SUMMARY
LIGHT BRIGADE
By Gary Baigent

Gary Baigent offers a unique perspective on the evolution of modern light weight sailing yachts from the small nation with the big image that led the way. This exerpt does not relate specifically to multihulls, but instead to the essence of multihulls, which is light weight.

When reading this article, consider that the postwar monohull had about half its total weight in its ballast keel and the rest in its hull, deck rig and all else. In contrast, the recent America’s Cup monohulls have a total weight of roughly 100,000 Lbs. nine-tenths of which is ballast (right, ballast keels of roughly 90,000 Lbs. with hull, rig and everything else weighing roughly 10,000 Lbs.). This indicates enormous advances in light weight construction of structures, and a frenzied effort to gain stability without adding another hull or two… Gracious no!

Of course the same structural advances are now applied to multihulls, which are totally non-ballasted. This enormous weight saving explains why the
2010 Americas Cup multihulls were able to sail at almost four times the speed of the true wind.

Gary Baigent’s story brings us some grasp of the sea change that has swamped modern yacht design, both mono and multi. And it harkens back to the multihull mantra of the 1960s, GET THE LEAD OUT.

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LIGHT BRIGADE
The New Zealand School of Yacht Design
19th to 21st Century
By Gary Baigent

Destroying The Old Order

HEAVILY BALLASTED keel yachts are too weighty to be fast even in winds just short of a
gale – but even then they are not fast – and are therefore justifiably ridiculed because
in such conditions the yacht, sails and gear become very difficult for the crew and helmsman
to handle. But this knowledge was not always so – in fact heavy boats almost without
exception, have been considered the norm in the history of pleasure yacht sailing. The
exceptions when light displacement boats gained a short period of acceptance with
yachting people were rare and could be considered almost aberrations of normal yachting
behaviour.

But although heavy boats in heavy winds are almost uncontrollable, rolling,
broaching, burying their bows or getting pooped by overtaking following seas, light
displacement boats and the even lighter multihulls handle such sea conditions well and sail
faster with less effort and with reduced loads on hull, sails and gear. They also require less
sail area for their high performance and they steer far more easily than their heavyweight
counterparts. This heavy boat struggle is well illustrated by the grimacing image of Chris
Bouzaid (below) struggling at the helm of a famous champion, but often broaching, US
designed, heavy displacement Sparkman and Stephens Rainbow 11.

Heavy yachts adhere to Froude’s Rule where speed is limited by the waves created by the
yacht – as they go faster, they sink lower and lower into the wave troughs they have built
for themselves – and to go beyond this limiting theoretical hull speed, heavy boats require
either huge seas from astern to push them along or an overpowering amount of extra wind
force on their distorted sails to provide power for speed – which, invariably
places dangerously high loads upon their rigs.

The breakthrough from this heavy boat approach that created an impression worldwide
began when New Zealand light displacement boats appeared in the 1970’s, particularly
the IOR (International Offshore Rule) centreboarders (actually daggerboarders to
be correct) from Bruce Farr, Laurie Davidson, Paul Whiting and Jim Young.

Horrified traditionalists comparing these lightweight designs with classical heavy
displacement boats from the USA like those from Dick Carter or Sparkman and Stephens,
found the New Zealand big dinghy boats to have about as much beauty as military weapons
– to them they looked ugly, austere and threatening – and especially so when they were
aggressively sailed by crews who were seemingly intent on destroying the old order.
Downwind surfing had special appeal to these new “Mulleties” (a derogatory, traditional
term suggesting loud, hard crews from fishing Mullet boats) – but upwind performance
was also depressing to owners of outmoded, outpaced heavier designs. But although
these iconoclasts had the appearance of something dangerously new, they were in reality,
an evolution of 1960’s designs from Bob Stewart, John Spencer, Jim Young and Des Townson.
So although avant garde light boats were admired by only a few, they were hated by
the majority of conservatives – however it was in this controversial period that
light, fast yachts became known world-wide as synonymous with New Zealand. It would
be difficult to find any activity more bound by restrictions than yachting.

Rules in the past were set by wealthy traditionalists who were determined to keep yachting
a rich man’s sport. But the New Zealand-type yacht arose from working class origins, from
people who were equally determined to be free of rules, one design restrictions and
conformity. This latter attitude inhibited most US and English yachting designs because
they were mostly boring production boats with no room for development. And in their
stagnation the joy of pure (read fast) sailing had been forgotten, yachts had become merely
status symbols.

Conversely the New Zealand racing lightweights broke free from displacement hull speeds
and tradition by outrageously planing like an overblown sailing dinghy. Under sail these
dancing lightweights became alive – and they retained this almost magical force even
when swinging on a mooring. And to the open minded the best design examples had a
beauty that was more than the piecing together of lightweight yacht components into
a radical form. Many disagreed. It took numbers of years before Northern Hemisphere
yachtsmen (but not the French, Scandinavians and a few enlightened, but ostracized,
Englishmen) to realize keel boats could exceed their theoretical hull speed, in fact
they didn’t know this was possible until they were jolted awake by the first French
single handed light displacement Open 60 yachts.

But in the 1970’s the light brigade from New Zealand was seen as a major threat to
yachting health by establishment legislators and like the US Sandbaggers a century before
(the Sandbagger period was another of those times when lightweight design ran too fast for
the “wise men” in power) legislation was introduced to suppress and ban this boat type. As
a result of the 1970’s establishment reaction, lightweight advocates from the Southern
Antipodeans scathingly viewed the people behind the Rule as reactionaries who were
determined to ban all yacht design performance advancement.

And that is why in the 1980’s New Zealand designers and sailors turned their
backs on the IOR and stepped aboard indigenous high performers from Farr, Young,
Davidson, Birdsall, Ross and Elliott. Young commented, “Specializing under rules
produces horrible boats. Rule makers have done more harm to yachting than religion has
done for mankind. Under a rule it is best to be just fast enough to beat the rest –
something New Zealand designers found out the hard way under IOR. In reality everyone
is trying to go slow. But that is what the majority want – they would like sports cars but
invariably end up with family saloons. Also, under a rule, once someone designs a
successful boat that fits the rule, suddenly all designs become the same, few are different.
Looking at it objectively over a period of time, at first, like sprats, they all rush off, then
most of them come back to the same spot.”

Although they would like to think differently most yachting people are not
experimentalists and when confronted with inventive types become frightened and
confused – and can only handle them by making criticism. Consistently throughout the
175 odd years before the 1980’s the leaders of controlling yacht clubs have stopped any
development that encouraged high performance – it has been suggested that in the early
years this was probably because of dour religious upbringings.
“The most innovative inventions,” wrote Garry Hoyt in the US publication Yacht
Racing/Cruising, “that have brought major changes in the 20th Century yachting, have come
from two ex-surfers with absolutely no formal training in yacht design: Hobie Alter and
Hoyle Schweitzer – who designed the breakthrough Hobie cat and the windsurfer.”
Similarly in New Zealand autodidacts have been a major influence in changes of
yacht design direction – “New Zealand’s shining light in self education is Bruce Farr,” said
Young, “he has done his own thing all his life, left school at 17 and has never stolen any
ideas from anyone.”

However besides the damaging hierarchical restraints from overseas conservatives,
the history of New Zealand light displacement yacht development has also been
undermined by local anger and jealousies – perhaps this approach is inevitable and also
necessary for progress. It is only in blatant suppression of movements that the situation
loses control. The more unfair the umpire, the more determined the iconoclast becomes –
so in the long run that is healthy too. Now with the emphasis and overwhelming
acceptance throughout the yachting world of building lighter and lighter monohull and
multihull designs, the circle has turned 180 degrees and the early New Zealand philosophy
beginning with the light centreboarder IOR designs has now been carried much further
and has become an unquestioned and established order in itself.

Folding Farrier’s

Cheekee Monkee from the Pacific Northwest was not what New Zealander Ian Farrier had
in mind when he designed his unique line of folding, cruising trimarans. In fact he was
slightly horrified. All his designs performed well because they were quite light trimarans
but they were geared for the family type boat owners who wanted to go beyond monohulls
but were concerned with safety and did not want to be frightened by multihull capsize
problems. And because Farrier was/is a perfectionist, a meticulous plan maker with a
philosophy geared towards moderate performance and comfort aboard his boats, the
serendipitous result was that, simply because they were trimarans, they ended up as fast
sailors. However Cheekee Monkee was something else. Farrier had an excellent reputation
from his production boats and was concerned that this hotted up version of his F31, might
sink this carefully gained reputation like a lead keel so he pointedly made sure that people
knew this was a boat that was not his design anymore.

Farrier came from an engineering background but had dropped out of university to go
sailing on a lengthened Piver Nugget, adventurously singlehanding it up to Auckland from
Christchurch. Later having an unpleasant time aboard a cruising monohull he realized he
would have been better off sticking with his tri. But this was 30 years ago and an infamous
period when a number of multihull disasters had occurred with capsizes and broken beams
and as a result, loud mainstream and nautical media coverage.

However Farrier, yet again another New Zealand autodidact with no formal yacht design
training, knew that trailerable monohulls could also capsize, swamp and sink and felt
strongly that there was a market for a well designed trailer trimaran and began working
on his own design. He was critical of the structural weaknesses in John Westell and Arthur
Piver folding trimaran versions and started making models of folding parallelograms,
then built a prototype 18-foot tri incorporating his folding ideas. Having spent long
hours perfecting his folding mechanism he knew he was on to something and because he
jealously guarded his secrets, patented the design – the thought of people copying was
particularly abhorrent to him.

Farrier prides himself on producing very detailed building plans sometimes spending a
year on finalizing one set, therefore he is very critical of other designers’ plansinadequate a
nd, because he is so meticulous in drawing up his own and covering all questions a potential
owner may ask, has the advantage of very few of his designs being modified. This has
resulted in a Farrier folding tri being instantly recognizable. After the success of the 680
and 720 he moved to the US where Corsair Marine produced over 450 F27’s – later
refinements produced the F9A (F31) and F25, both being extrapolations of F27.

Cheekee Monkee was a Catch 22 version of his F31. Farrier had been scathing in his
criticism of high performance multihulls saying that this was “something anyone could do
and to get a fast boat – you just put on a large rig, build lightweight and have no
accommodation, plus also suffer the ease of capsize and have no resale value too.”

Actually some courage and conviction is required to build such a craft – remember
Jim Young’s comment: “Everyone wants sports cars but invariably, once the real decision
time comes round, they end up with family saloons.” Farrier nevertheless hypocritically
denounced Cheekee Monkee and others like it but also worked on it at the same time,
building new carbon beams for the boat. Nautical web sites were quick to point out
this discrepancy and posted pithy comments along with images of Cheekee Monkee with one
float torn off and parked at a marina. Apparently the angled foils provided excessive
lifting moments in fresh winds and seas, snapping the float at the junctions of beams
to floats. Some heavy weather images show the trimaran being driven very hard and
sailing very fast with plenty of sail aloft and with the boat taking a savage beating
– so it is understandable that things began to go pop.

Since people were breathing heavily on his designs (and making mistakes), Farrier
produced, after many months of his usual rigorous research and design development,
an all carbon, high performance F35C to counter the bad press resulting from
Cheekee Monkee’s breakage; the new design looks a formidable, expensive craft,
low wooded, greater beam proportionately to his earlier design, tall, rotating
wing mast, large sail area and other high performance solutions of which he was
formerly very critical.

Conclusion – Brett Bakewell – White

What a fantastic period of yachting development, the likes of which we will never see
again. Volvo 60’s and 70’s seem like an obvious extension of the New Zealand school and
there is absolutely no doubt that the 60 class was completely dominated by Farr. His recent
Open 60 “Virbac” is also showing tremendous promise.

The NZ school must mention the likes of Kevin Dibley, Ian Vickers, and Steve
Thompson, who continue with the dinghy concept and are now selling and building
worldwide – maybe not quite the innovators of the earlier period, but definitely disciples. I
think that the advent of the computer has meant that the days of breakthrough schools of
thought are pretty much gone.

The other area is the New Zealanders at the forefront of structural design, High
Modulus and SP Systems rule the world of marine composites, all kiwis. Adhesive
Technologies Chris Timms and ATL’s Arnie Duckworth introduced ground breaking resin
systems and new lightweight building products. These guys may not be designers in the
pure sense of the word, but they are responsible for the designers being able to refine and
pursue their ideas to the limits. The reality is that boats have now become so complex that
no one designer can produce a complete boat now and these consultant designers have
become an essential part of the design process – along with the specialist spar designers,
systems designers, and occasionally the aero/hydrodynamicists.

Perhaps one of the most ironic twists is that the kiwi designers that terrorized the
establishment with their designs of the 1970’s are now well and truly the ‘establishment’.
It is also perhaps strange that Farr with all his success has continued to pursue the
lightweight concept in the Americas Cup class – and this has failed, whilst Davidson,
who was the first to go long and heavy, succeeding in the zone that they had earlier rebelled against.

Davidson was employed by Farr during the NZL20 campaign and he recommended the
long and heavy approach, but Farr rejected it and pursued the ‘skiff-on-steroids’ approach.
The failure of NZL20 in the heavy displacement Americas Cup is I feel a valid commentary
for this book as well.”