Desirable and Undesirable Characteristics of Offshore Yachts

[Steam Flyer]

Mine is a one-off custom build and has none of those. I'm not losing any sleep over it either.

FKT

The joys of a steelie? Don't need no stinking additional engineering when the hull is near impenetrable.

Mind you, a rudder post open to the interior sans a rudder could still make for a bad day.   

FKT may recall, there was a guy with a big steel ketch on an older discussion forum.... USENET practically pre-internet, it was back when you had to use a bicycle pump to blow post-it notes thru pipes... and it sank in a storm from exactly that cause... steering linkage broke, rudder started swinging free, full travel of rudder with all the weight of the boat behind it caused progressive failure of the rudder post tube.

FB- Doug

 

[Fah Kiew Tu]

FKT may recall, there was a guy with a big steel ketch on an older discussion forum.... USENET practically pre-internet, it was back when you had to use a bicycle pump to blow post-it notes thru pipes... and it sank in a storm from exactly that cause... steering linkage broke, rudder started swinging free, full travel of rudder with all the weight of the boat behind it caused progressive failure of the rudder post tube.

FB- Doug

Yeah. If you don't take the tube well above the DWL and properly brace it you're still at risk.

Many don't because it might fuck over the big double/queen berth in the aft cabin. So if things go wrong (like lip seals failing) then you're reaping the consequences of a design decision that prioritised comfort over seaworthiness.

Got 2 months or so away from my boat now unfortunately. OTOH I can buy more machine tooling etc.

FKT

 

[Jud - s/v Sputnik]

Yeah. If you don't take the tube well above the DWL and properly brace it you're still at risk.

Many don't because it might fuck over the big double/queen berth in the aft cabin.

This is making me think, and remember back to refit stuff about 4 years ago.  A looong, looong thought...

I replaced my two rudder bushings about 4 years ago when my boat was in my yard/by my house - part of a larger refit, a very busy time, what with work, parenting, and lots of other refit projects going on. The original bushings were old and likely nylon - I surmise that they had absorbed water over time and swollen slightly, making the rudder movement very stiff (the boat originally had hydraulic steering, so this stiffness/resistance wasn’t perceptible; once I changed it to tiller steering, though, it was immediately apparent.)

Anyway, that then led to removing the rudder and rudder post. Originally, there was a hard-walled exhaust hose double hose clamped on the standpipe (if that’s what it’s called) that holds the lower rudder shaft bushing.  That hose extended up maybe half a meter above the DWL.  The lower bushing was tight enough that no water could come in. However, the lower standpipe stainless pipe piece itself doesn’t extend “well” above the DWL.  I can’t recall how high it is - at least long enough to fit two hose clamps on it and likely a few more cms.  By contrast the upper standpipe/rudder bushing holder is much longer (maybe 25-30 cms) - see pic below.  

When I replaced these bushings, the boat was in my yard, I had a lot of big projects on the go, my time was quite limited, as was (importantly) my tooling and experience. So I settled on improving the set up a bit by running new hard wall exhaust hose fully between the lower bushing holder stainless pipe and the upper one - instead of just partway up, as it was before —thereby at least making it fully enclosed.
 

In light of reading the discussion above and thinking it through, though, I wonder if I should’ve extended the lower standpipe/bushing holder higher (and properly brace it!).  I had no clue how to do such a project at the time.

Two questions in my mind now are (1) how far above the DWL does that standpipe/lower bushing holder pipe actually extend - I don’t know.  Only way to find out for sure is to remove the tiller, rudder, rudder shaft and hard wall exhaust hose piece.  Big job, expensive time (likely weeks in a boat yard).  And second thing in my mind, (2) by what method would/could it actually be extended?  It’s a fairly tight space, i.e., the lazarette where the rudder shaft passes through - but an agile welder could get in there.  But I’ve no idea if it’s enough room to actually fully weld around the lower bushing holder pipe.  And the welding would be very close to adjacent wooden bulkhead and hull wood liner/floor. And —would in fact a fully welded seam/butt joint be the way to do it?  Or would the heat from welding distort the ID of the existing standpipe/lower bushing holder in the hull? (Making a bushing problematic to reinstall)  That’s my main question - even if you could weld a pipe extension on, would the welding create a problem? Or could that standpipe/bushing holder pipe instead be extended “mechanically” - like attaching a coupling and pipe piece? Unlikely, I think, as I don’t think it would be possible to put a die on the existing standpipe to thread it on the outside.  Could it instead be threaded on the inside with a very large tap, and is there a male fitting that could be screwed into it to add pipe to extend it.  Dunno.  So - welding...would it work?

The rudder is skeg hung so I sort of reasoned at the time (that I replaced the bushings but didn’t extend the lower bushing holder - it vaguely crossed my mind) that if I were unfortunate enough to suffer a hard grounding on the rudder, at least the skeg could take (some of? most of? all of?) the blow.  And at least the rudder shaft is very well braced/supported in two places - at deck level and where it exits the hull.  Or maybe the rudder would just break off where it’s nutted on (see pic below) - in which case I’d have other problems to deal with!!

But that lower standpipe/bushing holder...hmmm...it sometimes get me thinking...

Maybe the lower bushing holder pipe could be extended higher above the DWL by epoxying/glassing on a tube of some material (e.g., carbon fibre) that you could custom make to the right size to fit snugly ovet the OD of the lower standpipe piece.  Brace the top of this tube extension as well as the joint itself (some sort of gussets/struts.

If I don’t extend the lower bushing holder pipe well above the DWL, would I be able to sleep soundly out at sea...

 

[toddster]

Somehow, I suspect that a welder, if presented with the problem, would want to hog both of those tubing stubs out of there and replace them with a single piece. No grubbing about in small spaces.  I assume that the "naked" part of the shaft once had a quadrant bolted on?  Won't ever need one again?

Mine's continuous, but it's just a piece of plastic.  I couldn't actually reach my rudder tube - could only see it in the distance behind the battery compartment, before I created access. It passes up through a sort of tunnel in the quarterberth.  I drilled into it to install a zerk fitting, and it's a lot thinner than I'd hoped.  I suppose one could reinforce it with as much roving and epoxy as makes one happy.  Actually I think the tube is free-floating at the top, within the cockpit sole.  The rudder shaft is held between a bronze bushing at the bottom of the tube, and a bronze tiller escutcheon plate at the top.  Like, I guess the boat is supposed to be able to flex without cracking the tube loose from the hull.

Beyond reinforcing the tube, I'd like to build a crash box forward of the post so if a whale discovers that my rudder is the perfect thing to scratch behind his pectoral, it won't instantly sink the boat.  The problem with that is where to re-route all those hoses...

 

[Fah Kiew Tu]

Maybe the lower bushing holder pipe could be extended higher above the DWL by epoxying/glassing on a tube of some material (e.g., carbon fibre) that you could custom make to the right size to fit snugly ovet the OD of the lower standpipe piece.  Brace the top of this tube extension as well as the joint itself (some sort of gussets/struts.

If I don’t extend the lower bushing holder pipe well above the DWL, would I be able to sleep soundly out at sea...

You can do all sorts of things but honestly, it's not a spade rudder, right? So you've got 2 bushings to hold the rudder alignment and the clamped hose extends well above the DWL. Not likely the rudder is going to go flailing about and put massive flex loads on a single bushing penetrating the hull plate.

Sure it could be better, but it sounds quite good enough. I wouldn't worry about it.

One day when you're on the hard and with nothing else to do, you could torch out the lower bushing/clamp and slip a new piece of pipe all the way up to the top then weld it in place. I think you'd need to be very bored to bother, though, absent any serious corrosion or similar forcing work anyway.

FKT

 

[Panope]

Panope has the continuous tube thing.  Rudder shaft formerly extended above deck and into a steering gear box.  I sawed off everything, flush with the deck and welded a deck patch over the open tube.

The new steering arrangement needed a below deck quadrant.  Rather than cut a complete section of the tube away, I carefully cut rectangular "windows", leaving a significant amount of tube intact. 

Quadrant bolts to the rudder shaft with 6) 1/4" grade 8 bolts that have smooth shanks in tight fitting holes.  Shaft is 2.5 inch solid rod.  Quadrant is fabricated from 1/4" plate.

Edit: I agree with FKT.  Sputnik does not need a continuous tube. 

 

[Jud - s/v Sputnik]

The recent abandonment (and sinking?) of the 72’/22m Barlovento (all hands rescued in apparently 60 kts and 20 ft seas).  https://www.latitude38.com/lectronic/vessel-abandoned-off-crescent-city-after-uscg-rescue/#comments

Those huge windows look very undesirable offshore...and yet she once raced to Bermuda.

 

[MikeJohns]

The recent abandonment (and sinking?) .........Those huge windows look very undesirable offshore...........

Delivery crew was taken off.  Reportedly "Taking on water" and an injured crew.  Not much fun.

I see there was a warning that the vessel's still afloat and a navigation hazard.

An old shoal draft centerboarder.

 

[TwoLegged]

The recent abandonment (and sinking?) of the 72’/22m Barlovento (all hands rescued in apparently 60 kts and 20 ft seas).  https://www.latitude38.com/lectronic/vessel-abandoned-off-crescent-city-after-uscg-rescue/#comments

Those huge windows look very undesirable offshore...and yet she once raced to Bermuda.

View attachment 448270

Huge vulnerable windows, massive windage from that pilothouse.  

The archive advert at https://www.northropandjohnson.com/yachts-for-sale/barloventoii-72-abekingrasmussen#:~:text=Designed by-,Phillip Rhodes,-for Pierre S says she is a Philp Rhodes design.  Would Rhodes really have signed off on such an unseaworthy superstructure, even if a DuPont was paying?

 

[Elegua]

Design critiques aside, wrong boat. 

The boat in trouble is the 79'(spared length, 65' on deck) classic Gruber-designed schooner BARLOVENTO.  It was not sailing and under power with a small crew who didn't know how to sail her.  It is still floating and apparently will be salvaged. 

Another case of crew failure. 

 

[Autonomous]

Oh brother.

 

[MikeJohns]

Design critiques aside, wrong boat. 

The boat in trouble is the 79'(spared length, 65' on deck) classic Gruber-designed schooner BARLOVENTO. ........Another case of crew failure. 

That looks like a much more seaworthy craft.  Presumably "disabled" means the auxiliary stopped.

 

[Autonomous]

What are the odds the storm kicked up sediment in the fuel tank and the filter was plugged?

Crew than can't sail a sailboat likely has no clue or spares.

 

[Ishmael]

This is quite the sobering view. I hope he turned the engine off before he abandoned. 

 

[Elegua]

1 hour ago, Ishmael said:

This is quite the sobering view. I hope he turned the engine off before he abandoned. 

Very undesirable.  According to the intarwebs, it's a 1978 Pearson 323 named Delilah or maybe Ginny out of Virginia. 

 

[Fah Kiew Tu]

Very undesirable.  According to the intarwebs, it's a 1978 Pearson 323 named Delilah or maybe Ginny out of Virginia. 

I don't understand why this is in this thread. There appeared to be nothing wrong with the boat.

FKT

 

[Autonomous]

Curious. Whatever the distress was it is not obvious to me.

 

[Fah Kiew Tu]

Curious. Whatever the distress was it is not obvious to me.

There was some text at one point after they got the owner aboard. I think it said he tried to clear into Bermuda, was refused, was stooging about, got a bit far away, saw weather coming and asked for rescue.

I *think* that's what it said, not sure. Someone paying more attention will confirm, refute or add details.

FKT

 

[TwoLegged]

Curious. Whatever the distress was it is not obvious to me.

Skipper and boat both appeared to be fit and healthy.

 

[Mid]

the vessel's still afloat

bingo ...