gaff-rigged pinky sloop

I am thinking in having a gaff-rigged pinky sloop built. This is a classic sardine fishing boat from Maine. The desing is from Ted Brewer (here is the link to the sloop in Ted's page: http://www.tedbrewer.com/sail_glass/sunshine.htm)
Can you guys let me know your thoughts with respect to two areas:
1) What will be her windward ability? I know it will likely be poor, but I don't know how poor, so I will appreciate some examples.
2) Due to the long keel and the configuation of the rudder, it looks like the boat will be a hell to maneuver and dock. Do you guys think this will be like an Island Packet or much harder? Any thoughts here will be appreciated.

Thanks a lot

Sas

 

Anyone interested in windward ability shouldn't be considering a low aspect gaffer. This said, she'll easily tack through 50 degrees, being able to pinch down a few more degrees if necessary.

She'll have the close quarters maneuverability of any full keel, with fair amount of drag and inclined/attached rudder. Compared to a modern, divided appendage arrangement, she'll be sluggish, but her drag should help somewhat. On the other hand, she'll hove too well and track like a freight train.

This is a pretty well burdened hull form, so stowage is plentiful for cruising gear and spares. With her high D/L she'll be a comfortable sea boat, but she has a very modest SA/D, which means you'll need a fair bit of puff to move her. In the trades this will be an advantage, because you wouldn't have to carry a reef constantly, but for coastal sailing, this may prove bothersome. She's a handsome character yacht, but smart performance isn't very close to the top of her design brief details.

 

Like Par says, the manoeuvrability will be as expected for full keel designs. Shame the prop aperture and prop kills the rudder's effectiveness..
It is a bit undercanvassed too. Whenever i see stuff like <<[FONT=Courier New, Courier, mono] However, in moderate-strong breezes SUNSHINE has the power to stand up to it, carry full sail, and really pick up her heels when most boats her size are well reefed down and making heavy weather of it.>> [/FONT]I think "undercanvased". Then again, it has the engine so maybe it's not meant to be sailed in the really light stuff.
As for low aspect gaff rigs being no good to windward, that's a pretty misleading blanket statement.

 

On looks alone... the pinky is the kind of boat you walk away from backwards.
That stern pulpit is useful too. What a great vantage point for just about any viewing, whether for sightseeing or taking a bearing.
Performance will be as stated. Not bad for comfortable cruising.

 

On the Pinkies the stern deck was made slightly overhanging, which tapered into a behind the rudder platform, and the bulwarks came together at a sort of false transom. In that little platform a hole was cutout so a guy could do his personal needs. Basically, the 'head' was a 'tail'... Very, very practical. Lookitup H. Chapelle. And a good view in one's most meditative moments....

I still am a bit confused by the "pinky sloop" thing though. Is T. Brewer being liberal with his terminology or am i missing a crucial piece of the history of American workboats history?

To me, the pinky is a bald headed, single jib, well proportioned schooner. Often has an overlapping foresail and self tending club footed jib (very efficient setup, BTW) , centreboard, moderate beam, strong rake on the keel. Traditional colors were light pink topsides and bottle green bulwarks.

A picture i found, but not the most archetypal:

 

The term pinky is correct, though schooners have had much more exposure.

I didn't say that she wasn't any good to windward, but aspect ratio in the appendages and the rig account for this ability, plus several other design elements. My point, which I don't think was misunderstood, was that a person looking at a gaffer isn't looking into short tacking up a narrow channel, across 80 degrees, but the charm of the vessel, particularly one like this.

 

TCubed
I think you are right. All of the pinkys that I have seen or read about are schooners. I belive that this sloop is Ted Brewer's adaptation. Of course, the schoneers were larger (45-55f). To my eye schoones look even more beautiful, but they are much more complex. The sloop is simple and 35f is my size.
Thanks to all for your comments.

Sas

 

Chebacco boats of the pre and post colonial era often carried pinky sterns. They were noted to wear rigs of ketch, brigantine, "ship" and both single and double masted sloop. These early shallops seemed to carry what ever was the fancy of the builder, owner or employment. It wasn't until after the 1812 war, that the off shore fisheries required the need of larger Chebacco boats, most schooner rigged, in part following the trend of the Baltimore pilot successes, particularly the couple of decades after the war years. Most of these pinkies were about 50' LOD, though a few in the 65' to 70' range. "Spy" built in 1823 was 91 tons, 70' LOD, 17' beam, 8' 6" draft and three masted.

The heavily sparred working rigs retained their colonial era hull form until about 1850 when the Baltimore clipper hull form really began to show it's influence on the "old schooler's" of the fishing fleets. These new, square stern models were much faster, finer entry craft with light air additions to their rigs. All hell broke loose after this for a few decades, as these fisherman got more shoal, steeper deadrise and the sharpness of the model became excreted to dangerous levels. This lasted until the appearance of a Lawlor design "Roulette" and the Burgess design "Carrie E. Phillips". Both of these took on the stiffer bilge (in direct comparison of the very slack bilge in current favor), increased capacity, stability and straight stems of the pilot model. These new models whipped up on the Essex and Gloucester fleets (baddly) and were the predecessors to the great fisherman fleets, such as Elsie and the other "Indian-headers" (my personal favorite bow type) at the turn of the 19th to 20th centuries.

So yes, the pinky is typically a schooner, but much depends on the era and the employment of the craft.

 

Thanks for that great information. Could you please post more detailed info (quotes out of books, etc) so we can learn more? Your post is great but less concise would be better yet.

 

I'm not sure how I can be less concise, but more informative.

Information in general about these antique craft is scattered considerably, requiring a fair amount of research. Howard Chapelle's efforts helped tremendously, but there are blanks and assumptions that need to be addressed.

Several collections, many reference volumes and maritime archives of which to employ for this type of research are available. Some of these would include: the manuscript collections of the Essex Institute, ditto Salem, the Massachusetts Historical Society, Library of Congress, various state archives, Admiralty Library, the Smithsonian Institute's maritime collections, "Catalog of the Watercraft Collection in the US National Museum, plus the several books available on colonial era ships and 19th century commercial vessels.

As you might have guessed, I've been a bit of a sailing history buff, all my life.

 

Here are two books on the subject:
The American Fishing Schooners 1825-1935 - Howard I. Chapelle;
Down to the sea: The fishing schooners of Gloucester - Joseph E Garland

Both of them can be found at Amazon

Sas

 

Thanks.

When i grew up i read my father's extensive collection of tomes several times over, from Chapelle, Skene, H. Butler through Uffa Fox, Hereshoff, Dixon Kemp and others. When the boat sank the collection was lost and i am slowly building up a new collection of my own for reference. The process has been painfully slow though as most of these books are far from cheap.

 

This is an Eastport Pinky Sloop from astern, or at least it is if I get the image posting to work:




I've owned it since 2001, sailed her down from Maine to Salem, and split time between repairing and sailing depending on the year.

A number of these were built by Penbo (Penobscott Boatworks) in the late 60s and early 70s. Some were sloop rigged, at least one was ketch rigged.

The type was developed in Eastport Maine to bring herring from the fish weirs to the sardine canneries. They are designed to move the maximum amount of fish, at the maximum speed, with a minimum crew. The type was popular from the 1870s to about 1910.

My experience is something like what PAR describes. She does go like a freight train, especially when the breeze is up. Ted Brewer's design may be a little different in performance, but I don't reef until the breeze is pushing 20 knts. On my boat I am pretty sure they started with the 1880s rudder design and cut out a space for the prop without changing it. This is a bad thing, I would assume that Ted compensated for the propeller apature, but you might ask him about that.

The reduction in rudder size probably hurts, but another thing to think about with a boat like this is using the sails to turn as well as the rudder. I've started to learn about that, and she manuevers much better when you keep that in mind.

The big issue when getting in and out of docks is planning your moves ahead. The boat will manuever, but she will respond some time after you make the move. For example I will throw the engine into reverse, kick it a bit, and slow it down. Then the boat will move, then speed up, then slow down. Also there are tricks to using the rudder, prop spin, and lines to the shore that make docking much easier. When I first got her I was nervous about smashing up docks, but I find if I go slow and think in advance it is not an issue. (so far, knock on wood)


I'm not sure about the undercanvassed comment. 548 square foot main and 171 jib seems to move the boat fairly well. This is not to say that she will break modern speed records, but for a 100+ year old design she moves pretty well. I pass other classics from time to time, and catch badly sailed boats that I have no right to overtake on occasion. If you have sailed a Freindship sloop I am pretty sure that Pinky sloops are faster.

To windward she outsails most split rigs without trouble, though I could not point with a well handled Rozinante. Which makes an important point. If you learn the boat well you will outpoint marconi boats that are poorly skippered, poorly designed, have dirty bottoms or are poorly rigged, and the well designed marconi boats in good shape with competent skippers will out point you. If you really try I bet you can get a pinky within 5 degrees of a well founded modern cruiser, though I have not done a close comparison. Being honest, when the wind is on the nose and I have to get home I turn on the engine.


Finally, I'm not sure these two questions are really the most important. How critical is windward performance if you don't plan to sail in triangles? I race modern boats, I sail a Pinky sloop for a different sort of fun. Even the docking question is really a function of practice and learning, it is not as if you cannot dock the boat, you just dock it differently.

I'll try to stop by this thread again if you have any more questions, glad to help.

 

.....

 

Tom that is some boat thank you for sharing this with us.Please post more pic's. Do you have any photos of her on the hard?
Regards
Butch