Gunboat68 Crossing Debrief

Join us for a wrap-up of our three-part series on crossing the Atlantic Ocean on a Gunboat 68. It’s an informal discussion filmed while en route from Antigua to our next job in Martinique. The usual trade winds had disappeared and we thought it would be a good opportunity to debrief and share our thoughts on boat set up and performance.

We had lots of questions from this video series and the vast majority were clearly from viewers wanting to understand more about how these performance multihulls operate.

In this video we discuss losing a rudder while on the way to the Azores. Credit where it is due – Gunboat have nailed their rudder system on the 68. The Gunboat 68 rudder blade and box system is fantastic. This system allowed the crew to remove the damaged rudder and continue sailing without having to enter the water. This is a critical part of a well thought out design – keeping the crew safe! If you have ever done any beach catamaran sailing or seen an A Class catamaran then you will understand the approach Gunboat has taken with their rudder system. It must be noted that not everyone has been so successful with their attempts at adopting this concept to the larger performance multihulls and there are other rudder and box configurations by other multihull designs that do not come near to the Gunboat in terms of execution and reliability.

We also touch on daggerboard placement as we do get asked this question a lot both on these Gunboat videos and on our own Catana42 sailing videos. This is a complex topic and one that probably requires its own video to really show how to use your boards. The main thing to remember is that multihulls with daggerboards – whether it is a Catana 42 or a Gunboat 68 are designed to be sailed with their daggerboards down. They are there to reduce the sideways slip in the water and to give the rudders something to steer around. So the question you need to think is when DON’T you use your daggerboards? Nine times out of ten even the extra drag of keeping daggerboards down still outweighs the cost of bringing them up and losing out on control. Check out our playlist on Daggerboard placement if you would like to learn more.

The deck layout and the use of clutches and slave rings is a variation along an old theme. Each design has a deck layout which will require a combination of a lot of different solutions depending on what is required to effectively sail the boat. With advancements in technologies, more ways to tackle engineering issues onboard become available and this coupled with the fact that each sailor and/or designer has their own opinion on what operates well and looks good aesthetically means there are many solutions. For our members make sure you check out our Clutches and padeyes on the Gunboat 68 videos which go through these two topics in detail.

Hopefully, this series gave you all an insight into what it is like to sail and deliver these types of boats at a professional level.