"Sabbatical" aluminium cruiser

"Sabbatical" was commissioned by Ann and Scott Ripley of Virginia Beach, USA, to be built in their own country. She is a distance cruiser but will spend some time in the ICW, where bridges limit her rig height.

Her rig is set up for short-handed sailing, designed around in-boom furling on main and mizzen and roller furling on headsails. Most sail controls can be led to electric winches aft or on the pilothouse roof, as can the dinghy lifting lines from the davits.

Laid out for a couple to cruise very comfortably with occasional guests, she even has a gymset built into the aft cabin. Her saloon is compact but is complemented by the more sociable pilothouse with panoramic views. This area can be sealed off from the main accommodation below for security from burglars and the possibility of a pilothouse window being broken by violent seas. Below the pilothouse is the walk-in engine room and workshop.

Her cockpit is set above the aft deck rather than recessed into it, to attain headroom aft. Her central helm seat stores the liferaft and is flanked by a pair of gimballed "Rocking Horse" chairs.

LOA 17.00m

LOD 15.25m

LWL 14.00m

Beam 4.49m

Draft 1.98m

Displacement 19435kg

Ballast 6000kg

Sail Area - Working 122.35sq.m

Light airs 158.20sq.m

Tankage - Water 1075 litres

Diesel 1850 litres

My radius chine plywood range started with the Didi 38, to which I built my own yacht "Didi" (ex "Black Cat") to prove and fine-tune the system. Five sisterships are now under construction. Next came the Didi 34, now also with five in build.

The downsizing trend in the concept has continued and I now have the Didi 26 nearing design completion. This one is to the Australian Level Class 800 trailer-sailer rules and can be built either stripped racer or with weekend accommodation.

She has a bulb dropkeel and transom-hung rudder on a performance hull. The rig is double swept-spreader fractional. The stripped boat will have asymetrical spinnaker on retractable bowsprit, the weekender a conventional pole.

Construction uses longitudinals over bulkheads for hull and deck framing. The cabintop is multi-chine stitch and glue for simplicity.

Files are being prepared for all bulkheads to be CNC cut and these will be expanded to include joinery and skin panels if the demand is there.

See the next issue of Dix's Doings for more information.

More plywood designs?

Enquiries continue to come in re other concepts in plywood. When combined with epoxy, it forms an excellent basis for an economical, light and solid hull structure. Wood remains the material most suited to amateur builders and its combination with epoxy and radius chine construction is re-establishing its popularity.

Power catamaran ferry - Bobkat 22

Recent collaboration between this office and that of powerboat man Bob van Niekerk, resulted in the new 22m power cat under construction by Nelson Girdlestone near the graving dock in Table Bay Harbour.

She has a GRP hull structure and aluminium superstructure. More such cooperative design work will be coming in the future.

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