Trimaran - Especially Searunner - Owners

[slowbat]

Originally Posted by md7a

Thanks @RoyM -

When you get there I'd love to know how the furling staysail works for you. Seems like a natural adaptation.

Where do you attach the asymmetrical chute? On the stemhead or on a boom?

Hey Will,
I installed Profurl C-320's on NIBIRU in 2020. I really love them. I can roll up the genny when single-handing a little during the tack to help it get through the inner forestay slot.

The Profurl "C" or Cruising stile requires you to replace the plastic lockers with extremely overpriced stainless ones. Not sure I would go with them or Harken in the future. The big mistake I made was using Sunbrella for the UV cover. It is heavy cloth and sail shape is compromised in light winds.

I have not played with the kite yet. My plan is it try the ATN spinnaker tacker.

LMK when you are up in Seattle and want to check it out?
-Dan

[Training Wheels]

Why not put a stand up block on each float bow for your spinnaker tack?

[Boatguy30]

As part of the Irma repair/refit we put a new furler and Genoa on Scrimshaw. I have all the design info on that and can get you the same sail at a good offseason discount if you’re interested send me a message.

[Boatguy30]

FYI big lagoons and beneteaus in charter use the black plastic bits on the “C” furlers all around the Caribbean for the life of the rigging. Seem to work ok, but we did use the offshore model on Scrimshaw that uses the Titanium set screw.

[Training Wheels]

Originally Posted by slowbat

Hey Will,

I installed Profurl C-320's on NIBIRU in 2020. I really love them. I can roll up the genny when single-handing a little during the tack to help it get through the inner forestay slot.



The Profurl "C" or Cruising stile requires you to replace the plastic lockers with extremely overpriced stainless ones. Not sure I would go with them or Harken in the future. The big mistake I made was using Sunbrella for the UV cover. It is heavy cloth and sail shape is compromised in light winds.



I have not played with the kite yet. My plan is it try the ATN spinnaker tacker.



LMK when you are up in Seattle and want to check it out?

-Dan

[ATTACH]230257

[sddmack]

For any Searunner ownwers (specifically the SR34).....i've never seen one in person only pictures. In the pictures I see it looks like the amas are not canted. Is that true?

thanks

[Tusitala]

Hi sddmack, yes, that's accurate the outriggers are not canted at all, but I believe they are carried a little higher than the older designs. on a new build it wouldn't add much effort to do so. they're also asymmetric, which isn't really a thing anymore either. old school. they work fine, but there's better ways to go performance wise.

As for furlers we installed a Facnor back in '07. works great, no issues. I was pleasantly surprised how easily it all went together. we did the install with the boat in the water.

Pat

[sddmack]

thanks pat....Im not really worried about performance.

the 34 might be smaller but it looks like the amas are deeper.

I've always wondered how easily tris teeter totter from one side to the other at anchor.

I havent emailed Mr. Marples since before the pandemic. But I've always wanted to ask him how hard it would be to take the 37/40 plans and update them to to be more like the 34.

[Rotten Ricky]

Originally Posted by sddmack

thanks pat....Im not really worried about performance.

the 34 might be smaller but it looks like the amas are deeper.

I've always wondered how easily tris teeter totter from one side to the other at anchor.

I haven't emailed Mr. Marples since before the pandemic. But I've always wanted to ask him how hard it would be to take the 37/40 plans and update them to to be more like the 34.

John Marples has already "updated" the SR series - long ago. It is called the SeaClipper series, such as my SC38. It is a seldom seen but wonderful sailing vessel and retains a more flamboyant, nautical sheer-line than the SR series. It turns heads wherever we go. The more-prominent floats are canted at about 10 degrees and are positioned further forward - I assume this will help prevent the vessel tripping over a bow that digs in when in a following sea. But the design has an achilles heel.


While it may indeed provide the ability to swing aft when striking an under-water object, the centre-board as designed is quite ineffective to prevent lateral movement - from experience, it truly does not matter if it is raised or lowered so I cruised with mine raised. As well, the slot of the case creates great drag on boat speed. No amount of sail-balancing etc removed the impediment of not having a true NACA-foil shape in the keel, such as a true dagger-board would achieve. Just raise the dagger somewhat if in skinny water!

As well, the design of the pin and associated bores in which the pin sits was greatly under-engineered for the serious strains exerted on that board and the case. The result is that the journals made form PVC pipe eventually separate from the surrounding plywood, allowing ingress of water under pressure - and rot starts. In my case the rot took out a large portion of the lower hull of my boat. This was a very expensive repair in terms of time, money and loss of sailing - and an agony that is not yet over for me.

A case for either centre-board or dagger-board takes up an enormous space in the cabin. What I am proposing is to install a slightly smaller dagger board in each float. (Bear in mid that the floats are a robust 4ft in height at that point and can easily accommodate the case.) While there will be some small amount of torque on the boat under way, two of them will somewhat balance that out. With official NACA-engineered foil shapes, they will give far better lift to windward.

As well, the boards and their cases will be far easier and less expensive to build, install and operate than a single one that intrudes massively into the main hull. In the meantime, I sail it with no centre-board or dagger-board and the deep-V floats provide some resistance to lateral movement.

Incidentally, I have been inside a SC34 - and interior space is vastly superior in the 38. Only 4 ft longer, the SC38 is worth building instead. Regarding teetering, this does not happen on an SC38 and there is no slap and bang as the floats enter the water. They draw about 10" on mine.

No matter this centre-board flaw, I believe that this design is one of the most under-appreciated and least well-known designs for home build. I wish I had had the opportunity to build it myself. Just build it with fanatical dedication to excluding condensation etc INSIDE the hulls - the lower in the hull you get, the more fanatical you should be. And build it as much as possible with composite hulls. Do not get trapped into the romantic thinking that because you are familiar with wood, that that is the way to go.

You will find more that I have written on this subject in previous posts.

Stay safe everyone.

RR.

[sddmack]

Originally Posted by Rotten Ricky

John Marples has already "updated" the SR series - long ago. It is called the SeaClipper series, such as my SC38. It is a seldom seen but wonderful sailing vessel and retains a more flamboyant, nautical sheer-line than the SR series. It turns heads wherever we go. The more-prominent floats are canted at about 10 degrees and are positioned further forward - I assume this will help prevent the vessel tripping over a bow that digs in when in a following sea. But the design has an achilles heel.


RR.

Thanks RR. I never really looked into the SCs. I had looked in the CCs and was sent some info on them from Mr. Marples. I really like the CCs but molded ply is probably outside of my abilities. Hell, the SR34 would be difficult enough for me. Maybe something like Rikki-tikki-tavi will come up for sale in the next five years.

[Tusitala]

I wouldn't consider a Seaclipper to be an update of a Searunner. They were designed as a cost effective alternative, and to be much simpler to build. An excellent choice for a first time builder. Since the design is based around using lumberyard grade materials the weights and displacements that are listed are a little high, you can build a very light boat with upgraded ply and keeping it simple. I think something like a Seaclipper 34 could be built in 1/2 the time of the same size Searunner,, especially if you use an outboard. You could do this on a larger Seaclipper or on a Searunner, but an inboard is a lot more realistic for those. An inboard installation is very involved, especially if you're inexperienced. Of course something like the 38' or 41' is much nicer, larger vessel, but take a lot longer to build, in part because they tend to be a more complicated boat.

I'm with RR about using a daggerboard, they're much simpler and always work better, a centerboard, even a good one, really only presents the proper foil shape when in the full down position which can be limiting.

Hey RR, do you have any photos of your boat you could post? I'd love to see them.

[Rotten Ricky]

Originally Posted by Tusitala

I wouldn't consider a Seaclipper to be an update of a Searunner. They were designed as a cost effective alternative, and to be much simpler to build. An excellent choice for a first time builder. Since the design is based around using lumberyard grade materials the weights and displacements that are listed are a little high, you can build a very light boat with upgraded ply and keeping it simple. I think something like a Seaclipper 34 could be built in 1/2 the time of the same size Searunner,, especially if you use an outboard. You could do this on a larger Seaclipper or on a Searunner, but an inboard is a lot more realistic for those. An inboard installation is very involved, especially if you're inexperienced. Of course something like the 38' or 41' is much nicer, larger vessel, but take a lot longer to build, in part because they tend to be a more complicated boat.

I'm with RR about using a daggerboard, they're much simpler and always work better, a centerboard, even a good one, really only presents the proper foil shape when in the full down position which can be limiting.

Hey RR, do you have any photos of your boat you could post? I'd love to see them.

I will "tri" to include some pics - but I am a neophyte at this...

The restraining factor faced by John Marples was that the centre-board had to be small enough to fit in the case in the interior. The result was that the board was too small and too poorly shaped to do the job. It bears little resemblance to the ideal dagger foil - which, for this vessel, would be about 5 or 6 feet vertically below the keel-band and have a chord (fore-and-aft) of 24 to 30 inches - and be NEAR VERTICAL! The designed CB was FAR short of that and deployed at about 30 degrees off vertical - and the trailing edge was severely truncated so that it would swing back up inside the case, thus again destroying the hydrodynamic qualities to provide lift to windward.

A dagger-board case is also enormously intrusive into the salon space and I believe having a dagger in each float makes much more sense.

You are right - the design was as an "economy cruiser" and in spite of the cheaper materials and a couple of other problems, I think John did an outstanding job, designing an cruising tri that was less expensive to build but one that, if built well, could last as long as any professionally built one. It takes almost the same amount of work to build a low-quality compared to high-quality vessel - much of the cost of a "better-built" boat is in the labour and materials to give it greater comforts and a classier appearance, and the extra toys. The surveyor for mine commented that this was a tough and great design, but could not find the rot damage buried so deep in the hull.

The one thing outside of Johns control is that the builders of a "budget" vessel are likely to be inexperienced builders who do not understand that small overlooked technical details can lead to catastrophic results - like in my case.

Lightness might be next to Godliness in a multi-hull, and the designed weight of 8,000lbs (11,000lbs laden) might be heavy compared to a lighter and higher-quality built tri, but in a seaway it does not bounce as much as the lighter one and under good conditions she still sails comfortably at up to 11.5 knots. And this is no racing machine - it is a cruiser!

I believe that 3/8" plywood hulls with at least two layers of 6 oz cloth would have been better than the 1/2" ply covered with only one 6 oz layer. It does not take much to damage one layer of 6 oz! Also the specs called for the vulnerable edges like along the float keels to be armoured with not nearly enough glass - which resulted in mine being ripped open by logs etc. - not by steel or rocks.

When 10,000 lbs of boat moves against something else.....

Same for the decks that should have had two instead of only one layer - even a dropped winch handle would damage one layer of glass, the small crack to allow moisture into the plywood base. And a much bigger repair problem. It is very unwise to provide proper protection on all surfaces.

Remember, the hull and deck only represents about 1/3 - more or less - of the cost of materials and labour in the building of a boat....

As I have written before, outboards on the aft beam of a tri are a big mistake for several reasons, the most important one being that in a bad seaway when it literally could mean life and death, you really need reliability - but outboards tend to have waves crashing over them or be screaming in the air. Yes, I have experienced it. However, positioning them to hinge off the forward beams, engaging the water where the water level is more constant, and lifting up through the side nets would be far better. I am so glad to have installed an inboard.

Now to try to send pics. You will also be able to see pics if you go to bcms.bc.ca and look for "Cloud Nine". At that time it still had outboards.

RR.

[Tusitala]

Very nice boat Ricky! I like it.

an issue with daggerboards in the amas is that the outriggers vary immersion under sail in waves and wind. with the boards that far off the centerline the boat can tend to hunt and seek yawing around, especially on autopilot. but there's no question they work. On our small Seaclipper I used the daggerboard trunk to replace the mast compression strut that went from the deck to the centerboard trunk and built it in as part of the interior. works okay, certainly takes up room

I've used outboards on Tri's up to 40 feet. The trick is to have a pivoting sled type bracket that lowers and moves fwd as it does. you can adjust it for height above the water and they tend to float up over swells. mounting it on the fwd cross arm sounds interesting, I mean, on a boat your size you'd need remote cables and electric start to access it anyway.

[Rotten Ricky]

Thanks - I like to say that she is an exuberant, flamboyant design,


The outboards on my SC38 were great when the waters were flat, and for maneuvering in harbour, but useless when the conditions got rougher. The leeward outboard had to be lowered far enough down to enable it to provide propulsion, which it did, but the waves were frequently right over the top. Remember that waves between hulls sometime ricochet between them.

The windward outboard was either drowning or screaming in the air as the boat rode over the waves, lifting her quarter as she did, and was useless - so we would shut it off and raise it. These are not storm force conditions, either. I could not tolerate having such poor reliability - peoples would be at stake in a bad conditions.

The sleds were heavy to take the torque etc, and with the 120 lb (I think) weight of a 9.9 Merc. outboard on each, did not rise over the waves, but crashed through them, acting as a brake. Note that the sleds and the outboards etc were just as heavy as the diesel I installed. And outboard tankage (and more weight) was greater because of the extra fuel they consumed, compared to the diesel.

Having the outboards amidships is now often where cats have them, almost right under the mast area. (I almost bought a 36 ft cat that had that feature). That location seems to have the smallest variation of water level. I used to watch the water level amidships with my tri and it seldom varied more than a foot total, being about a third of the variation in the designed location aft of the aft beam.

That amidships place would be best for an outboard on a suitably-shaped sled, and it would be easier to work on above the nets, and quieter under way. Clean appearance, and more weight in a central location too - not good to have 300 lbs at the stern. I would have placed mine there if they had been electric start, but converting them to electric would have been so expensive that it would have made more sense to buy new ones. So I installed the diesel - and thank goodness I did.

Cheers, RR.

[Tusitala]

Yeah, I get it. Like I said originally an inboard is much more realistic on a boat of that displacement. Long ago I met a guy with a 46' Newick 3 Cheers design. He used a 15Hp Johnson for an auxillary. This was before electric start and remote cables were common. Watching his process for getting underway was amazing, and involved a lot of sailor talk.

So do you have any interior pics? I like the green trim and canvas work.

Pat