PETESBOAT, MOTOR/SAILER, 24'X7', 1500 POUNDS EMPTY

This boat was designed for Pete James, brother of Karl James who built the original Jewelbox. Petesboat is an overall enlargement of Jewelbox and I'm guessing a 50% increase in volume and weight over Jewelbox. The hull shape is patterned after my Twixt and thus has a warped V entry to reduce pounding and a wide stern to improve performance under power. There was much discussion about whether the warped V entry was worth the extra work. Converting to a simple flat bottom entry would be easy. On Twixt I'm quite certain the V is worth the work and Ed Heins praised the V entry on his Tween, but perhaps not on these larger boats.

Unlike Jewelbox, Petesboat is supposed to be a planing motorsailer. Picking through the numbers in Dave Gerr's writings, and assuming Petesboat will weigh 2100 pounds ready to go, I figured it takes 40 honest horses to plane out at 17 knots. 15 horses will push it 9 knots and it looks like nothing in between makes much sense. Pete used it with a 4 horse motor the first season and reported 5 knots on the GPS with it. Second season he fitted 30 hp and said it planed at 15 knots full throttle. Then he purchased a new 60 hp outboard which gave 20 knots at full throttle. He said she handles very well although he didn't try any hairpin turns. He's still tinkering with trim tabs to lower the nose a bit under power. Fuel consumption with a 60 hp engine would normally run about 6 gal/hr so you see the down side of trying to "cruise" with a planing boat.

The sail rig is a 200 square foot balanced lug with a single pivoting leeboard. The rudder is offset to one side and the big motor is on centerline. We motor with the rudder retracted and sail with the motor retracted. Pete reports the effect of all the offsets in the rigging is nothing - she handles the same in both tacks. He says she always goes about 8.5 knots on the GPS reaching in a good wind.

The plywood bill looks like six sheets of 1/4", 5 sheets of 3/8", and 14 sheets of 1/2". The tinted Plexiglas for the windows can get expensive and it will often be worthwhile to get the plastic companies to bid against one another. In spite of its size this is still simple jigless construction.