I also decided that for sensible cruising (as opposed to just burning around in the bay) I need a set of reef points, while a furling jib would also be nice. So for next season I will fit the boom and also get a better mainsail. For as soon as you ease the mainsheet the sail goes baggy and you can no longer point and tacking is hard. (Something I had actually already learnt when sailing a Dart 18). I found that the boomless mainsail is horrible. The other boats on the video are a F24, a F32, a Banks 35, a Horstman 38 and Bad Kitty, one of the fastest 35ft cats in the world. In the last shot I appear from the right. Unfortunately, after the first sequence I was rather along way from shore, but you should be able to see that I did sail at a steady 10 knots for much of the time (11.2 was the highest speed on the gps). An indication of the wind strength was that I was the only boat unreefed (because I can't - yet), a Farrier 32 was double reefed. The local multihull association (the BCMS) was having a regatta so I decided to sail along with the fleet for a while. The wind was certainly well over 20 knots at times. In fact the first time this year that we saw white horses in our normal sailing area.
So, as you can see, with a bit of time spent modifying things, you can use parts from most beach cats. The jib is also from a Tornado, but 38 years old. The mainsail a cut down 18sqm and the mast a shortened Tornado mast. On the prototype the outriggers are cut down 18ft singlehander hulls. I am experimenting with a boomless mainsail, early days yet. A very comfortable and easy boat to sail. The gps showed a maximum speed of 6.2 knots, yet as you can see there was hardly any wind. Even with the raised wing and lowered windscreen there will still be plenty of room below with the cuddy fitted. Even before launching our Strike I decided to raise the wing bottoms slightly and to lower the front windscreen. One reason why I build prototypes is to refine the design. The Strike is available as both an open deck boat, as we have built, and also one with a removable cuddy for a basic one/two person micro cruiser. We look forward to some more wind, when I will make a more detailed report of the sailing performance, but in the meantime here are some photos. Even so the boat sailed really well and was extremely comfortable to sail. Unfortunately, as is often the case in BC in the summer, winds for the first sail were very light. The prototype Strike was launched in Canada on September 2nd 2009. The cabin top is removable to convert a fast day sailing boat that sits six in dry comfort into a simple pocket cruiser that sleeps two. The main hull is plywood and has a dory shape that is extremely easy to build. The 18ft STRIKE is a trimaran design that uses a 16ft beach cat as the outriggers/amas and rig.
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