Slocum`s Spray

With rig maybe 1000 lbs or so. The crane operator thought it was stuck since when he lifted the mast the boat came up with it, but boat was rising because the mast with shrouds and all is heavy. I have never weighed it.

 

Rather than figuring SDR, I divide displacement by SA, and use my tartan as the standard which is 19.68 (lower number is better). Your Spray's number is double, along with immersed transom, slower hull form, and much heavier weight aloft. Trying not to be critical but, those parameters look awful compared to the tartan, which is an old, heavy racing design but within context for a reasonable cruiser.

 

After about 20,000 miles with this vessel I am quite happy with all aspects of the design. BERTIE is not a boat, but the smallest type of commercial sailing ship of the 19th century, and does her 100 to 150 miles a day most of the time, has shallow draft and massive build which shrug off groundings and getting pounded against a dock, carries all her 100 gallons of water and much more on deck giving even more room below, can be reefed literally with one hand in 90 seconds even downwind in a gale and has many many other sweet seagoing attributes in her thousands of years of design evolution. While displacement is large, the lines are very very easy with a long run and she leaves little wake. Motion is easy enough usually that we have often tied up in a harbor after some bad weather we found no big thing and had neighboring yachties tell us how thrashed they got and all the expensive things that broke....
The space inside is enormous for a boat less than 40' on deck. We had 8 aboard for two weeks without a problem and didn't run out of water or gourmet food, could sit all at the table etc. We like to eat well aboard.
Theory, Displacement/sail area ratios are all fine when you start with a clean sheet of paper and re-invent the boat, but all those very smart sailors and builders of the past knew more than we in a lot of ways, and I realize this when I stand on deck with my hands in my pockets in the middle of a gale watching her lovely habits of always sliding out of the way of a breaking sea and keeping her deck dry, or looking at the non-moving compass card as she steers herself dead downwind without a vane. Most modern sailors have no experience with such a vessel and no concept of how comfortable, safe and fast she is at sea. Fast because she can be pushed very hard without broaching even in breaking conditions, yet has sufficient area to ghost well in very light airs. Just don't ask her to go to windward like a racer. We have a lovely 30 hp Sabb and 100 gallons of fuel for that, yet the interior is open and people ask where the engine is.
If you want to criticize a design, research and understand it first and don't judge it against a vessel designed for completely different purposes.
This little ship is still teaching me things and I've been running her since 1984. I'm not going to enter a round the buoys race on Saturday against Tartans, but the Tartan isn't going to eat/sleep/rest/drink/socialize eight adults for weeks at a time without running out of water, beer, space and food while you cruise in wilderness areas, or run unattended night and day before a bad gale or have the potential to carry ten tons of cargo in her forward hold. All design is trade-offs and that is one of the things that makes watercraft so fascinating.
Here is a 45 minute film on a trip we took to BC to find a Junk Rig Guru. It's in 3 short parts on youTube.
This may help you understand the design a little better.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zw6mdrcDL1o
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFb3AfxxgO0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIBDOUSd-Ag
The last one has some good footage of the ship self-steering before a moderate sea in about force 6-7 or so.

 

Looked at videos and it seems a good little ship accepting the compromises. What the green thing to left of entry and chrome on top right?

 

hand operated pump, lever removed

 

Chrome thing is a big compass with its binnacle cover shut to keep the sun off the card. Its been adjusted until it has zero deviation or ship's error. Up high it's dandy for taking bearings across.
Green thing is, as Edsel pointed out, a big hand operated pump in a place where one can steer and pump at the same time. Very efficient pump takes little effort to move vast amounts of water. Only time it gets used is when we flush and scrub the bilges or if I forget to tighten the shaft packing when we've been motoring a while. With a full bilge it takes about 20-30 strokes to empty it.

 

A great read, that guy new how to 'cruise' in style. A real sailor.

One of the big points he made about the style of boat he used was how he could beat off a lee shore even in a decent blow if the motor quit.

Seems mandatory to me.

 

Great post and fantastic videos! Was interesting to learn more about the chinese djonk rigs. Thanks.

 

rwatson is correct. Being able to stand up to your canvas and beat off a lee shore is a necessity. BERTIE,while not as close winded as the AWAHNEE, a long slim marconi cutter, stands up to excess canvas well due to her tremendous form stability and beats well until the waves get too steep and close together. Any vessel can get embayed on a lee shore and not be able to get out under sail. This is why heavy ground tackle and a reliable engine are the best insurance.

 

There seems to be a wide agreement that this type of boat is good for voyaging among those who own them and have gone on long voyages in them.

I find the natural course keeping ability most attractive. More modern types need vanes or auto pilots, which are expensive and prone to break down.

Also, being able to ground out for bottom cleaning and painting w/o a hoist or marine railroad is also appealing.

I think cruising boats have vastly different requirements than racing boats, and though racing boats have often been converted to cruising boats successfully, I would never want to design one for cruising.

For short, coastal cruising, where upwind sailing will be done more frequently, as well as some racing, the more modern pinched bow, fin keel, spade rudder configuration makes sense.

I wouldn't hesitate to sail one around the world, if I could get a good vane for it, I could get it much cheaper than a more traditional (SPRAY like) boat, and I was convinced it was strong enough, but it wouldn't be my first choice.

I could imagine if BERTIE were built today, she would be much more expensive than getting a use more modern type and converting it to a cruiser.

 

To build BERTIE today would cost $250,000 since she is mostly Port Orford Cedar and old growth Douglas Fir fastened with galvanized iron spikes, all of which are very hard to find for a reasonable price.
At the time, the total hull cost was about $15,000 since I bought directly from a mill in Oregon that delivered on its own truck, I was a member of a co-op shipyard that cost me $35 a month for building space, the landlord had a warehouse full of pre-WW2 hardware and fasteners he was willing to trade and sell cheap, and it was 1976.
For fun weekend cruising there are much more suitable boats than her, but for long term live aboard or extended voyaging she is quite good.

 

Bataan, I wish you would write a book! So much experience from building Bertie and sailing her. And all the other jobs you have done and skills, wisdom and experience you have gained. You have also met and worked with so many skilled and wise people that are sadly disappearing now that a book would be really worthwhile. I had stumbled on this site and thread out of a facination for Spray. Your posts and all the photos are simply tremendous - you are halfway to a book already!
You mentioned fitting Bertie out for charter work now instead of liveaboard. Is that done? Will you be chartering ? Where exactly are you? Many thanks for the most inspiring posts so genuinely filled with real practical experience. Bertie is a dream ship, really; a tough little cargo ship and beautiful with it (as true working boats always are), more pictures please - unless you are saving them for the book of course!

 

MasalaChai, you are far too kind. All these years I have considered myself a societal freak, stuck in 19th century technology and unable to deal with the present, much like the grumpy old skilled men I apprenticed myself to long ago, so these really are nice words of appreciation I never hear.
Most people look at BERTIE and laugh at her comic girth and odd rig, but then they don't see her at far out at sea on a gnarly black night full of breakers. Tourists walking down the dock rarely seem to notice her and are busy looking at shiny motorboats with huge barbecues on the back deck or the latest carbon rigged racer. Just like when I apply for a shipyard job and they see how old I am and don't hire me for that reason alone, BERTIE is relegated to the quaint past in most minds, and therefore lacking worth.
The ship is able to charter, I just am not ready to get in the floating hotel business, but maybe one of these days. Done the charter thing quite a bit on other ships as crew in the past and it can be OK, but often sucks due to clients from hell. Plus with the economy down, few people other than the rich are chartering and they charter big boats with bells and whistles like a hot tub and kayaks.
Here in NW Washington state there is a lot of competition, with many nice older large yachts chartering up to Alaska and BC waters. BERTIE is bare bones with no shower or hot water, and modern people tend to be a little spoiled it seems, with few willing for an adventure, but more looking for a floating hotel room.
I've had some friends with classic sailboats who tried, but none of them are still doing it.
About a book.... We have a large local bookstore that deals in used books and 'select remainders', or those recently published books that did not sell, and it's heartbreaking to see some good book on an interesting subject that an author sweated blood over for years going for $3.00 when you know the printing alone was more than that.
I could write one, but I fear there is no market.
Who cares about such an antique boat or one life in this fast modern age? You do, and I thank you for it.
Here are some more photos for you, and pardon me if some are repeats as I'm not sure just what I've published here.

 

MasalaChai- If you want to charter the ship, message me.

 

Bataan, thanks for the replies. I still think a book would sell, especially as you have so many good photos to support it. How did Sailing Back In Time, that book about Farrels do? What a lovely boat China Cloud is and what a remarkable man. And Bertie is also an incrdibly lovely boat and you also a remarkable man. Not many people around who can build working boats / small ships and have done so and lived on and sailed them and gained the experience of them as you have. A book, a book!!
And a quote from an earlier post:
"Part of BERTIE's reason to be is as a research vessel, learning the practical handling of a small cargo vessel under sail in all conditions, as to what would be the most advantageous combination (cost/manning/capacity/lifespan) for a 'nineteenth century small windship of the future' kind of thing." Have you more thoughts on this? could Bertie make a loving carring cargos (other than clients from hell!)?

Would love to charter her, but could dream of affording to! Would happily come and crew / scape, sand paint etc!!

very best wishes