• Home
  • Subscribe
  • About Us
  • This Issue
  • For Sale
  • Trades
  • Archives
  • ISSUE #116

    issue
  • ISSUE #117

    issue
  • ISSUE #118

    StAylesSkiff93

  • 1

      Featured Stories

      West System 207 Special Clear Hardener

      Details
      ATL Composites

      WestSystemPage13

      BOAT REVIEW: Norwalk Islands Sharpie 18

      Details
      Images SCA Associate Editor Marty Loken

      Traditional Ideas in a Modern Boat Design
      You Can Build Yourself

      lokenHero

      Although there’s some evidence similar boats were built centuries earlier, ‘sharpies’, as we know them, are supposed to have originated in the New Haven Connecticut region of Long Island Sound. These narrow, hard-chined, flat-bottomed centreboarders began to replace the huge dugout canoes used there historically to work the shoals and oyster fisheries. They were boxy enough to be easily built, fast under sail, and they could work the shallowest of waters.

      Read more...

      Follow The Drawings

      Details
      Dudley Dix

      followHero

      This is an Oppikat 9ft junior catamaran. The builder launched it for his children and test-sailed it himself first. He emailed me to say that the boat is dangerous and he cannot let his children sail it. I asked for the measurements of his mainsail and he said that they had intentionally made it a ‘bit larger’. I found that it was approximately 65% larger than my designed mainsail, which is a massive increase. After remaking the sail to the correct size the boat is sailed safely by his children.

       

      Most of the boats that are built to my designs are amateur projects. Amateur boatbuilding is in my origins for both building and designing, from very early in life. I watched my dad building boats when I was hardly more than a toddler. My first boat, built with the help of my dad, was a tin canoe. The first more serious boat that I built was a 4.5m tortured plywood catamaran that I designed as well. It was a very rudimentary design, drawn when I was absolutely clueless about boat design. Thanks to a good eye and more by luck than any other factor, I built a fast and well-mannered boat that was also exciting to sail. It had some structural issues with the trampoline frame that I was able to remedy by trial and error but I raced it, I surfed it and I cruised it. Both the boat and I survived our many experiences together. When I moved on to bigger boats I sold it to a friend and a few years later he sold it to another mutual friend. Built before epoxy became the standard boatbuilding resin, it eventually succumbed to rot after many years.

      Read more...

      Page 10 of 26

      • Start
      • Prev
      • 5
      • 6
      • 7
      • 8
      • 9
      • 10
      • 11
      • 12
      • 13
      • 14
      • Next
      • End

      GoSailCargoFinal

      SecretFerry

      StAylesSkiff93

      BOATCRAFT

      AABB DigitalAdvert

      Advertise with Australian Amateur Boat Builder Magazine
      - Online or in our World Wide Magazine

      AABBKBmasthead

      Get the most out of your advertising with Australian Amateur Boatbuilder/KitBoats 
      We can help you with your products ...

      More Information

      Our other Magazines

      • Multihull World 137

        Read More
      • Multihull World 138

        Read More
      • 1

      Our Magazines

      AABBKBmasthead
       
      image
       


      Australialian Amateur Boat Builder Magazine is an Australian-based specialist publication devoted exclusively to Amateur Boat Building enthusiasts.

      Inside Australian Amateur Boat Builder

      • Australasian Kitboats
      • Subscriptions
      • Sponsors @ AABB
      • PDF Archives Guides
      • About AABB
       

      Contact Us

      07 5593 8187
       
      Australian Amateur Boat Builder Magazine
      PO BOX 560
      Varsity Lakes QLD 4227
      Australia
       
      wendy@multihull.com.au