Slocum`s Spray

absolutely wonderfull video ,thanks for sharing those with us . jnjwilson

 

Thank you. Please tell your friends about my channel.
http://www.youtube.com/user/RVUSTUDIO?feature=mhum

 

BERTIE is back in the water after her big stem repair. The last few days were putting in the bowsprit and re-rigging it. The spar was originally 22' LOA with 16' of that outboard but to save berthage and windage and gain a little maneuverability I cut off 2' and re-fitted the hardware. It's still longer than Slocum's cut-down rig.
As usual, I'm single-handed so delicately placing the bowsprit without banging the paint took several hours using ship's gear and a long tackle to the pier.

 

Designs of vessels change, the ocean remains constant. After over 22 years as a commercial fisherman I can identify with Captian Slocum and the Spray as he earned his living beyond the sight of land. A heavy displacment vessel is much more livable as a light displacment vessel becomes a torture chamber after a few weeks on the water, I knew of a light displacment lobster boat that was designed to be efficient. It couldn't keep a crew because it was a hard boat to work, it wore you out. The owner ended up putting 5 tons of lead outboard in the bilges to ease the motion. Of course people with computer designed vessels no longer suffer discomfort because they are beyond the old fashon ideas.
Many Alaskan fishing vessels use computer designed flume tanks to reduce motion because being at sea for more than a few hours brings back the old fashon need of a vessel also being a work (living) platform and being tossed around in a light displacment boat isn't good for safety or production. The Spray had to meet the requirments of "DO", economics and survival. These characteristics are hard to program.

 

Yes, some very good points there.

Its a balancing act between saving a weeks passage using a lighter vessel, versus suffering from a 'difficult' craft for the extra speed.

One day someone will invent the 'perfect' boat .... real soon now

 

BERTIE, a close cousin of SPRAY and perhaps over-represented in this thread, is very good at making use of a fair wind while steering herself without a vane gear, lets us sleep, eat, play music and lounge instead of hanging on by our fingernails, keeps her decks dry and things on the table, allows us to cook elaborate meals almost all the time, and generally does what she was designed to do. Going on deck we can stroll about in carpet slippers and never have to hold on with our bulwarks and lifelines and the easy motion. Racing is not one of her design parameters and her working rig is very large like her ancestors, so we don't have light sails, a spinnaker or a tactical computer. The light air performance is adequate and we have to reef in ten knots of wind, which takes literally a few seconds. Gales usually just slow us down and let us get some sleep, and are rarely dramatic. These traits may seem plodding, even boring to the adrenaline-seeking folks who view sailing as a challenge to be conquered and enslaved with technology and speed, but then we all go to sea for our own reasons.

 

When you're working alone, you march to a drummer with a different cadence. In the last few years, four of my brothers have moved out of state (or far away in-state) and one has died, and I've been working away from home so much that I've lost track of my neighbors and my old friends. And the friends I've made at work are too far away to do me any good when I do finally get back home.

Sometimes it gets tiresome, figuring out how to single-hand something that would be easy with one or two more pairs of hands. On the brighter side, there's a lot less arguing....

I admire your boat, for the way it fulfills what you want and need from her (him?). I wouldn't build one another Bertie of course, because that isn't what I want or need. But I hope any boats I build in the future fulfill expectations for me as well as Bertie has done for you.

 

This forum and all its chapters help to show all of us the way to the boats we actually need, instead of those shiny ones we want.

 

I honestly thought the perfect boat would be my next boat but with the perfect boat soon to be invented I recognised you are correct so I will wait a bit longer. Thank you for your great insight

 

The perfect boat is the one that does what you need right now. It may not be perfect tomorrow for a different need. Very frustrating.

 

Pete Cullers "Spray"

Boy am i glad i surfed this! I am researching Joshua Slocum's "Spray"! I am also a devotee of Pete Culler who had this same (close version) of spray built in the twenties. R. D. Culler who, as you all know, owned one and sailed it for 20 years.
It is very dis-heartening to me to hear all of the disparaging remarks made about Culler's dream boat. Especially when he himself had such success!
Hey to qualify myself i have been a commercial lobsterman and working on the high seas since 1974, 37 years! So i am no rookie to the sea, however, i have only owned 1 sailboat in my youth, a 16 foot wooden snipe that i bought from my girl friends father. I want to retire from fishing and travel globally in a traditional sailboat of classic and safe design. I also appreciate Billy Atkins 28 foot cutter , "fore and aft". I will be single handing so i need advice since i am no marine architect. I leave this to all of you "nautical wiseacres" to inform me. thanks

 

For single handed cruising, 30 feet is about the maximum size for easy handling. We're not all Slocum or Motissier. I've sailed BERTIE by myself many times and don't like it much as I get too exhausted. Base advice is find a boat someone else has finished and spent all their money on, then had a life change so must sell. Westsail 32s are excellent and many of them are around (and it's not a "wet snail").
Lyle Hess cutters of the SERAFFYN line are quite good too.
The basic single-handed cruiser must: self steer, have an easy motion so it doesn't exhaust you, be easily hauled out (even on a beach with the tides), be very seaworthy, be able to stand a hard grounding, and have room for adequate stores of food, fuel and water. Beyond that, the sky's the limit (or the budget is).

 

Wow, that was fast! Thank you BATAAN! I'll have to look up these vessels of which you speak, since i have no experience with them. I especially appreciate your views on "Spray" due to your experience. I know all about the exhaustion thing. Would you kindly go to "Atkin & Co." and check out his, "Fore and Aft", gaff rigged cutter and let me know what you think.
I positively agree with your theory about purchasing someone else's "dollar sink". I also have a friend that owns a "Bristol Channel Cutter", He purchased it new and new and is in his 70's. He maintained it faithfully and now wishes, due to age and health to part with it. It i is 28 ft. or so LOL. I gather that this may be a good single hander. Thanks in advance for any help given by you.

 

The Lyle Hess cutter of which I spoke is the "Bristol Channel Cutter", as it is vaguely based on a historic pilot boat type of that area. Get a survey on any vessel from a surveyor skilled in the materials of her build. If a wood boat, make sure the surveyor has a reputation for finding the hidden problems inherent.

 

R.D. Culler was a friend by correspondence, and he always answered my naive questions with humor, experience and encouragement.