Peter and Mike Stevenson, Part 2

     The Gaff Rig continues the interview of Peter and Mike Stevenson, of Stevenson Projects, the creators of the Weekender, Vacationer and Pocket Cruiser. Part 1 of the interview premiered in the last edition, with Peter hinting at the possibility of a 20 year anniversary "celebration" of the Weekender’s debut.

     THE GAFF RIG: A celebration?
     PETER: It’s important to realize at this crossroads that we support the kind of approach to boating that spawned the Weekender: builder-skippers enjoying what we’ve come to call "barefoot sailing." There are as many approaches to boating as any other endeavor, everything from snobbish yachtery to lets-go-rent-a-boat-and-run-into-something. If we have anything to say about it, the Weekender movement will favor those who seek an escape and a breath of fresh air from the organized nonsense of life. Weekender events should reflect a mood of self-reliant, non-consumerism, and quiet retreat from the hype, a kind of romantic-practicality that had always surrounded people who build boats to sail (which is slightly different from people who build boats and like to live in their shops.)

      THE GAFF RIG: Members of the BYYB joke about being "seduced" by the lines of the Pocket Yachts, but beyond being "sexy," the boats seem to fit that care-free philosophy. And sometimes we want more. Is there a 24’, blue water Weekender-style cruiser in our futures?
      PETER: There’s a refreshing pragmatic eclecticism in people who want to build a boat to sail, rather than something to stroke and polish. There already has been a twenty-four foot Weekender, and it was one of the boats we quietly sawed into firewood. The boat was simply too large for the stressed-skin building techniques. The stressed skin still worked, but the loads on the stringers were getting large, too large for the same concept that makes the 16’ on deck Weekender fun. So no, there won’t be another twenty-four footer in the future.

      THE GAFF RIG: Any new boats coming out?
      PETER: We are thinking seriously about going to the other end of the scale with a new Super-Skipjack, the design that led directly into the Weekender. We’ve learned a lot of tricks since then that could add to its versatility. Plus it was a fast little witch and light enough for one guy to car-top. Perfect for a quick day on the water.

      THE GAFF RIG: What about updates to the Pocket Cruiser and Vacationer?
      PETER: The only update I’d like to see on the Pocket Cruiser and the Vacationer has to do with putting in a mast tabernacle to reduce the trailer-to-water time down to a fraction of what it can be with all those lines you need with a gaff rig. The Vacationer already has a tabernacle, but we were just beginning to use one when we did those plans and we didn’t realize that if we place the cut farther up the mast, above the gooseneck about a foot, then we can simply fold the whole rig down on top of the sails. The sails are left in place on the boom, and you can secure it for trailering in a few minutes. Probably the best solution would be to put the Weekender’s folding mast system up on the website and direct Pocket Cruiser and Vacationer builders to this small modification that can make so much difference in the convenience of the boats.

      THE GAFF RIG: The Weekender was first, then the Vacationer and Pocket Cruiser. You can see the Weekender’s influence on the Vacationer. What was the inspiration for the Pocket Cruiser?
      PETER: Both the Vacationer and Pocket Cruiser were brought about by builder feedback. Some people want interior space so badly they’ll pay the price for a huge boat, forgetting that all boats are too small, so you might as well have a nice convenient one. The price that is paid for more room with the Vacationer is twice as much cost, more building time, and more involved trailering and launching. The price in the Pocket Cruiser is stubby looks and reduced light airs performance. The inspiration for the Pocket Cruiser was the cute looks of the traditional catboat. But without a headsail-jib, the Pocket Cruiser was slow to tack, so we added a jib as a test and it solved the problem while adding downwind speed . . . we love jibs!

      THE GAFF RIG: So is the Pocket Cruiser the "weak sister?"
      PETER: Over the years of cautioning builders that the Pocket Cruiser won’t be as lively in light airs as the Weekender, we’ve erred on the negative side with the boat. It does have a large flat bottom, so in a head chop its going to slap, but then, any boat will have some condition where it slaps. After hearing about the cruise one skipper took up Australia’s east coast and back, we no longer are so cautious with builders about the handling of the boat. The Pocket Cruiser does provide a very stable platform for water fun, along with a hefty built-in engine mount for those days when the wind doesn’t cooperate. Also, being pretty much strong as a brick, people like to hang sails all over it for those light-air days. It will always retain its bilge-boards because of its wide hull aspect ratio and the fact that it takes quite a bit to get it to heel enough to get the kind of chine-lift the Weekender and Vacationer enjoy.

      THE GAFF RIG: What about a Stevenson Projects PWC?
      PETER: We did a Personal Water Craft in an effort to create a fun machine that wouldn’t need the power of a loud, polluting 2-cycle. It was the assisted-lift hydrofoil that you fly like a plane from a jet-like cockpit. Its main breakthrough was that it would keep flying below five knots, which no traditional hydrofoil can do. You could fly it right up to the dock. The investment to design a way to make that out of materials available to the home builder, and the investment to make a good, easy to follow set of plans, is pretty huge. So not much has happened with the project. We did take it to a PWC manufacturer, but when their executives saw our proud display of how controllable it was at an incredibly slow pace, they wouldn’t admit it could also go fast if you simply twisted the throttle. After repeated tries to convince them the machine had more performance capabilities than the planing-hull style they were selling, we had to give up.

      THE GAFF RIG: Have you considered some "instant boat" designs using stitch and glue techniques?
      PETER: There are a couple of phenomena that happen when you use stringers and screws to create a boat that we really like. For one thing, attaching stringers along the cut edge of a plywood panel averages out the cutting errors and makes for a beautifully curved joint any beginner can achieve. A well-faired edge is necessary when you are attaching bent panels to it to prevent cracking. Also, when you’re attaching bent wood together one screw at a time, the wood is bent down into a curve it would be able to take without cracking if we simply tried to bend it all at once.

     THE GAFF RIG: So its a technique you really like.
     PETER: I’d like to explain further. Its a stressed-skin monococque approach that makes the Weekender possible. We first came across the enormous strength that plywood can have when bending a panel, and then stressing this panel in sheer, when we were trying to create a catamaran with articulated hulls that could rock independently. That’s a not-so-brilliant concept after all these years of catamaran development, but Herreschoff was taken in by the concept too, and he even figured out a way to make it happen, even if it didn’t turn out to be good for upwind performance. The more we worked to make flexible platform that could support a rig, the more we saw how strong flexed panels were when the stress hit them sideways, across their surfaces.

     THE GAFF RIG: Was the catamaran responsible for the breakthrough?
     PETER: It was years later, in our design forum -- a bunch of us boat nuts working in boatyards in the area, sitting around and talking design. I was playing with a model of a Greek fish boat called a Caique that I’d fallen for. It was a double-ender with a full-length keelson coming up into a sternpost and stempost at the ends. In Greek fashion the deck extended all the way around the boat, at the bow, at the stern, and along both sides with a cockpit cut out in the center. I was making a model of it in cardboard and taping it together while the design talk was going on. I cut out the bottom, then cut the stem-keelson-stern and taped this to the bottom. The I cut the side panels and taped it all up. It looked OK, but was wobbly like all paper models. Then I cut out the deck that ran all the way around the boat, and something surprising happened. When I flexed the deck down into position and taped it, the whole thing became rigid as a rock. With all the centerlines lined up, the hull was miraculously true without any without any twist or lopsidedness. There was no way the Caique could come out lopsided. But more than that, the structure was so rigid it was laughable.

     THE GAFF RIG: Did a quiet, respectful hush come over the rest of the group?
     PETER: We threw the cardboard boat around and played catch with it like a football! But we knew we were on to something. Instantly the structure was analyzed from the point of view of the scientists in the crowd. It was, they said, a double tetrahedron, two tetrahedrons, the strongest shape in the universe, joined at their bases. Whatever. When you have an immensely strong shape, you can build it light. And its still rugged. So we made a 16-footer. Mark Farnham, the editor of "Boating," also fell for the looks, and he sent off the lines to a friend at Sparkman and Stevens to loft up some plans. This was before we thought we could make boat plans. The result that came back, for this incredibly easy to build boat, was a blueprint showing all the parts at once. It didn’t seem to us to be a good way to show people how to build it, but they sold about 1200 of the plans. People on the east coast were having launching parties with 200 people around the silly little craft. But no matter how much they spent building it, and these were the deep pocket people, or how many people came to their launching party, the boat wouldn’t tack worth a toot. Our method of sailing it was to launch it from a beach pointing in the direction we wanted to go, sail like hell, then run into another beach and turn it around by hand to set off like hell on another tack.

     THE GAFF RIG: Sounds, uh, interesting.
     PETER: We learned a few golden lessons from the Caique. First, that this stressed-skin shape really worked. That modern catamaran-style rudders work a helluva lot better than traditional funky old-style shapes. And that traditional style boat plans could stand a lot of improvement. We started thinking about the new opportunities. By simply lopping off the rear, we could still keep it strong and light, yet have a transom. And there was no reason a bowsprit couldn’t be grafted on the front. Looking at a model of a Chesapeake Bay Skipjack, we realized how easily this shape could be made out of plywood panels. The result of this was our first Skipjack, our quick little 12-footer. The boat came out to an incredible 150 pounds, and I could easily car top it and beach launch it.

     THE GAFF RIG: Well, this is interesting.
     PETER: For the Skipjack plans, we threw everything we’d learned about traditional boat plans out the window. We decided to try a completely new approach and presented only the information you needed when you needed it, drew only the parts you needed to see, when you needed to build them. Then we decided to add a written description, even if it got lengthy, to cover every step of the way, with sequence sketches and exploded views as needed. The plans, especially the written part, seemed bulkier than traditional plans. But we’d noticed that the plans that seem simple and quick often make for projects that are complicated and drawn out. Better to throw it all in and caution builders to take one step at a time, in small doses as you need the information, rather than making it look simple and be hard. The Skipjack was a winner, and soon people were asking for a larger version with a cabin. And the rest is Weekender history.

     THE GAFF RIG: What about any new things, marine related or not, coming from Stevenson Projects?
     PETER: We’ve done nine books, including a kid’s project series for Scribners, two books on how to build toys for Chilton, and a couple of books on the history of grand prix racing, including one due out next summer called "Driving Forces" about racing grand prix cars under the watchful eye of Hitler. And we’d like to do the Super-Skipjack too, as a great little day sailer without a cabin and a great rowboat (the keelson makes it a fabulous rowboat without constantly adjusting your stroke to keep a straight course.)
     MIKE: And the Weekender organization, of course. We’re going to concentrate on doing what we can to encourage the Weekender organizations.
     PETER: We’ve built bigger boats and faster boats, and even easier to build boats, but the Weekender has something magic to it, and if we can reach critical mass with the number of builder/skippers active out there the fun can really grow exponentially. We’re already playing around with new kinds of boating event that can possibly add more fun than just traditional racing rules.
     MIKE: We’re thinking of naval warfare.
     PETER: We were taken by the fact that on sailing warships, in the frigate days when the ships began to be good sailers, but before the artillery got too precise, crews were actually mutinying because their captains didn’t want to engage and have it out! We began to piece together that in spite of the horrors of combat, chasing each other down in sailboats to blast away at each other made racing look pretty bland. After sailing on some square-riggers that staged some lively re-enactor battles, we’re pretty sure its good fun, as long as you’re not getting maimed or anything.
     MIKE: We’ve been experimenting with combining elements of various sports to create something new that could be good fun for a fleet of Weekenders.
     PETER: Basically, we’re combining a scavenger treasure-hunt with some "capture the flag" elements, beach picnic barbeques, and re-enactor battles using a new paint-ball naval cannon we’re developing. The object: to find, capture, and evade others, while working our way back to the barbeque, and painting the sails of our adversaries with our cannonades in the process. The elements are coming together, but we wont be able to balance out the rules of the day’s activities until we get enough boats together to try them in action. This is where we could use the help of other builder/skippers for fine tuning and getting fleets together. It could create some satisfying days.

     THE GAFF RIG: That sounds like a wonderful 20^th anniversary celebration idea!
     PETER: We’re right with you on organizing a twenty-year celebration for the Weekender. We’ve already tried to get "Popular Science" interested, even if just on their website. But they don’t answer our letters and e-mail. We’ll keep trying. If any skipper wants to nudge them, that might do more good. They might see us as just a commercial venture looking for a free blurb.
     MIKE: We want to make it more than just a boat race.
     PETER: This type of event makes sense, because just boat racing so often devolves into something that’s not fun for everybody but the winners. We’d like to develop a whole new way to enjoy a semi-organized day of sailing that fits better with the barefoot sailing approach. Something with a lot looser give and take, more fun, and less protests. How can you protest a shady maneuver when the whole point of the event is to cheat?

     THE GAFF RIG: So how can we help make this happen?
     PETER: We invite builder/skipper comments on this one issue: that some degree of organizing can produce a lot of fun, but on the other hand, those who usually take over the organizing often forget about the fun part and make the whole process unattractive to the real sports in the crowd. We’ve seen this in auto racing as well, where the minute a club arrives at a really fun way to spend a day, they start to escalate the rules until its no longer fun. Its important, we think, to keep people with a humorous perspective in charge of activities whose main goal is fun. So let us know what you think about developing a special Weekender way to have a day of competition.

     As we end this interview, the Stevenson’s are busy preparing for the publishing date of a new book by Peter on auto racing during Hitler’s reign in Germany. And magazine articles are being prepared on family boat building (builders are invited to check out the Stevenson’s Projects page for details on the articles at http://www.stevproj.com).
     Plans for the 20^th anniversary of the Weekender are still tenuous, but a challenge has been given: are we up to organizing special Weekender events to celebrate it? Would regional events in our fledging fleets capture the attention of the folks at Popular Science?
     Peter and Mike Stevenson will monitor the BYYB Bulletin Board for our comments on these ideas. Until then, the Gaff Rig would like to thank the Stevenson’s for their time and openness in granting the interview.