1977 26' simpson-wild trimaran

[terryI]

looking for any information on their early(1977)demountable fiberglass 26' trimaran. from what i have been able to find out the company successfully produced boats for three years until world econmics caught up and were forced to close. roger simpson is also the author of a book called "Simpson on boat building" of which i am also searching for. any information would be appreciated thanks terry

[catsketcher]

Hello

I don't know the tri you are talking about but just one thing to add. The designer is not Roger Simpson but his elder brother. Roger's first tri design was the Liahona 40 he then built - it was buit in the early 80s in Brisbane and called Liahona.

Simpson Wild were based in Englad at first and did some pretty fast early tris like Triple Arrow. They moved to Texas I think but things didn't last long for them there.

Roger is now out of the design game. He is into airplanes now.

cheers

Phil

[terryI]

i found out that the boat in question is called a slipstream...by simpsonwild...anyone know anything at all about this particular boat...looks somewhat like the corsair sprint 750

[Meanz Beanz]

This type of thing?

[Meanz Beanz]

Simpson Design offers cruising catamaran designs for home builders from 6.5 to 20 metres 21 ft 4 in to 65 ft 7 in), as well as custom designs for all types of craft. Over 300 Simpson designed boats have been built [2004].

Roger Simpson, founder of Simpson Designs, built his first boat with his brother at home in the UK. It was a 23 ft (7 m) trimaran called SHANGAAN, and too small to enter the Round Britain Race, so the brothers built the 26 ft (7.9 m)THREE FINGERED JACK to comply with the waterline length requirements. They finished 8th out of 49 starters. Roger Simpson was a surveyor and produced multihull designs part-time, until he founded the boat-building company Simpson-Wild with his brother and another partner. The company was successful for 3 years, but was forced to close when the world economic climate changed.

Roger Simpson moved to Australia in 1978, after some years working as a boat builder and studying yacht design in New Zealand. He started designing again and eventually founded Simpson Design. He is the author of Simpson on Boatbuilding.

Maybe a development of "THREE FINGERED JACK", the boat is mentioned here http://www.ayrs.org/Index12D.html maybe they can help further.

MBz

[Gary Baigent]

I have the AYRS publication with Three Fingered Jack's Round Britain effort. Also have a cutout from an aussie magazine featuring the boat, along with Slithy Tove and Kelsall's Sidewinder, all in the same race. Could jpeg them and send them to you.
regards
Gary Baigent

[Meanz Beanz]

Hey Gary,

Why not scan them and post them or at least the pictures. A few peeps might be curious about it.

Cheers
MBz

[Gary Baigent]

Couldn't find the aussie ripout but here are the AYRS pages.

[Gary Baigent]

and a few more - hope you can read the small print

[Gary Baigent]

final pages:

[Meanz Beanz]

Hey Gary,

Thanks for that, pity there is no clear photo of "Three Fingered Jack" but its a good read regardless.

Thanks
MBz

[4sail]

The company, Simpson Wild International of Kemah Texas, only made a handful of the Slipstream 26 trailerable tris and a dozen or so Shifter 32 MkII trimarans. Andrew Simpson was the designer. After the company folded, he returned to the UK with his Texas bride to do design work and marine surveys. One guy who was involved at that time with Simpson Wild was Frank Tuma; his son, Scott Tuma, is still in the gulf coast Texas area and has a rigging business (rigging-solutions.com). You might contact him to see if he has any information. There was also a nice looking grey Simpson Wild Slipstream 26 in the Houston area that was for sale on Craig's List and eBay several months ago.

[Gary Baigent]

Sorry about not finding the Three Fingers Jack image - but I did find some stuff about Triple Arrow - a good boat but unlucky - and a logical development by Simpson-Wild of Three Fingers.

[Meanz Beanz]

No worries Gary, I have had a look but can't find anything on the web. Interesting old beast's eh? Wonder what they where like to sail.

[terryI]

awesome...now thats what i'm talkin about...!..you guys are great...! care to jump in on their philosophy ie. the floats each have a displacement of just less then the weight of the yacht so that they would submerge rather than allow the main hull to capsize over the float. looking at the float size of a similar sized corsair tells me that this is not a real concern although i have heard of a capsize or two...