Andrew wrote some really nice words about the performance and strong wind handling of the BETH sailing canoe. He is an experienced racing dinghy sailor.
We were discussing the new Viola Sailing Canoe on Facebook. Plywood Sailing canoes are kinda my specialty.
Andrew built his own BETH. It was my first design a couple of decades ago and was intended to be a crazy fast but simple boat. I ended up with a strong weather downwind addiction just like Andrew!
We also have a story about club racing a Beth with more “modern” boats including an approximate PY – Portsmouth Yardstick
Andrew’s comments on sailing the BETH sailing canoe in high winds
I just looked up the weather records for my last day of sailing on my summer break in BETH last year.
It was a gloomy day and I might not have gone out if I wasn’t so eager for that one last whoosh around the harbor.
Well I got whoosh as the breeze really picked up while I was out and despite having both reefs in it was a pantswettingly fun run.
I had a headland I could use as a bit of wind shade to work my way upwind, then I’d pop out into the open for a wild downwind run, over and over I did this.
BETH retained her good manners the whole time, and as the surfing grew more and more exciting I thought a lot about exactly what you’re saying about that canoe stern helping keep things much more on track.
Before I knew the boat this well I was really a bit nervous about strong wild conditions but I realize more and more that stuff that makes wide assed boats quite tweaky is just the kind of stuff a skinny boat like Beth -or Viola- will take in stride. Weather Underground recorded winds from 14-22mph with gusts up to 30 (I doubt I saw any of those gusts).
I didn’t even come close to dumping the boat and I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face for days.
General comments on designing sailing canoes and other boats to handle well in tough conditions of wind and wave
Andrew was writing this because we were discussing the new Viola Sailing Canoe which is more of a concept to appeal to mainstream sailing dinghy sailors. Neither boat has a classic canoe cross section – both are focussed on much more sailing dinghy-like stability.
Something I wrote struck a chord with Andrew …
The notable things in my mind are
1/ Photographing fast boats is really hard because they make relatively little fuss at speed. Take something big and heavy and it looks like it is going a million miles an hour at half the speed.
2/ Joost is still right in the middle of the boat. He hasn’t moved back to get the nose up, the boat is doing that by itself. That is why this open boat (that way for lightness) has been quite successful at keeping going in RAID events when the wind and waves get up.
3/ Looking at the videos shows very few tiller movements and no tiller compensation when the boat heels. That’s been one of my trademarks. From the Goose, to the GIS, to BETH – the boat has fingertip steering control at any angle of heel and in most wave conditions. Other boats would require big rudder inputs to keep from spearing off in waves and extreme gusts and touch and go behaviour when sticking the nose into wavebacks. Several other of the better recreational designers do something similar, but for the most part the racing boats have mostly forgotten this.
There was actually a nice discussion between Julian Bethwaite who designed the 49er and a couple of other fast racing dinghy designers. Wish I could find it. He was basically saying that the other designer’s boats have a higher top speed. But his boats are easier to control in tough conditions. I can see that in the shapes too – he steers away from the wide sterns and super straight keelines aft that make the noses of boats tricksy to keep out of the water in wilder conditions.
Video of the Viola Sailing Canoe
Here is the video that the Viola still image is lifted from. You can see that Joost, sailing the boat, hasn’t had to move aft to keep the nose out. It rises by itself. There are a couple of little features that promote that behaviour. It proved very useful in the Dorestad RAID event 2017. Joost was sailing when the wind came in strong forcing a few of the larger boats to shore, but in the waves the Viola was OK if a bit wet.
Video image can take a moment to load.
A lot of this thinking came from Beth and also sailing the strange OzRacers and OzGeese – as these boats travel with bows well up when at speed.
