Building a Light Performance Sailing Canoe isn’t Difficult
Assembly of the beautiful BETH Sailing Canoe. Photos of all the major stages.
Foiling Week 2018 Pt 2 – Foiling Sail for the rest of us!
Foiling for the mainstream. Part 1 focussed on the bleeding edge, but that is a minority of sailors. This part reports on work done on foilers that are stable, easy to sail and don’t do dramatic crashes. Boats for the mainstream
What is the the Goat Island Skiff’s carry capacity? VIDEOS
How much weight can a light homebuilt boat carry? It turns out … quite a bit if designed the right way. And without becoming a slug to sail
Foiling week 2018 Part 1 – composites and foils – Sydney
I found myself at Foiling Week 2018 in Sydney. There are two groups involved in foiling with a large gulf between them. The out and out high expense group who see themselves as the future of sailing. The other group is much more interesting to me as it looks at the stability and handling advantages of foiling which are only just starting to be explored.
Oz Goose National Titles Philippines 2017 – Video
17 boats and over 40 sailors attended the Championships for the Oz Goose class was held at Taal Lake Yacht Club south of Manila late November 2017. Series sponsor was Hyde Sails International, sailors from all main regions of the Philippines attended.
Calendar Cover Photo Retrospective Goat Island Skiff
Some of the best Calendar Covers for the yearly Goat Island Skiff Calendar. Put together by the builders and sailors.
Goat Island Skiff Calendar 2018 is out for Christmas.
The goat island Skiff calendar 2018 is out now for christmas
Vote for the year’s best Goat Island Skiff photos on FB
Help us vote for the best photos of the year! The Goat Island Skiff group on Facebook puts out a calendar and we have 160 brilliant photos. Your votes will select the shortlist for the 12 or 14 we will put in the Calendar.
Videos – GIS cruising on Lake Como with nice helming technique
Sailing and handling the steering and sail together can be confusing. But racing dinghy sailors have some techniques that will make sailing smoother and safer for more leisure oriented sailing. Your hands will be happier and probably your head too!
Tip – boat details – spacing inwale spacers right.
How do I get nice looking intervals for the inwale spacers on my boat? Photos. How many expensive clamps do I need for the job?
BETH Sailing Canoe for sale – Narrabeen Lakes, Australia
Dennis, in Sydney, has been blitzing around in his beautifully built Beth sailing canoe for well over a decade. He now has to reluctantly let go of this lovely looking boat. It really is for experienced dinghy sailors, but is rewarding to sail and easier on the bod than a Laser!
Kanangra Photos – BETH Sailing Canoe in South Australia
A particularly beautiful BETH sailing Canoe Kanangra Launched in South Australia. Also some lug sail setup information
20 ways to boost Lug rig and lug sail performance! Rigging and Tuning.
All our lug rig information on one page. We have seen the change from the balance lug being almost forgotten to becoming the predominant rig for small self built wooden boat. This was the situation a hundred years ago. We can still use the cheapness and effectiveness of this rig to create boats with very quick and pleasant sailing characteristic.
When box boats got our attention – Oz Racer then Goose Sailboats
How we discovered our box boat designs were good … and how they (or any other boat can reach its potential for very small extra effort. It is mostly in the thinking!
Honey, I shrank the boat and it don’t work no more.
I’ve written about the stupid statements that get put on the net elsewhere. Here someone took the wrong advice “that you can stretch or shrink a boat a percentage” and applied it to one of my Goat Island Skiff plans. It wasn’t OK … the boat was useless after.
Strip planked Fenwick Williams Catboat at Port Vincent Boat show
More photos of Fenwick Williams Catboat built in Strip Plank by David Wilson at Duckflat, Adelaide
Some Fun Boat Stuff – our old design projects page.
A collection of some of our fun projects. Often collaborations. Some turned into production designs and others gave us significant learning!
Design process from simple to complicated – Plywood Murray Riverboat
The problem with design is that it is relatively cheap. Sometimes fixed price. But it is not realised what successive design iterations are doing to the boat.
In the end Chris was unable to complete the boat. Partially because the hull turned out to be in much worse condition than expected. But also despite some nice positives coming in terms of usable space below, other things just seemed to get more and more complex.
Foiling – Forefront vs Fakes
Who is Foiling and who is Faking. Where is the real technical development? First a glimpse of history before we see who is foiling and how the Moth group solved all the problems. Yes … all of them. America’s cup just leaches off this amazing technical success. It is Trickle Up … not Trickle Down.
The 24ft steam canoe project for the Murray River Lakes
The AMAZING steam canoe project. I designed the hullshape and Roger Baker built it. Strip planked with American Oak trim. One of the most striking boats on the Lower Murray River – or anywhere!