Opposite ends of the design spectrum |
| Monday, 26 July 2004 |
You couldn’t get two more different boats represented in the same news feature. The first is instantly recognisable as a day sailing gaffer. Yes, this boat has been drawn by the same office that produces futuristic machines such as Mike Golding’s Ecover Open 60. Allen Clarke and Liz Tier have been working on the design of a number of boats for the Plymouth based company Timeless Yachts. Built in China, this is the first of a range of production sailing and motorboats for which Owen Clarke are undertaking the design (see the Design Consultancy page on the website). The first yacht arrived from Hong Kong in June and as this article is written she is sailing around the Devon and Cornwall coast taking part in a television program about the joys of cruising, drinking and eating in the West Country. Sounds like a nice job if you can get it! Commenting on the boat Chris Denham, of Denham Productions, west country sailor and bon viveur has told us that she was "ridiculously fast and easy to handle, the fastest little boat he'd sailed"
The second design featured is a Swath that has been produced in Owen Clarke’s Dartmouth office by Charlotte Rigg. Charlotte isn’t our latest recruit however. She came and spent a week with Allen last year as part of a school workshop period and went on a crash course with Rhino and Maxsurf. This time she worked for two weeks in the office with Merfyn and her assignment was an entry into Concept Boat 2004. She decided to produce an ecologically friendly powerboat design based around the needs of the Environmental Protection Agency and inland waterway users. As you can see, Charlotte’s got pretty good at Maxsurf, Rhino and we also ran the design through Hydromax as well.
The hull configuration significantly minimizes the effect of boating on the environment as it has a significantly reduced wake in comparison to displacement hulls and therefore will not damage riverside plants or the riverbank, decreasing erosion and making the river a safer place. Also, the low wake feature of the swath impacts less on boaters, swimmers and other marine users
The vessel itself is energy and resource efficient as the swath design has very low drag and therefore uses less power. The engine is of low emission and non-polluting design as it makes use of Liquid Petroleum Gas, which is more environmentally friendly than petrol as the carbon monoxide emissions are about 80% less than petrol and 40% less than diesel.
The competition was open to amateur and professional designers alike and the results will be announced at the Southampton International Boatshow in September. We’d like to wish Charlotte the best of luck.
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