Hi,
I built Kleen Breeze (formerly Luca Antara) from plans provided by Peter at Etamax. Rob Denney made the basic design and then Peter, who is an architect and a friend of Rob, made up the full hull,beam and mast plans. After constructing the hulls (from western red cedar), beams and masts in a warehouse I took them to a boatyard and put them together. Then I built the interiors to my design.
Wisdom from experience
- I learned that 50% of home builds do not get completed, and the ones that are completed take an average of 8 years. I built the largest HarryProa to date at 20 metres, and took 7 years to do it. I had expected it to take about 4 years to build. I would recommend that you limit the size to make it easier.
- It took 3 years to build the hulls, masts, and beams. It took a further 4 years to build the interior and fit it out. There is a lot of work to be done once the basic shape has been built.
- The cost of the basic shape was less than a third of the completed boat. Fitting out can be very expensive.
- I chose western red cedar as I wanted a cruising boat, and because I did not want to get involved with vacuum bagging. While cedar is much heavier than foam, foam absorbs a lot more epoxy resin. I still believe I made the right call on this. There is actually not much difference in the basic end weight, and I believe I have a more solid boat. However, if you are very knowledgeable about foam methods, there is no doubt that you could build the basic shape faster.
- I built the carbon fibre wing masts myself. So far, in 35 knot winds they appear to be solid. They are heavy though, maybe 300kg heavier than if done professionally. I would still build wing (rather than round) free standing masts because firstly, they only bend sideways in high winds (they do not bend fore and aft), and secondly, I believe they give me more than 30% more power, especially in light winds. If I was building them now, I would probably have them done professionally, however, at the time I could not find anyone who could build 17 metre wing masts. I understand that Peter at Etamax can now do this.
- The sails were designed with a large roach, and are square topped to spill gusts. During sea trials we observed that Peter had designed the masts so that the top 3rd bends through about 10 degrees in gusts. The square top is unnecessary, and actually makes for difficulty when stowing the sails under their sail covers.
- The daggerboard/rudders and steering assemblies into which they fit were built professionally, due to their critical importance in heavy weather.
Best regards,
Robin Warde.
On Tue, Aug 22, 2017 at 6:54 PM, '.' eruttan@yahoo.com [harryproa] <harryproa@yahoogroups.com.au> wrote:
Thanks for those links!
I was meaning home builders, building from plans. I am looking to see what their personal build experiences have been. And to see if there is any wisdom they would like to share.
On August 22, 2017 7:45:12 AM EDT, "realink@iprimus.com.au [harryproa]" <harryproa@yahoogroups.com.au> wrote:and not to forget the builders, Ballotta
https://www.cata-ballotta.com/harryproa
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Posted by: Robin Warde <robin.warde@gmail.com>
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