Wharram Tiki 26 Voyaging?

[salticrak]

Good info here. That there dodger would fit the bill for sure, i did not realize that was your boat boatman,good looking for sure.
@ Kettlewell thanks for the heads up, will look for the books.
@ tamicatana your traveller suggestion makes sense.

My proposed voyage will hopefully take me up the east coast, then maybe north to P.N.G.
or Indonesia/ Thailand etc.

i would love to sail up the Red sea, who knows what it will be like in the future?

[charliehows]

i'm not familiar with wharram designs but a multihull without some kind of daggerboard or keel is a PITA going to weather - mainly because you know as you crab your way through endless useless tacks that a daggerboard would have you belting almost straight into the wind. With a raisable keel i consider multihulls to be the absolute ideal design for australia and most of the pacific.

[Kettlewell]

I have often wondered why you couldn't add daggerboards or centerboards to Wharram cats for use when you needed that better pointing ability. However, they apparently have good enough performance to windward, because people have sailed them just about everywhere. The deeply V-shaped hulls do provide a fair bit of lateral resistance. Tom Jones managed to sail one of his Wharrams most of the length of the ICW, and we used to see him in New England every summer, going wherever anyone else went, and then having a beat back to New Jersey.

[salticrak]

I have bought the book Multihull voyaging from that jungle mob.Looks to be a good read and applicable.

[boatsmith]

we are in the process of adding daggerboards to one of the Tiki 8ms (26') we built. The windward ability is more like a Westsail32 than a J24. On the small Tikis the worst performance to weather is light wind and leftover seas. It does take some HP to keep a very light boat going to weather through waves. On the Ariki 48' we are building the 2nd two boats have been sold with daggerboards. Sponberg Yacht Designs is assisting us with the details of the design. Eric also helped us with the engineering on our beams for the Ariki.

[Snowpetrel]

I sailed a wharram 30 foot Taninui across Tasman bay in a good strong NW. We ended up surfing her at 15-20 knots with just a little staysail up. The owner said if it got any stronger we would chuck out the drogue... I was very impressed with it's seaworthiness, It handled the unpleasant conditions easily, and then we surfed over the bar into a secluded and sheltered nook inaccessible to most boats.

I think the Tiki26 would get you through most stuff safely. But you might be uncomfortable at times and you would need to travel very light, but the benefits of simplicity and being able to beach her and drag her clear of the water easily would be fantastic.

You would probably be able to pack her up and load her onto a truck pretty cheaply.

[olaf hart]

Originally Posted by boatsmith

we are in the process of adding daggerboards to one of the Tiki 8ms (26') we built. The windward ability is more like a Westsail32 than a J24. On the small Tikis the worst performance to weather is light wind and leftover seas. It does take some HP to keep a very light boat going to weather through waves. On the Ariki 48' we are building the 2nd two boats have been sold with daggerboards. Sponberg Yacht Designs is assisting us with the details of the design. Eric also helped us with the engineering on our beams for the Ariki.

I would have thought the Tiki Hulls were well suited to leeboards.

[boatman61]

Personnally I would do something else I tried on my Tiki 21... I fitted 2" x 1/4" alluminium shoes which I screwed and epoxied to the keel from W.line at the bow back to just after the main aft beam.. great for beaching...
Remember your sailing with more than a case of beer n picnic basket... 100L of water in each hull, food, fuel, clothes n bedding.. etc all make her sit more firmly in the water.. you'll do just fine... you won't point as high as a fin keel for sure but your speed more than compensates.. you'll beat em over a distance..

[Wotname]

FWIW, a friend built and sailed a Tiki 26 from Perth to Darwin and onto East Africa. After that he was planning to continue to Cape Town and then the South Atlantic towards the Carib. I lost touch with him but the boat sure made it to East Africa without any issues.

[ozskipper]

Originally Posted by salticrak

Righto I am near the end of my build and now am considering where i would like to sail this little cat. I am based on the east coast of Oz for now.

The limitations of this cat are more to do with sailor comfort etc. I chose to build this boat as it is the only way I could get into sailing a catamaran that i own.

As to voyaging in it i see the modern trend is for catamarans of around 40ft to be considered entry level.

your thoughts and suggestions please.

The east coast of Oz is a large land mass mate. So I will guess youre in the middle somewhere. There is great cruising up the NSW Coast, though some of the rivers are tricky to get into. Once you get past the Gold coast- say mooloolaba (qld) you will start to notice a difference in sea conditions and have ample island stop Overs. There is much much more to see than just the whitsundays. Possibly a hundred or more islands From mooloo to Cairns. So great cruising all the way up there.

From Cooktown take a left a few hundred k's nth and you have the whole of south east asia in front of you. Not that I would do SEA on a 26 ft Wharram. But I am sure others have and will continue to do so.

Forget "needing" a 40ft cat. As humans we only "need" air water love shelter and food. After that, be as creative as you like.

[boatman61]

And remember... with just an 18" draught fully loaded your gonna go where 99.999% of other boats cannot go...
Apart from everywhere everyone else can..

[Kettlewell]

And remember... with just an 18" draught fully loaded your gonna go where 99.999% of other boats cannot go...
Apart from everywhere everyone else can

Shallow draft is hugely underrated by most people. Makes a tremendous difference in making coastal cruising enjoyable.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by Kettlewell

Shallow draft is hugely underrated by most people. Makes a tremendous difference in making coastal cruising enjoyable.

Maurice Griffiths fan... how to find solitude.. anywhere

[salticrak]

Wonderful insights here.

[David_Old_Jersey]

Originally Posted by salticrak

your thoughts and suggestions please.

Plenty of people sail half way around the world to get to Australia (and many more dream about it) - you are already there .........what I am saying is don't discount "local" just because it is on your doorstep (wherever "you" are in the world) - admittedly Australia's "local" is a bit bigger than in many others places .....

......no great experiance of Sailing in Australia, save for a few dive trips and a few days or so onboard a "backpackers charter" sailing in the Whitsundays many moons ago - but I could see myself happily spending a season wandering around simply there.....both the sailing / islands etc plus a bit of "civilisation" within reach when wanted (I like a pint or 2 of "civilisation" now and again ).

After that I would be looking North towards SEA - could spend a lifetime (or 3!) wandering around there .....and pretty much ideal for your boat.....and then? well, the rest of the world is fairly big .

BTW, boat pics would be nice .