Pictures of Nearly Completed Wherry

[wwaterman]

Well folks,

I think I'll have her finished in about two weeks, complete with four seats and a front bulkhead.

Thanksgiving the boat will get its maiden voyage on Lake Mohave (Southern section of Lake Mead.. the dammed Colorado River south of the Hoover Dam).

I'll probably paint the boat with SystemThree two-part paint in January..

Enjoy the pictures!

http://thumb18.webshots.net/t/68/68/6/16/76/2630616760102410218hYFrDi_th.jpg (http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2630616760102410218hYFrDi)

http://thumb18.webshots.net/t/64/564/8/42/31/2289842310102410218gsVEHe_th.jpg (http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2289842310102410218gsVEHe)

http://thumb18.webshots.net/t/69/69/4/55/17/2418455170102410218SyWRjv_th.jpg (http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2418455170102410218SyWRjv)

http://thumb18.webshots.net/t/24/565/5/65/94/2526565940102410218JnUsvD_th.jpg (http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2526565940102410218JnUsvD)

[Jay Greer]

You should have a ball rowing that one. Building a boat is only half the fun! Nice job.
Jay

[Paul Pless]

Beauty of a boat!!!:)

[Thorne]

Lovely!

[Yeadon]

Very nice. Gotta be tough to stay patient and not just drag it down to water and throw it in, huh? :D

Wwaterman, are you going to make a little sail rig for your wherry? I bet that'd be a fun little boat to sail.


You should have a ball rowing that one. Building a boat is only half the fun! Nice job.
Jay

This reminds me, I finished a peapod earlier this year, and I had the hardest time switching from construction-mode to go-play-in-the-boat-mode. I was so used to going outside to mess with the boat every free minute I had. It was sort of like going cold turkey on boat building. Not an easy thing to do.

Luckily, after a few good outings on the water I was hooked on sailing.

[wwaterman]

I think in about a year or so I'll make a sail rig for it. So many people have told me how delighted they are with its rowing, that most have said to not build a centerboard setup for it; it detracts from the rowing.

Supposedly getting a leeboard on it is hard because of the gunwale setup - as seen in the pictures.

Anyone have any ideas on how to attach a leeboard to it? Bob, any ideas?

That's the only way I'll do a sail rig, is if I can attach a leeboard and not deal with the centerboard. I guess its quite a difficult task to get a leeboard on it, as I said, because of the gunwale setup. However, I haven't researched it at all - I'm going off of a very reliable, previous builder who also built a Bolger micro.

[Yeadon]

It'd be helpful to have a centerboard, or some type of lateral resistance for sailing, but I don't think the lack of a leeboard or centerboard will keep you from having fun while sailing your wherry.

You won't be able to point upwind nearly as well (especially when the wind really picks up) so you'll just have to get a little more creative in your sailing. It's a cerebral game, anyways. I think the point of it all is to just go out, row a bit, sail a bit, relax, blow off some steam and have a nice time.

And when you're simply not getting where you need to be because you can't get upwind, then fire up the oars, and do a bit of "motor-sailing" until you hit a tack that works for you.

Man, I'm already excited to see your boat on the water.

[wwaterman]

Well put, thank you. I haven't thought about this -- sailing mostly down wind.

An approx. 110-lb boat - think it's a very bady idea trying to sail without a leeboard or centerboard?

[wwaterman]

Well put, thank you. I haven't thought about this -- sailing mostly down wind.

An approx. 110-lb boat - think it's a very bady idea trying to sail without a leeboard or centerboard?

[Yeadon]

Well put, thank you. I haven't thought about this -- sailing mostly down wind.

An approx. 110-lb boat - think it's a very bady idea trying to sail without a leeboard or centerboard?

My understanding is that it isn't the weight of a small open boat, but the shape of the hull that provides stability. The centerboard is just lateral resistance.

Add in your own moveable human ballast, and a healthy dose of common sense, and you'll have a great time.

[Eric Hvalsoe]

Is this the Pygmy Wherry? Just sort of looks like it. Just looking at the pictures, hard to say for sure, the hull shape appears to be a good candidate for a sail rig - fairly beamy and full midships for reasonable stability. I don't have any experience with leeboards and can't help you in that department. For sure you are missing out on a lot of fun by not being able to both row and sail. Is there not a sail rig from the designer for this boat? My experience is that a centerboard is not a hindrence but an adjunct to rowing. A centerboard will improve the tracking of the hull into and off the wind. This can be a great help when you must punch into it. Rowing or drifting downwind the course heading of the boat can be adjusted by raising or lowering the board. Board down dampens the motion of the boat and slows you down a little bit - but sea and wind conditions sometimes still make it advantagous. Board up the boat is more manueverable. Some kayakers understand all this from the use of drop skegs in a few of the English kayak designs. You can drop just about any kind of rig in this thing and get some down or off wind performance, and a good deal of enjoyment, with or without a centerboard. But to set up a balanced rig with good performance all around requires some design knowledge. Yeadon was successful lifting the catspaw sail rig and centerboard design, keeping the orientation of sail and board the same to each other, and dropping this into his peapod. With the double ended design and straight keel he even gets some upwind performance with very little board. My 13 and 16 (Hvalsoe-Boats.com) were designed from the get go with a rig. All of which affects positioning of thwarts, mast step, trunk, etc etc. Okay that is probably more than you wanted to know. Good luck.
Eric Hvalsoe

[wwaterman]

Thanks, Eric. It is indeed a Pygmy Wineglass Wherry.

From my understanding, this boat was designed to be under oar and it isn't very good under sail.

There are sail rigs designed for it - a sprit and a marconi - where the sprit uses a skeg type centerboard and the marconi uses a drop in centerboard.

From my understanding, this boat loses about 15% of its rowing speed by putting either of these in.

My neighbor is actually the guy who, in the Pygmy catalogue, is pictured with the full sail-ring setup while in Mexico. After having the boat for ten years, he is now taking the centerboard trunk out and converting back to just a row boat, because, "It rows just so sweet."

This is why I'm thinking Yeadon is right with just having a sail to have fun with.

Any thoughts from other folks?

[esingleman]

This reminds me, I finished a peapod earlier this year, and I had the hardest time switching from construction-mode to go-play-in-the-boat-mode. I was so used to going outside to mess with the boat every free minute I had. It was sort of like going cold turkey on boat building. Not an easy thing to do.

Luckily, after a few good outings on the water I was hooked on sailing.

I am coming back the other way. I have been sailing my Pooduck skiff for six years now, and am finding it hard to get back to boatbuilding to restore my 12 1/2. Fortunately winter is coming. And I know next spring I will be torn... Go sailing or keep building.

[Eric Hvalsoe]

wwaterman,
That's interesting, I imagine it is true that you lose some speed. For just a short daggarboard slot 15% sounds pessimistic - maybe with a longer centerboard opening. Pros and cons for everything. Tearing out an existing trunk seems harsh.
Eric

[chainyank]

I see you had a case of "boat-builders hand" it seems to strike he most healthy of us!!!
good work!
Joel