Tough boat.
The question is was he towed or did he sail off?


Gary

That's absolutely amazing. And as one who can't stop believing that boats are alive, I can't help thinking that the boat sailed itself off!

tough little boat!!!!

Very smart coxswain on the first powerboat!
I think it was luck. The yacht just fell away on starboard and the mainsail filled powering her off just as a wave passed under her. I bet that swimmer was surprised when the boat sailed past him!

Good to have a feel good video for a change and see two professional mariners handling the powerboats well.

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Ramona said..
Very smart coxswain on the first powerboat!
I think it was luck. The yacht just fell away on starboard and the mainsail filled powering her off just as a wave passed under her. I bet that swimmer was surprised when the boat sailed past him!

Good to have a feel good video for a change and see two professional mariners handling the powerboats well.

You're right Ramona at 2:40 you can see the boat swing downwind at just the right time a smaller swell picks the keel up off the rocks and she sails out in a lull between the sets

Love to see how she got there!

Looked bloody rough out to sea!

Looks like he was about where I dropped the red pin ...... 33.841507, -118.393589 ..... in Google maps



I think the comments on Youtube will start hotting up soon

Better result than for these poor guys. The pier is to the right in above picture.

Obviously not a Lexcen design...or is it?
Anyway just proves the point never give up

A couple of photos from SA. Bend the rudder back down, good to go!

That looks like a problem spade rudders are subject to.

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samsturdy said..
That looks like a problem spade rudders are subject to.

Another way of looking at it Sam is that the rudder took a lot of punishment that otherwise might have been transferred to the hull had it had a skeg.
Damn tough boat though, however you look at it.

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LooseChange said..

samsturdy said..
That looks like a problem spade rudders are subject to.

Another way of looking at it Sam is that the rudder took a lot of punishment that otherwise might have been transferred to the hull had it had a skeg.
Damn tough boat though, however you look at it.

Yes, that's a point LC although I don't know that MB would agree that the absence of a skeg is better.

There are pros and cons with skeg and spade rudders.

I was horrified by the video and had a tough time watching it. That the yacht survived the pounding is amazing.

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samsturdy said..

LooseChange said..

samsturdy said..
That looks like a problem spade rudders are subject to.

Another way of looking at it Sam is that the rudder took a lot of punishment that otherwise might have been transferred to the hull had it had a skeg.
Damn tough boat though, however you look at it.

Yes, that's a point LC although I don't know that MB would agree that the absence of a skeg is better.

As cisco says, there are pros and cons.

A spade rudder will give better performance especially downwind/sea but at the expense of strength especially to impacts. If I was seriously racing a yacht it would have a spade rudder and I would be very wary of exposing it to damage.

For a cruising sailor in a well found yacht a skeg hung rudder should be preferred for its strength.

A well constructed skeg protects the rudder, will take any impact that any part of the boat can take and allows the ruddder to be supported at top, middle and bottom.

The weak rudder post on this particular yacht would bend in a decent sea, although to be fair the boat may not be intended to be an offshore capable vessel. A solid rudder post like that on a Cole 43 or S&S34 won't bend like that without damaging the hull and rudder post tube, risking a catastrophic leak like that which sank Morning Tide.

For a boat to go through what that boat did and come out with what appears to be so minor damage you can't knock the strength of it. I don't think any rudder would survive with the full weight of the boat being slammed on it. Even an S&S.

So could the rudder post in this case be considered like a shear pin and actually be designed to bend
rather than break the boat ??. Would it be right to say that designers look at options like this in the interest
of designing a boat that is safer than others, or am I missing the point that it's really just a weak rudder post ?.

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twodogs1969 said..
For a boat to go through what that boat did and come out with what appears to be so minor damage you can't knock the strength of it. I don't think any rudder would survive with the full weight of the boat being slammed on it. Even an S&S.

I agree, it is a solid boat but the rudder post on this yacht is clearly quite thin as shown on the photos. If a spade rudder equipped yacht with a solid rudder post had the rudder slammed like this boat had, it is not likely the post would have bent without cracking the hull.

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samsturdy said..
So could the rudder post in this case be considered like a shear pin and actually be designed to bend
rather than break the boat ??. Would it be right to say that designers look at options like this in the interest
of designing a boat that is safer than others, or am I missing the point that it's really just a weak rudder post ?.

Quite possible Sam. But do you really want a yacht designed with the rudder as a weak shear point in an ocean going vessel?
Maybe your point is a clue to why so many race boats retire with 'rudder failure' as the reason.

But what is a better outcome
Very strong rudder post breached hull or weaker post that bent and boat still floats?
My point is whomever the designer and builders were it is a bloody strong boat to go through what that boat did and come out with what appears to be so minor damage. Maybe the weaker post is a design feature as Sam suggested to save the hull from breaching.

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MorningBird said..

samsturdy said..
So could the rudder post in this case be considered like a shear pin and actually be designed to bend
rather than break the boat ??. Would it be right to say that designers look at options like this in the interest
of designing a boat that is safer than others, or am I missing the point that it's really just a weak rudder post ?.

Quite possible Sam. But do you really want a yacht designed with the rudder as a weak shear point in an ocean going vessel?
Maybe your point is a clue to why so many race boats retire with 'rudder failure' as the reason.

Yes good point MB. It's been said before that boats are a compromise so I suppose things on boats are
designed NOT to break, but if they do.....look out.

A boat put through that sort of punishment may have alot of underlying damage to the glass. Although it may not be holed and depending on the age, the polyester may be brittle and crack between the layers of glass, de-laminating causing that white bruising.

I recently created a repair job on a hull because I temporally spot glued a fitting to the bottom of the hull with epoxy,,, just so I could make a pattern for fairing the part to the hull. When i went to break it off, the fitting was stuck to the first layer of glass better than that layer was stuck to the next and it de laminated., I don't think 80's built grp boats are as tough as we might think( or they are just getting brittle) and I have been told there was some poor polyester resin used to build boats of that era, mine included.

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twodogs1969 said..
But what is a better outcome
Very strong rudder post breached hull or weaker post that bent and boat still floats?
My point is whomever the designer and builders were it is a bloody strong boat to go through what that boat did and come out with what appears to be so minor damage. Maybe the weaker post is a design feature as Sam suggested to save the hull from breaching.

Or a skeg hung rudder that is supported along its length to mitigate the possibility of either bending the rudder post or breaching the hull?
Given enough punishment any boat can suffer a catastrophic failure. In a cruising boat sufficient strength to withstand all but the extraordinary is my preference.

Plenty of skeg hung rudders fold up too. The skeg just snaps off. Check out the photos of the yachts damaged in the Florida storms. That rudder looks to be a solid SS rod. If the designer wanted to make it indestructible it would be a larger diameter hollow tube. Most yachts that go up the beach don't have there rudders damaged at all. Getting slammed down on rocks is something a designer can't foresee.

On the x-Yacht the rudderpost is in a seperate water tight compartment formed by the aft lazzarett.

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andy59 said..
On the x-Yacht the rudderpost is in a seperate water tight compartment formed by the aft lazzarett.

Yes....same as the Santana.