If you want a boat which will row and sail with equal efficiency, then you are a minority interest and have some difficult decisions to make. Consider the following:—

(1) For rowing, the narrower the beam, the faster the craft, but a narrow beam is no good for sailing. Coastal rowing boats have beams of about 4’. In Inshore Dinghy Sailing, Crab Searle says, “Increasing the beam from 4’ to 5’ increases the stability by 100%. Increasing from 5’ to 6’ increases the stability by a further 50%.” This may be an oversimplification but the message is clear.

(2) Side decks can provide extra buoyancy when heeled and prevent the craft from swamping, but they get in the way of the oars. A proper layout is important for efficient and tireless rowing. Peter Glover and George Dyer got it right in Bulletin 102, spring 1984. See also Working Boats of Britain, by Eric McKee, published Conway 1983. With side decks the correct geometry can only by achieved by:—

(a) Raising the rowlocks on blocks.

(b) Having panels in the side deck which can be removed for rowing.

(3) For rowing, the keel should be long and straight, the craft trimmed level or slightly down by the stern (she will yaw if trimmed by the head). Properly trimmed, she will run straight in spite of winds on bow or quarter. Craft with a higher freeboard should have a correspondingly deeper draft along the whole length of the keel to maintain directional stability, in spite of the extra windage of the higher topsides. This shape of keel is not good for sailing, being inefficient at preventing leeway, and providing no deep pivotal point around which the hull can turn when going about. With such a hull, tacking can be an uncertain business, though a big improvement can be made by trimming her a few inches deeper by the stern. A rockered keel is better for going about, but I know of only one situation when a rockered keel is advantageous in a rowing boat; that is when a fast flowing stream with an uneven bed (e.g. the River Tweed) causes strong eddies which spin the boat off course. A rockered keel allows corrections to be made quicker, and more easily, than a straight one.

(4) The windage of the mast and rigging is considerable. The Norsemen lowered their mast for rowing to windward, and laid it in the bottom of their boat. In Shetland and Norwegian boats the thwarts could be lifted out for this purpose, but the mast was quite short and unsuitable for our efficient modern rigs.

(5) If equipped with oars at all, modern boats usually have one pair of oars for use by one person. Yet two people with four oars increase the power by 100% with negligible increase in drag. Three people with six oars give a further increase of 50%. A popular saying from several places along the coast of Norway was, “Three men in a six-oared boat will make the trip regardless of the weather.” Photographs and drawings of such vessels can be seen in Inshore Craft of Norway, published by Conway, 1979. When all members of the crew are rowing, the boat goes faster, and no one gets cold.

Shetland Fourern Solveig built Cooper, Windermere, 1979 Re-rigged 1982.

Deck by Elton Boatbuilding Co, Kirkcudbright, 1984

To be fitted with 750 lb lead keel for 1986 season, increasing hull depth by 3”

Holt-Allen roller jib : 40 ft² Stays’l : 30 ft² Main (gaffer) : 70 ft² LOA : 19’ 10” Beam : 6’ 3” Draft (1986) (est.) : 2’ 3” Total displacement : 1700 lb approx.

Acorn Skiff Joe Burt Designed : Ian Outred Built : Fabian Bush, 1984 Double sculls only (no sail) Good in quite rough conditions

Here being rowed on Kielder Water, Northumberland, Spring 1985.

The standard Acorn 15 can be rowed by one person or sailed.

Joe Burt is a one-off for double sculling.

(6) In Britain, the nearest to the ideal (two man) rower/sailer seems to be the Shetland Fourern, or Fourareen. This is a double-ended clinker built boat of about 20’ in length, similar to, but smaller than the Sixareen. See The Sixareen and her Racing Descendants, by Charles Sandison, published by The Shetland Times Ltd, Lerwick, 1981. The mast is slightly forward of midships, between the two oarsmen. The hull is almost V-shaped in section. Thus, when light, the waterline beam is only about 4’ and she can be rowed at a speed of 3½ to 4 knots for several miles in calm water by the likes of us. Without ballast she is very tender, but 800 lb of internal ballast (traditionally stones from the beach) provide a dramatic increase in stability. The snag (there is always a snag!) is that the cruising speed under oars falls by about ½ knot due to the increased displacement.

Speeds in excess of the theoretical maximum hull speed are possible under sail, but because of the shallow draft (2’ 3” approx.) she is not a star performer to windward. A centreplate could easily be fitted by a boatbuilder, but the mast would be in the way of the case unless the craft was re-rigged as a yawl. The addition of some decking would then produce a craft very like the canoe yawl Cherub II, designed by Albert Strange in 1893, described and illustrated in Sail and Oar, by John Leather, again published by Conway — this time in 1982. Canoe yawls of this type made some notable cruises at the turn of the century. In his canoe yawl Eel, George Holmes and Albert Strange cruised on the Elbe and the Baltic in 1907, crossing the North Sea by steamer!

Weighing in at 2 tons, Holmes’ yawl was massive compared with the average cruising dinghy. Even heavier than our converted Shetland Fourern Solveig, rigged as a gaff cutter and rowed with four oars, but otherwise rather similar to a canoe yawl.

It seems to me that this type of craft might be of interest to DCA members, particularly to those of riper years, and I will describe Solveig in more detail later if you are interested. Meanwhile the books I have mentioned will give food for thought to anyone interested in the compromise between sail and oar.