Core Sound 17 - Any builders/sailers out there?

[WWheeler]

The camping boat thread sparked a new lust, the Core Sound 17, an open ketch-rigged camper/cruiser. (designed by the designers of the famous Princess Sharpie - http://www.bandbyachtdesigns.com/ ) It seems a practical comfortable boat that will launch easily, rig quickly, and hold lots of camping gear, people etc.

This is a whole different type of sailing type, the camping cruise, which would be convenient in the waters of Georgian Bay, which has lots of islands and rock. There's many places to pull up and camp, and lots of hazards for a deep draft boat. (sort like Maine, I guess, except that most of it is lee shore.)

Any builders or sailors out there? I'd like to do a reality check before I go and spend money on plans etc.

[Tom Lathrop]

Do a search for "core sound 17" in this section of the forum and you will come up with dozens of comments.

[ricardo de oliveira]

Hi,
I'm finishing mine: sanding, sanding, priming, sanding, sanding, sanding for a nice coat of paint.
The plans are clear and the construction goes easily if you measure everything with extra dose of care. The boat looks great and must be a joy to sail in.
Go ahead, call B&B and have fun!

[WWheeler]

Tom: The CS 17 is mentioned in passing any number of times, but I was looking for some more recent comments regarding building techniques, seaworthiness, etc. Is this because it's so easy to build and use? What type of sailing are you doing with it? Do you have any afterthoughts about features, usability.

[Tom Lathrop]

Ricardo and others can tell you about the building but I can tell you that it is a great sailing boat, very roomy and very simple and easy to rig. I have helped build a CS 17 and it's like the rest of Grahams boats, well designed and well documented. What else is there to say?

[Jim M]

A very interesting boat indeed. Unfortunately the web site is lite on detail as to hull form. It looks like a sort of shallow V bottom -- true?

[capt jake]

Jim M, this is true. Graham would be happy to take your call (if he is in). wonderful person, very knowledgable and honest.
Yes a shallow 'V' hull, but to what degree I am not sure. Check out this link to show the basic construction. You will see Graham in his prime! [img]smile.gif[/img] I have a great respect for Graham and his designs.
Regards,
Johncore sound 20

[WWheeler]

Anyone have an up to date e-mail address for B&B or Graham? The one listed on their site is bouncing my mail. (b&byat@cconnect.net)

[ricardo de oliveira]

This is a couple of months ago. It's a shame I don't have any recent pics being a photographer...Check this
http://br.photos.yahoo.com/coresound17

[ricardo de oliveira]

Ah, I think you have to clic at the album "touché" to see the pic. I'm sorry.

[WWheeler]

Thanks, Ricardo. I got to the site just ok, even if my Portugese is kind of rusty. [img]smile.gif[/img] How are you making out with the building project? Had any difficulty finding materials, epoxy etc?

[ricardo de oliveira]

Hi,
yes, the old Portgoose...sure it's a complicated language [img]smile.gif[/img]
I had problems finding a good plywood since the true certificated marine ones goes exported.I bought a marine plywood made out of Paraná Pine (local wood), three plys, the inner one full of voids, so I glassed the outside. Yes, adding some extra pounds but a lot of structural and abrasion strength.
Now I can't find 6061 T-6 aluminun tubes for the masts so I'm thinking in building wooden hollow ones out of the same Parana Pine ( about the same strenght and weight of Douglas Fir).
The epoxi is from Du Pont Chemicals (now Vantico).No blush, sure cure, very hard too sand.
That's it. No major problems but money shortage ...
All the best.
Tchau.

[WWheeler]

That must be a real burn, seeing all the good stuff leaving the country without being able to buy it. Around here, we just export pine 2x4s (all the incredible white pine was exported years ago, to the U.S. and British) Of course, you could build some incredible things with the tropical hardwoods. You'd hardly need plywood and epoxy.

[Meerkat]

Ricardo, you can find the voids by turning the hull over at night and waiting for the morning dew (get up early and mark them!). (A Sam Devlin trick.) The voids will show up as either wet or dry oval spots (I do not recall which) on the hull. It will prolong the life of your boat if you drill into them and use a syringe to inject epoxy into them. The hole only needs to be big enough for the syringe to reach in. Otherwise, osmosis will pull water into the unfilled voids, even through epoxy and cloth and they will be a source of rot from the inside.

I think you can also tap-tap-tap for the hollow sounding places.

[ 09-17-2002, 05:00 PM: Message edited by: meerkat ]

[Tom Lathrop]

Hi Ricardo,

I see you had to accept the poorer grade of plywood. I still find it hard to believe that there is not some good marine plywood available somewhere in that big country.

The boat is looking good and I see no real problem with a wood mast if you cannot locate good aluminum tubing. The bird's mouth method results in a good mast and will alow scarfing of smaller pieces it you can't find clear sections long enough for the whole mast.

As for the voids in the plywood, it's probably best not to have them or to fill with epoxy them if you locate them. I do have a question about the negative aspects of voids though. Many boats have been built using open core materials like nomex that is corugated and leaves the interior of the laminate as mostly an air void. I've not heard of problems with the interior of these hull laminates filling with water. I don't think osmosis works to fill these voids, but am not expert in this field.

Anybody have experience with this?

[WWheeler]

I've received the following article from the B&B Designs, "Building the Core Sound 17", because the link on their web site was dead.

----------------------------------------------

BUILDING A CORE SOUND 17 “SAW DUST”

BY GORDY HILL

"I couldn't find Okume plywood anywhere near Orlando, and since Vandemere N. C. was only twelve hours away, I drove up and bought my wood from Graham. The money I saved paid for the trip and I got a chance to sail Graham's boat and see some other boats he's designed. Graham teaches boatbuilding at the local community college and has a wonderful way of explaining things; he could write BOATBUILDING FOR IDIOTS.
Since my one-car garage is full of things I don't need and can't find, I needed a place to build my boat. ( Just saying 'my boat' was cool. ) With the help of some friends, I poured a pad next to the garage and rigged a tarp over it. A real roof would have been well worth the trouble. The basic hull went together like it was supposed to, and then I cut off three inches of freeboard. You could hardly hear Graham choke when I told him.

Next came the fun part. The great thing about building my own boat was that I could modify it to be exactly what I wanted. All the technical stuff had been handled. Like how much sail area did I need. Where does the center board go, and how big should it be etc. The interior, however, was different. There were constant revisions to revisions, and Graham and Carla were always there with encouragement, suggestions, or hints that maybe I should rethink a modification or two.

The final result turned out better than I could have hoped. The seats join about the middle of the centerboard trunk and from that point forward continue as a large casting deck. Under the starboard seat is a seven and a half foot rod locker, and on the port side of the centerboard trunk is a live well that can be opened to fresh sea water. Most of the lockers are water tight or nearly so, except the aft eighteen inches of each seat. These are trash lockers and this is the first boat I've had that didn't have soda cans rolling around the bilges.

The entire lazarette is a built-in cooler divided into three sections. The outside compartments have their own six inch round plastic hatches and are for sodas, sandwiches, and a beer or two. The inner section is for ice and dead fish. The interior dividers are one eighth inch plywood and stop about two inches from the top. It works great!

The top of the lazarette is a poling platform.

The boat sails like a dream! The cat-ketch rig with sprits takes just minutes to rig and when we fish we just roll the sails around the masts. I put an extra mast step just forward of the mizzen and use it for a place to park the main when we fish. Graham designed a third mast step giving the option of sailing with just one sail on a windy day. We use it to ghost across the flats with one fisherman forward of the mast on the casting deck looking for Redfish. If we aren't trying to go to windward we can leave the board up and only need about eight inches of water. I don't think any boat, power or otherwise, could do as well.

With both sails, and a fresh breeze, this is a seventeen foot dingy. She really moves out. My GPS has reported seven and a half knots and I'm sure a more competent sailor could do better. In the No Motor Zone we were doing 4.7 knots close hauled, up wind, towing a guy in a canoe who really didn't want to paddle the last two miles up wind to get back to the launch site.

It took me eight months to build, but if I'd had a better facility it would have taken half as long. No single step in the construction was really difficult, and Graham and Carla were always just a phone call away. I kept reminding myself that this was to be a fishing boat and not a show-piece or I'd never finish it. I'd planned to paint the whole thing, but the Okume just looked too good. The deck, seat sides, and hull interior are finished bright. Although I get lots of complements on it, all I see are all the little goof-ups. I just don't point them out.

If anyone is contemplating building a Core Sound 17, I'd be delighted to talk to them.

If you have any questions please e-mail me: sirgordy@peoplepc.com

[ricardo de oliveira]

Believe me, Tom. There's only one source from decent marine plywood around here, made out of Cedar ( cedrella sp.),beautiful colour and grain, tested, certificated etc but you have to buy it "bulk", 30 or more sheets...I think nobody is building plywood boats in this neighborhood.
Note that I had problems only with the thinner pieces (1/4"), the thicker (3/8") bottom ones went allright.
I think that, besides osmosis, the real problem with the voids is when you try to compound the hull curvature and note irritating hollows and bumps instead of a smooth, fluid, fair and sexy curve...

[Tom Lathrop]

Graham's website was being rebuilt recently but it's back up and running now.

Ricardo, we have some of the same trouble with quantity buys from some plywood sources. Too bad you can't buy the good stuff. Is the cedar what we know as "Spanish Cedar"? I've heard that it is good stuff but have not used it.

Ditto the remarks about voids.

[ 09-18-2002, 09:18 AM: Message edited by: Tom Lathrop ]

[Paul Jeffrey]

WWheeler,

I have the plans for the Core Sound 17 but have not started the boat. The plans are good, and Graham sent a cd of photo's along with the plans. The boat is a nice quick daysailer with camping as an option. I have not started the boat as I am taking a break from boat building for a while. Trying to make my mind up as to if I want to build another boat or just buy one. But if I do decide to build again the Core Sound 17 is the boat I will build.

Having built a couple of my own designs and a couple of other peoples designs the Core Sound boats are well thought out and the construction method is straight forward. The sailing ability of the boat is well documented. I love the rig on the boat, simple and powerful. A staysail could also be flown for long reaches in light air also. Overall I would say go for it, maybe you will get me back to feeling the desire to build again.

Here's a photo of one of my designs I built. Took me 8 weeks to laminate the frames and plank the hull alone. That was 8 hours a day 7 days a week and that was just the beginning of a year of solid work to get the boat into the water. This is not the kind of project you want to get into on a part time basis I should have designed and built a boat like the Core Sounds. I would have spent 1/6th the money and 1/5th the time and had a better boat to use. But at the time I was into the speed thing, you know "how fast can we go in a sailboat". It's an 18 foot sailboat that weighted 500 lbs and was way overpowered, on a reach we could fly 700 sq ft of sail. Thats when we could keep it up.

The Core Sounds are much more sensible designs for daysailing and for building. I recommend them highly.

Paul J

[ricardo de oliveira]

Yes, Tom. Cedrella spp. is a large family and spanish cedar (cedrella mexicana, I believe) is part of it. Looks like mahogany with a somewhat coarser grain and a little oily, so it's a good idea to wipe it with acetone or thinner before gluing. The sawdust can cause allergical responses sometimes.
By the way, delicious text is "The Great Race", but I think that our local "mosquitoes bombing squadron" are much more radical then yours...

[WWheeler]

Paul:

What the heck, are those outriggers on bat wings? What was the total beam of the thing when folded out? That looks totally original.

[Paul Jeffrey]

With the hiking racks down the platform beam was 12'. I scrapped those racks and built a set of gull winged racks that folded into the boat one over top of the other. When they where folded out and secured the platform beam was 9' 8". The second rack gave a bit more clearence of the water surface. The first set pictured where canting and although a fine idea did not work that well at all.

The racks are made of 2" ID carbon fiber with a core layer of unidirectional quartz fibers, vacum bagged and oven cured. I had great fun making them, but spent way too much money to have fun. The project was really a lot of fun, a lot of hard work, and a great learning experience. The only computer work done on the entire project was by the sail designer [Lidgard Sails New Zealand] the rest of it was done on the drafting table.

But I am 10 years older now and a bit stiffer in the joints. I would not do another one of these projects again. There where a lot of design ideas put into the design at the time some of which where good and some where shall we say less than that. If the hull was blown up in size the shape would be very much like that of the latest IACC boats.

But over the past few years the boat has been parted out, sad to say. The hull still exisits but will be gone soon. Lack of attention has been hard on it. I still walk by it almost every day and still the thought passes through my mind, "What if I did this, or maybe that, it could sail again" but the reality is that it will most likely never sail again. Which kinda tugs at the heart strings. One day I want it gone out of my life, the next I find myself thinking about new changes for it, maybe if I did this. It is kind of like a personal curse that I inflicted upon myself years ago and there is no cure. But once the trailer is sold off and the boat can no longer be moved that may be the end for the boat. Which may be a good thing, a sad thing, but just maybe a good thing. Then move on to other things.

Damn is it hard to let that thing go, it's just a damn boat. What's the big problem here?

Paul J

[WWheeler]

An interesting story. I brought the dinghy home from the sailing club this week, and I had similar mixed emotions about this summer, about the sailing that I did, and the sailing that I wanted to do, but didn't, due to lack of time, focus of time etc. Could be a whole thread.

PS Maybe you could pass the boat on to someone else with a similar interest, rather than see it decay. Something like the Free column in WB, or Boneyard boats.

[ 09-19-2002, 02:44 PM: Message edited by: WWheeler ]

[Sheep]

I've been researching a number of boats (DIY & built) in the 17-20 range. Today I drove 60mi and stopped in on Graham (B&B) without notice. He took me over to a fellow's house near him who was ready to put the decks on a CoreSound 17. A very, very nice boat and Graham was the complete gentleman. Quite patient with one who is about to embark into sailing for first time, and possibly build his first boat. Although I'm considering the 20'er, the two are so similar and everything is well laid out and of simple design. The builder has done an excellent job. Lots of room and storage. The light weight is very attractive feature, yet the boat is very strong.