfully (thanks Mik). And got her wet too :eek:

Here are some detail pics.

Richard

[Daddles]

And, of course, I wanted to be greedy and add an extra pic. Here's the mast head. You can just see the white block lashed to the spar hiding behind the mast.

Richard

[Daddles]

But Ahhh, the cynics will say. Does it all work. Well, I think maybe it does.

Satdy arvo.
Wally's Landing on the Finniss River.
Wind? Hah, it didn't even get up to 'gentle breeze'.

The first shot shows me getting her ready. Can you see I'm nervous. You can't? That's good, I was terrified - an experienced yachtsman I am NOT.

The second piccy shows her ghosting down wind. Note the full sail - this wee boatie is sailing :D

The third piccy shows me trying to get back again. Of course, what breeze there was was straight down the channel (about 10m wide if that) and is just wasn't strong enough to tack against. Hah. I think it might almost have died completely at this point and I'm 'rowing' her back using the rudder. It's about now I decided the tiller was an inch or so too long. You can see the rescue boat in the background.

The fourth piccy shows her tucked into the bank. Ain't she a sweetie ... the boat too ;)

Richard

[TK1]

Hi Richard,

Well done on getting your boat launched under sail - a lot further than a lot of boat projects get!

What did you use for the spars, and where did you get the sail? (Sorry if I've missed this in previous posts).

Let us know how it goes on a really windy day, and somewhere oyu can tack;)

Regards,
Darren

[jmk89]

She's beautiful (actually they both are).
Redback looks like she's almost straight out of Arthur Ransome (although a bit smaller).
A lovely wee boatie. A greenie for her.

[Daddles]

What did you use for the spars, and where did you get the sail? (Sorry if I've missed this in previous posts).


The spars are oregon, as is the mast. Lovely stuff to work with though there is some funny grain in there.

The sail was made by a local mob. When I first started building her, I was doing the boat building course at the local TAFE. One of the instructors was part of a group of blokes who decided to all build Nutshell prams and negotiated with a local sail maker to make the sails at a bulk discount. I added my name to the list :D

So, the sail isn't as per the plans, the mast and spars aren't per the plans, the centreboard is nothing like the plans and the rudder is something even more wild again. The rigging bears no relationship to what was shown on the plans. Maybe this is why she worked :rolleyes: (sorry, not a Welsford fan after building one of his tubs).

Mik Storer gets a lot of the credit for the way she's turned out (in a positive way). In particular, he gave me a lot of help and support in rigging her.

Richard

[erogs]

Hi Richard

I am in the process of building a Tender Behind currently have most panels / parts cut and are just about to start assembly on the jig. You say you are not a fan of Welsford after building Redback, I would be interested to know what troubles you may have encounted during the building. Also what changes you made to centreboard and rigging and why you considered this necessary.

Cheers

Steve

[Daddles]

Hi Richard

I am in the process of building a Tender Behind currently have most panels / parts cut and are just about to start assembly on the jig. You say you are not a fan of Welsford after building Redback, I would be interested to know what troubles you may have encounted during the building. Also what changes you made to centreboard and rigging and why you considered this necessary.

Cheers

Steve

OMG Steve. Where the hell do I start?
Seriously, actually, I was serious :eek:

You're in SA - you don't say where. I'm at Happy Valley. The smart move is for you and me to get together, perhaps with my wee boatie in tow, and go from there.

I'm still pretty annoyed with the plans Welsford supplied, I'd LOVE to see yours to see if he's got his act together and fixed all the ####ups, but seriously, with these plans and with other Welsford builders I've spoken to, across his range, his plans are not good. I hope he reads this and changes it, but his replies to a some of my emails about problems with the plans suggest not - this is three years ago, he might have improved.

DON'T cut any planks at this stage - his patterns are waaaaayyyy out of wack. I'll teach you how to spile them, it makes a lot more sense and you'll save a heap of ply (on the bottom plank, it's over 4cm too wide in one point - measure a frame and then the plank at that point ... unless he's fixed the plans). The first plank I cut, looked wrong, badly wrong. I've got a photo of his layout with the plank I finally cut rattling around inside it - it's even a different shape. I ignored his plans for the other two planks and spiled them.

Getting the frames accurate is critical in the extreme with this building method - he's scaled down a method that works on larger boats but doesn't handle the transition as well. I'll need to have a chat with you about getting the shapes right. But accuracy is critical ... and the layout shown on his plans is wrong :rolleyes: Nothing you can't fix but ...

His sheerline is out - as per the plans, the sheer jumps UP in the middle. I wound up running a batten and dropping the sheerline in the middle by nearly an inch. It still looks like it's got a reverse curve in the middle from some angles but now it's quite sweet otherwise. This necessitated recutting the top frames and final plank - considering that all three planks were already glued to the boat, you can imagine that I thought long and hard before doing this.

I'm near enough to 100kg and it doesn't work well for me as a rowboat with his seat and rowlock positions. Redback starts to make sense when I put an adult on the rear seat :eek: . For this reason, I've always been critical of that part of the design. I had a mate in her today who's a tad over 70kg and it seemed worked for him, but worked better with three kids on the back seat. I'd suggest you have an outing in Redback to see where you want to put the rowlocks (hard to move if you use the ladder type inwales I did).

The sailing rig I use came about not through any disagreement with JW and what he has drawn may indeed work very well (though I know no-one who thinks hanging the main sheet off the rudder is a good idea). When I was at about the same stage you are, a bloke I know got a group of mates together to build Nutshell prams. As part of that, they got a bulk discount deal from the sail maker. Because the Tender Behind is about the same size, etc, I bought a Nutshell sail for her ... and so it is different to the plan. I used the Nutshell mast and spars as a result. The centreboard is more or less what JW designed. The rudder on the Tender Behind is plug ugly and I wanted a lifting or tilting rudder, so I used Mik's suggestion for a lifting blade for her. The rudder blade itself was cut the size and shape it is because it looked about right and that was sized plank I could buy from the hardware store the day I bought it - I'd wanted something wider. It has no right to work, but it seems to. The foil is one of Mik's.

The rigging is as per Mik's thoughts and rather different to the plan and other, older rigs you see around - for example, I don't use a parrel around the mast, the main halyard traps the mast to the spar. However, as promised by Mik, it works very nicely indeed thank you very much :D

A mate was sailing Redback today in barely enough wind to ripple the water. I'm serious. You could tell there was wind around because Redback started making headway, not because you could feel it :eek: She hasn't been used in anything stronger yet but in light airs, she's great.

The Tender Behind seems to be very stable and to have a great load carrying ability - as promised by the designer. We have yet to prove her a good sailer but initial indications suggest that, as promised by the designer, she will be fun to sail and a good sail trainer (which I need even if you don't :o )

What she isn't is an easy build. It's a #### of a way to build a boat and in this incarnation (downsized for a small boat), there are much more sensible designs out there. Nor is she a good rower - she's okay but you need to give some thought to rowlock position and what's on the plans is hopeless for me. In this you are lucky, you can have a play in mine and get an idea of where you need them on your boat. She is strong but she is heavy, especially as I built her. Some advanced building methods such as splining will help. You are unlikely to be able to get the gunwale and inwale to bend to that intense curve so you might save heartache and money by going with my cheat.

The result? As my first complete boat, I'm proud of what I've done, pleased with most of what it does, disappointed with other aspects. I could have chosen a better design to start with, especially with regards to building and the boat building course I did at TAFE gave me the advanced methods I needed to get around the problems. So it's a real mixed bag of emotions. However, sitting out there in a Mouseboat watching my mate sail her in damn near a flat calm, it was hard not to feel proud of my achievement:D

Richard