How To Build H28 Twenty-Eight Foot Auxiliary Cruising Ketch
Designed by L. Francis Herreshoff
Adapted from the Rudder, December 1942.
Our editor is pleased to introduce as the latest “How To” a twenty-eight foot auxiliary cruising ketch designed by L. Francis Herreshoff. The designer will describe the boat in the following issues. We will limit ourselves to a few random remarks of a general nature.
For some time past readers have been urging us to turn out a small round bottom auxiliary suitable for general coastwise cruising, yet able enough to take dirty weather she might encounter in some of her longer hops in open water. The ketch rig was selected as the best adapted for cruising, the easiest to handle, allowing rapid reduction of sail area without the tedious job of reefing, which in a confused sea and adverse conditions (the only time you do reef) is a tiring job to say the least.
There are a number of arguments against the ketch rig which we would like to discuss now. First of all, it is constantly stated that the ketch is slow ... it’s slow if not properly designed. No one can say the L. Francis Herreshoff ketches are sluggish. His are the fastest ever built as proven by a number of successful boats (the seventy-four foot Landfall, seventy-two foot Tioga, fifty- seven foot Bounty, forty-five foot Mobjack and several others). His secret of success besides hull lines is the large sail area allowed. Since sail reduction is so easy and rapid, more sails can be carried.
The next fallacy we would like to lay low is the statement constantly heard that the mizzen mast in the cockpit is a nuisance. That is unadulterated nonsense. If you speak to anyone who has owned or sailed a ketch you will find him agreeing with us that the mast in the cockpit is a definite asset. It’s something solid to brace yourself against. If the seas run high and the elements knock the little ship around, as they will, you have a solid structural member of the ship to hold on to. Think of the binnacles that usually take the punishment . . . in a ketch you have the mizzen as solid support.
The most ridiculous statement of all is that the mizzen mast obstructs visibility. Who in the world sits dead amidships when sailing a boat? You either sit to weather or, if working her carefully to windward, you’d sit to loo’rd watching the jib. You know, of course, the jib luffs first .. . watching the mainsail is amateur stuff. All fine racing skippers watch the jib and follow the breeze around like a cat follows the mouse. This is why you sometimes notice the wake of a boat working to windward in light airs isn’t straight, but wavy . . . her helmsman is watching his headsails and hugging the breeze like a fond mother her child.
You also know, or you ought to, that when working a ketch to windward you don’t trim all your sails equally flat. Your mizzen is flattest, then the main, then the jib. It’s just a hair’s difference, and you'll have to find the proper balance for your boat yourself, but that’s what is done to get her to foot best, and not just to hang there. Anyway, break yourself of the habit of pinching a boat ... keep moving!
About reducing canvas on a ketch, one of the advantages of a ketch is the number of adjustments of sail area that can be made. Not only is it possible to keep the center of sail area the same with several combinations of area, but it often happens that you want all your sail way forward when reaching in a very strong wind and sea, when the jib alone can be used. Or, if you should want to lay to, well head to the wind, the mizzen only can be used, and on a ketch the mizzen is large enough to keep her head well up. But on a yawl it is often too small and she will lay in the trough of the sea.
The ketch has always been recognized as the best cruising rig, but with a gaff mainsail it was impossible to run a spring stay from the head of the mainmast to the mizzen so they always had trouble supporting the mizzen mast fore and aft. Now that the leg-o’-mutton sail has come into popularity, this trouble has been done away with.
Probably one of the greatest advantages of the ketch is the ability to lay head to the wind under several circumstances quite often met with, like when laying to an anchor or mooring with sail set. If the mizzen is flattened down and the other sails cast loose, also a ketch can be sailed backwards directly to leeward which is often an advantage, but, of course, not so necessary if there is an auxiliary motor.
As for the hull of H 28, she will in many respects have the qualities of a double-ender and many of her sections are similar to the Colin Archer double-enders, but it is thought a small transom is such a saving in expense and workmanship that the designer has adopted it, for particularly the amateur would have great difficulty with the sharp bends of a quickly tucked up stern and when sailing well heeled down, as we Americans are accustomed to do, the typical Norwegian pilot boat stern causes poor steering.
H 28 has rather flaring sides and this is to increase the deck room and keep down spray, although it might make her rather more lively in a sea than she otherwise would be, but it must be realized that we cannot suit all tastes in one design.