Classic_Boat_2016-08

LETTER OF THE MONTH SUPPORTED

BY OLD PULTENEY WHISKY

110 CLASSIC BOAT AUGUST 2016

Letters

Excusing Oona

Adherance to an

aesthetic

38 CLASSIC BOAT JULY 2016 CLASSIC BOAT JULY 2016 39

F

or thousands of years, sailors had no choice but to use natural fibre ropes made from the likes of

hemp, manila, sisal and coir – and to accept their shortcomings. They were prone to rot, and

though that could be lessened with tarring or waxing, this often left the lines themselves harder to handle. Their

construction, by necessity from countless, relatively short pieces twisted together, known as spun yarn, meant they

were not particularly strong.In 2016, things are very different. Any local chandler

will sell us rope so strong and supple it might as well come from a different world. Ironically, some modern

lines are so strong and inflexible that when matched with the latest non-stretch sails, they pose as big a hazard to a

wooden yacht as a relatively weak hemp line might have 100 years ago. Over the next few pages, we’ll talk about

this and take a look at the products available to the owner fitting out their classic yacht with today’s lines.

HEMP LOOKThe first synthetic ropes started to appear soon after the

Second World War. These could be produced with continuous filaments to provide greater strength, but

for many years, the colours available did not lend themselves to a traditional look.

rope manufacturers produced 3-strand polypropylene, That began to change in the late 1960s when several

known to most people as the floating blue rope, in a beige colour. In the 1980s, rope specialist Jimmy Green

Marine took things a stage further by commissioning Bridport Gundry to make a hemp-coloured 3-strand

polyester: stronger and less stretchy than polypropylene.Today there are more than 50 different hemp-

coloured rope products on the market. Although it seems logical to compare different products within certain

categories, there can be significant variations within each of those categories in terms of strength and stretch

characteristics. It is unlikely that these variations are caused by material differences as the properties of

polyester, for instance, are universal. The differences will come from the application of manufacturing techniques

such as heat setting, pre-stretching and the amount of twist, whether spun yarn or continuous filaments are

used, and the amount of material. “The more material you have, the stronger it is, but

there is a limit to how much you can pack into a given diameter,” says Martin Bean of Seago Yachting, UK

agents for Liros. Ropes must also be manufactured so they are practical. Marlow’s technical manager, Paul

Dyer, says: “Our products need to be durable, spliceable, flexible, and work in jammers and on winches and so on.

All rope design and manufacture is a compromise and the trick is understanding what you are trying to achieve.

It is often not about simple break strength.” Furthermore, it may be misleading to compare

different companies’ published breaking loads and stretch figures, as they may be measured differently.

Break loads might be the lowest in a series of tests or might be the average; they might or might not include

a splice, which can reduce a rope’s strength by about 10%. Additionally, stretch is normally measured as a

specific percentage of break load (it is measured at a higher load on a product that has a higher break load,

meaning the actual stretch will be proportionally lower on that product) and the percentage might vary between

manufacturers. To give a meaningful idea of the characteristics of different types of ropes, the figures on

page 43 are all from the same company. The quality of modern ropes is such that, in many

cases, the selection of a rope based on its diameter (so

What halyards and sheets are right for an old rig and which

modern ropes are available in that ‘classic’ look?

STORY NIGEL SHARP

CORE

VALUE S

Onboard the 19-Metre Mariquita where the

running rigging was made from English Braids’

3-strand polyester INGRID ABERY

[(Length+Beam) The ‘1730 rule’ was simply

x Beam ] / 1730

OONA 1886

46ft (14m)LOA

34ft (10.4m)LW L

5ft 6ins (1.7m)BEAM

DRAUGHT 8ft (2.4m)

DISPLACEMENT 12.5 tons

BALLAST KEEL (LEAD) 9.6 tons

BALLAST RATIO76.8%

2,120sq ft (197mSAIL AREA )

62 CLASSIC BOAT JULY 2016

They say Paton’s last yacht sounded the death knell of the 1730 rule – but is that one of the

many misconceptions about her?

THEO RYE

F

ew yachts in history are as misunderstood as Oona, the tragic swan song of her talented

now applied apparently at random to anything from the designer, William Evans Paton. She was a genuine ‘plank-on-edge’: a much-abused term,

Victorian era, but it applies correctly in this case. was a fimore than its fair share of radical designs, and the ve-tonner, a class that was small enough to have Oona

favoured playground of designers seeking to make their mark; but of a measurement rule, and was not even particularly Oona’s shape was almost purely the product

extreme in that context. having been apprenticed at the great shipbuilder A&J WE Paton had training similar to GL Watson’s, both

Inglis. Paton went from there to study at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich, before moving to Armstrong, Mitchell & Co on the Tyne. Aged just 18, he had

designed for himself a successful fiTridentLuath (1885), each progressively more extreme than the in 1879. That was followed by ve-tonner called Olga (1883) and

last, plus a successful three-tonner called also studied the designs of others, especially GL Watson, who indulged him in providing details of CurrytushClothilde. He

(1875) and attempt to correct what was felt to be an unfair tax on Oona was built to the ‘1730 rule’ of 1881, a failed Finesse (1877).

beam in the earlier Thames measurement rule. The rule was simply [(L+B)The more analytical designers soon determined that x B ] / 1730.

the new version was even worse than the old one. It was remarkably simple, as Paton noted in a paper, Points of Interest in the Designing of Racing YachtsSome ,

presented to the North East Coast Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders in March 1886. Most designers fi xed the beam and then determined the

corresponding length for the desired rating. The rest of the design was an attempt to press as much sail area, and get as much stability from the ballast, as possible.

The result was ever-narrower hulls with increasingly The rule had no sail area factor, or control of draught.

large sail areas, deep draught and remarkable ballast ratios. Oona, Paton’s ‘Design No.38’, has been

described since as a freak, but she was merely the logical result of a fla similar form and all the major designers of the era awed rule; there were plenty of others of

were doing it. produced the highly successful As early as 1879 (under the old rule), Watson had Madge, with her 7ft 9in

beam and 39ft 9in LWL, and a ballast ratio of more than 60%. Fife had produced his 9ft beam on a waterline of 53ft, and in the same year Clara in 1884, which was

Watson gave us the beam. RE Froude had produced the she was 33ft 9in LWL and 5ft 5¾in beam.Doris; 33ft 7in LWL and 5ft 7in Jenny Wren in 1885;

12 May 1886, is often held up in yachting histories as being due to the failure of her keel causing her to capsize, Oona’s loss with fi ve crew, including Paton, on

but that is a fallacy. In reality she was embayed in terrible conditions off Malahide, near Dublin, and the failure of her mainsheet horse when under trysail

probably rendered her uncontrollable. Her crew desperately cut away her mast in an effort to reduce windage, but she was wrecked on the shore. Having

been rolled in the heavy surf, it is true that her keel had been wrenched off, but contemporary commentators on site were unanimous that it was through no fl aw in her

design or build, just the appalling conditions. Two men were drowned from a 68-ton brigantine that was wrecked on the Skerries just to the north and at least

three other vessels were lost in the locality.for the 1730 rule, which was replaced by the ‘length and Oona is now also often cited as the fi nal death knell

sail area rule’ in 1887, but again this is inaccurate. The 1730 rule was disliked for producing yachts that lacked accommodation and so were practically useless for

cruising once their racing days were done. at the wrong time and was entirely unrelated to her Oona’s loss was due to her being in the wrong place

design, as the informed observers of the time were perfectly well aware.

OONA

WILLIAM EVANS PATON

CLASSIC DESIGNS

Your article on classic-look ropes shows all too clearly

how ludicrous the widespread adherence to what is called

‘authenticity’ can be. We all want to look the part, but

none of us wants to put up with sailing as it really was 100

years ago. The great number of ‘classic look’ ropes listed

in your article showed how many of us want the ease of

modern lines, but we have an idea in our minds about

what is ‘right’ on a vintage yacht – that is, we don’t want

them to look like modern lines!

In the case of ropes, there is a strong safety argument,

as the skipper of Morwenna, Robin Kenyon, makes of being

pinned to the water in a squall, unable to free off hemp

knots that had balled up hard in the wet. But the

authenticity trend goes wider than just ropes. Perhaps

people should frown less when they see a modern winch on

a wooden yacht, or learn that the deck was glued. People

get very uptight about what is ‘classic’ and what isn’t.

Onlookers become proprietorial about yachts they don’t

own, commenting that this or that modernisation is a

‘crime’. They forget that most of these boats have been

restored so greatly over the years that almost none of the

original remains. A boat can be restored back again, so that

it doesn’t have a glued deck, if a future owner wishes. More

likely is that the new owner will happily accept the glued

(and watertight) deck, blaming the glue on his predecessor!

Jules ‘Judders’ Smith, via email

What’s this boat?

I’m hoping that someone can help me identify this yacht – Z20

• and any details of its designer, builder and history. Any
  information would be most gratefully received.
  Hugh Lloyd, via email

Theo Rye takes an admirably even-handed approach when

discussing Oona, the radical design of William Evans Paton

• so radical, indeed, that it failed to save Paton and his
  crew when they found themselves on Oona in poor
  conditions. One thing not made clear in the article was
  Paton’s age when he drowned, just 23. He had already
  designed some 40 boats by this time. As is widely stated,
  had he survived, he would surely be ranked
  among the greatest designers.
  It is easy to criticise from an armchair 130 years later, but
  should not Paton and his colleagues shoulder some of the
  criticism of these early designs, which were designed to a
  rule, yes, but were just unsafe? One thing that always puzzles
  me is that as naval architects and sailors themselves, they
  surely would have known they were drawing yachts that
  were inherently unstable. Commercial restraints may have
  made it difficult not to take commissions, but no designer
  wants his name on an upturned hull.
  Anthony Leleux, Hampstead, London