Daggerboards Catana 44

[Stumble]

Donnie is a very well known guy on the gulf coast who was the bottom guy for some of the Tornado Olypic campaigns (Lovel/Ogeltree). When they first went to the Olympics he went with them, and has gone ever since, originally just as their boat guy, later on for the whole team. These days he pretty much gets to work on whatever he wants, but still maintains his small shop in Mobile Al.

He really should be charging more for his labor, but he is still only at $100/hr. He is somewhat picky about what he will work on, and is getting more selective (no more templating big keels). But if it's fun and fast he is an amazing resource. You just drop off the boat with a blank check and come back to a boat that is crazy fast, and the bill is generally less than other yards for better work.

As an example, I just got my A-Cat back from him where he;
Repaired a 2" crack in the both bows
-Faired both hulls
-Faired both dagger boards
-faired both rudders
-replaced all 4 chainplates
-reinforced both transoms, and replaced rudder gudgeons
-centerlined and straitened the gudgeons
-rebuilt both DB trunks to 1mm tolerance
-added carbon reinforcing plates for deck hardware
-compounded and waxed the boat

The total bill was $3,500.

I should point out that almost all of what he does in OD raceboats. The level of optimization is just silly for cruisers. Things like moving keels 1/4" forward to maximize upwind speed, or thinning keels to class minimums for light air performance.

[mark_morwood]

Try the Catana Group on Yahoo - someone there may know of a builder with a mould.

Lots of good info in this thread, but maybe a bit much for your problem. You have a good production cruising boat and are probably not going to rip it apart to change the trunk or how the boards work. The Catana 44 (and 48 which we had) have a reinforced daggerboard trunk already. You also do not need the bottom of the board reinforced for haulout as the boat does not sit on it - it is fully retracted in that situation.

It does not seem that uncommon to break Catana dagger boards, and generally the approach I have heard most people take is to just use the remaining board as a template for the new board - obviously taking into consideration the needs for it to be sacrificial so don't overbuild the bottom half.

Mark.

[UNCIVILIZED]

Originally Posted by 44'cruisingcat

I think you're overstating this a bit. Certainly daggerboards have to handle substantial loads, but not the entire weight of the boat, certainly not several times that!

There's no way mine was built to handle 6 tonnes, let alone multiples of it.

But, 27,000 miles later, still intact....

Mine was built using a timber frame, with a central spar of timber with unidirectional glass around it, a plywood skin, with biaxial, then double bias glass over that.

And this is a BIG board, the boat only has one. Big loads, sure, but within reason...

now THATS a daggerboard - Cruisers & Sailing Photo Gallery

I'd also recommend, if you do decide to build one, to start out making it smaller in section than the old board. (Unless you are able to get hold of moulds) Once you start fairing and painting, especially antifoul, they get fatter than you expect. Nothing worse than a board that's too tight for it's case....

How much load the board sees, really depends upon the boat, & the application. If it's a boat which routinely flys a hull, & gets pushed, then yeah, the boards see a LOT of load.
Such sailing styles probably aren't the norm for cruising multihulls. But even the board on my 31' Searunner was 3"+ thick plywood, & heavily glassed.

Then again, if you have something like a Gunboat... And I don't know the performance envelopes of the boats in question, thus some of my comments.
Especially including the one about talking to the folks who designed & built the boat in question in the first place.

If you're consistently flying a hull on a catamaran, yes, the leeward hull bears a fair bit of the load which is trying to stop the boat from sliding sideways. But the foils take the brunt of it. Otherwise without them, you'd slide sideways so much that it'd pretty much be impossible to sail on one hull for any length of time.

It's just; math, physics, common sense. Choose which ever word you like.

Why do you think that the foils are made out of thick laminates of carbon fiber? And given that most of them are decompiled several times, during their layup, before the final vacuum bagging & baking (or autoclaving), it's readily apparent that they're strong as hell.
Check out the linked board in Stumble's post, & it's construction spec's.

But again, that one's for a racing multi. As Stated: One needs to get a hold off the original plans & specs for the DB's for their boat. Just as you would if you were replacing the rig; with one to match OEM spec's, or something else entirely.

[AD28]

Mr Rubin

Diversified does indeed work on bigger boats. In fact, these days he's (mostly Tom, but Donnie too) been working on the very C411 from which he molded the daggerboard I mention. You can see it for yourself at Turner Marine just up the street.

Diversified would like to make the mould do more than one job so it pays for itself, which is why it was set up to do more than one size of board. I was asked specifically to spread the word, in fact.

Diversified/Donnie rebuilt the bow, amongst other repairs, of a Catana 40S.

He was working on the teak deck of a rather large monohull of some flavor.

it's spelled "Lovell and Ogletree."

Please don't imply that Diversified won't take the work, because they will.

If they have the time.

[Stumble]

AD28,

If it came across that DM was turning away work then obviously there was a miscommunication on my part. The only jobs I know of DM turning down where scheduling issues, where they couldn't meet the clients time frame. My point was with the Olympics in a few months any working he near future has to be slotted around the Olympic teams boats, and their travel availability.

And I know they work on bigger boats. They did the entire bottom job of our J-35, and a Tripp-40. Both of which weren't on to do very well over the years.

And good to know about the daggerboards.

[44'cruisingcat]

Originally Posted by UNCIVILIZED

How much load the board sees, really depends upon the boat, & the application. If it's a boat which routinely flys a hull, & gets pushed, then yeah, the boards see a LOT of load.
Such sailing styles probably aren't the norm for cruising multihulls. But even the board on my 31' Searunner was 3"+ thick plywood, & heavily glassed.

Then again, if you have something like a Gunboat... And I don't know the performance envelopes of the boats in question, thus some of my comments.
Especially including the one about talking to the folks who designed & built the boat in question in the first place.

If you're consistently flying a hull on a catamaran, yes, the leeward hull bears a fair bit of the load which is trying to stop the boat from sliding sideways. But the foils take the brunt of it. Otherwise without them, you'd slide sideways so much that it'd pretty much be impossible to sail on one hull for any length of time.

It's just; math, physics, common sense. Choose which ever word you like.

Why do you think that the foils are made out of thick laminates of carbon fiber? And given that most of them are decompiled several times, during their layup, before the final vacuum bagging & baking (or autoclaving), it's readily apparent that they're strong as hell.
Check out the linked board in Stumble's post, & it's construction spec's.

But again, that one's for a racing multi. As Stated: One needs to get a hold off the original plans & specs for the DB's for their boat. Just as you would if you were replacing the rig; with one to match OEM spec's, or something else entirely.

Never said boards don't need to be strong. I just questioned your statement about HOW strong. Multiples of the boat's weight. The boat in question is a Catana 44, so I'd guess at around 8 tonnes.

I don't think it's board would need to be specced to handle 16, 24, or 32 tonnes. Or even 8.

My board certainly wouldn't handle 6 tonnes placed in the middle of it. I doubt it would even handle 1/2 that. Even 1/3.... But it hasn't broken.