April 7, igoo.t 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
278 
The Royal CAJC, Cruising? JCanoe. 
The canoeing department of the Yachtsman of Feb. 15 
contained a very interesting design of a proposed new 
canoe to the Umits of the cruising class of the Royal C. C. 
The design is the work of an amateur, Mr. J. Pain Clark, 
a member of the club, who designed the successful canoe 
Rani II. and the single-hand canoe-yacht Rani III. The 
limits of the class were given in full by Mr. Linton Hope 
in the Forest ,\nd Stream of March 3. The designer is 
an expert and thoroughly familiar with the rules and 
conditions, so the design, though not yet built and tested, 
may be taken as a good representative of the leading class 
in canoeing to-day. The canoe is described as follows by 
her designer : ''She is designed to do her best \vork in 
smooth water and light winds, which are the conditions 
under which by far the majority of the R. C. C. races 
are sailed, in my experience; but I consider that she 
should give a very good account of herself in rough water 
and fresh breezes, and I do not think that the torpedo 
bow should be any disadvantage under these circum- 
stances, as she carries all her lifting power low down 
and near the waterlinc. The idea of the boat is to get 
the greatest effective length with the least weight and 
windage, and without the unnecessarily lumpy ends which 
the rule encourages. I have always been a great believer 
in efifective length as against overhang, which, I con- 
sider, is very often used so as to be no more than extra 
Aveight and windage built on toiiie ends of the boat." 
is that found in all canoes and pointed-ended craft which 
have overhanging ends ; but the Upper sides of ttese over- 
hangs round over to an acutely rolled-home sterri, and so 
form a ram bow and stern, and the side sections all along 
are considerably rolled-home at the top of the freeboard. 
At first sight to many men this design may appear so 
peculiar as to be thought quite novel and original, and 
possibly it ma}^ have been so to Mr. Clark when he drew 
the lines ; but. as a matter of fact, this form has been 
used in several canoes, canoe yawls and raters within the 
last few years, either wholly or in maiii part, and also is 
in great part the main feature of the Coble type of boat 
on our northeast coast. The principles of roll-home, or 
tumble-home, as it is technically called, are so excellent 
from a sea-going point of view, and yet are so conflicting 
with utility and the requirements of sailing, that we 
propose to review them more in technical detail next 
week. Meantime, \vc refer those interested to the design 
published, as' above stated, and in looking at the draw- 
ing they should note that the claim of utilit}^ put forward 
by the designer in relation to the extreme tumble-home of 
bow and stern is the comparative lightness of structure 
and the lessened windage of such ends compared to the 
ordinary form. Equally for racing or cruising, this is 
important, especially at the bow. A fiigh-bowed canoe 
cannot be paddled against a fresh head wind, and equally 
a high flat bow should stop or be harmful to sailing; but 
the performance .of the ram bow^ in a sea, especiallv in 
short, hollow tide rip. waves, is so peculia^ as; to absolute- 
*5o?p or /err 
DESIGN FOR ROYAL C. C. CRUISING CLASS. J. PAIN CLARK, ESQ., 1900. 
The dimensions are : Length on deck, 13ft. ; length over 
all, i6ft. ; l.w.l., 12ft. 6in. ; beam, extreme, 42in. ; draft of 
hull, 6in. ; with board, 3ft. 6in. ; sail area, 144 sq. ft. ; dis- 
placement, 4981bs. The hull is of ribband can-el construc- 
tion, with cedar planksheer and light wood deck covered 
with oiled silk. The centerboard weighs solbs. and is of 
spring brass, fitted to slide forward and aft. The under- 
body rudder is fitted to lift out through a well. The sloop 
rig has a roller jib fitted to swing square as a spinaker. 
The mast and boom are hollow spars. The yard is of 
bamboo. The design has been criticised at length in the 
Field, and we reproduce a portion of Mr. Baden-Powell's 
remarks. 
ly counterbalance the other or former advantages. The 
stern matters little, and the weight-saving is rather a 
myth, for the tumble-home stern or post, which has to 
be very stout wood, and probable aproned, is just double 
the length or more than would be put in for the usual up- 
right work. 
The tumble-home of the topsides along the main body 
from right aft up to about 3ft. from the sterri is simply 
excellent for sea work, but it has its practical disad- 
vantages, which we will deal with. 
A design of great interest to sailing canoe men was 
published in the Yachtsman, Feb. 15; it is supposed to be 
the lines of Mr. Pain Clark's new cruising class canoe. 
The drawing is entitled "Design for a Racing Canoe in 
the Cruising Class Royal Canoe Club" ; we may, there- 
fore, assume that every advantage from a racing point of 
view has been taken within the rule, and as the design is 
the work of Mr. Clark, one of the most expert and 
successful racing canoe men and the designer of the cele- 
brated machine canoe Rani, now called Nana, there is no 
room to doubt this being the case. It is, therefore, very 
gratifying to find that this racing craft, . produced within 
the rule, makes at the same time an excellent and roomy 
sailing canoe for general work on lakes or open waters; 
the strict rule limitations have, preserved those useful 
features of size' and fitment in fair proportion. 
Tlie only features which w'e can find in the design which 
may fairly be called attributable to racing dictation are the 
short waterline, the light .center plate, the small dis- 
placement and the awkwaf-d bowsprit. None of these 
are fixedly harmful to her utility as. a cruiser when rac- 
ing js off; for making a cruise and for camping out the 
rig can be changed and the bowsprit left at home; the 
center plate can be replaced by a heavier one. fit to trust 
to for stability when the canoe is tented for a blowy night 
on unsheltered waters: the displacement will be increased 
by weight of stores and tent, etc., and yet ample body 
will remain as .surplus buoyancy. 
The main feature of interest about this design is, how- 
ever, to be seen in her bow and stern formation, which 
are formed as above-water cigar-ends, of ram form, or 
torpedo nosej that is, the underside of each overhang 
Commenting last week on Mr. Clark's design for a 
racing canoe to be built wathin the rigid limitations of. 
the cruising canoe class, we drew attention to the very; 
pronounced ram bow and the similar formation of the 
after end; in each case the tumble-home is i8in.', the total 
length of the canoe being i6ft. The only valitf reason foi-.. 
such ends is that they hold less wind -than is -the case 
with the ordinary form of end. But there are serious 
faults in this ram construction wliich are- probably more 
important than the saving- of windage ; -^at -the "stern the 
mainsheet horse is brought very far inboard, -^nd thus 
necessitates a mainsheet of three parts instead- of two-^- 
that is, about 12ft. extra sheet to trouble with-; the ordi- 
nary two-part sheet might be shackled to- the sterri ridge, 
but then there would be no cross travel, and it has cer- 
tainly been found that a sheet traveling acrosS'-a'horse is 
desirable in order to get a fair down -pull on the main 
leech, and the sheet leads inboard by thimbles under the 
boom to a block forward of the skipper, atid thence tQ a 
block at fore end of the- well. : ■ 
The claim as to absence of windage cannot Be^ftSd good-"" 
as regards the after end of a canoe, a vessel with sharply 
pointed end; it can only be considered in going" to wand- 
ward, and then the wind would be striking the stern at an 
angle of 45 degrees, and the level lines, or- general form 
of the quaVter. trend at the angle of 45 ^degrees, that is 
with the wind. Once in a long seasons' sea sailing, a 
breaking sea might happen to tumble over" the stern, then 
possibly the cigar end might be more efifective than the 
ordinary stern formation, but a well rolled home quarter 
and rounded deck would do as well, and would be more 
sightly all other times. ; 
Forward, as we have said before, windage is an im- 
portant consideration, and is much eased by tumble-home 
of sections and of stem; but, on the other hand, in our 
model towing trials there was no doubt about the fact 
that the sloping ram bow simply lifted the sea, when she 
dipped head in, solid on to the deck; it seemed to invite 
the sea to come on board. In actual vessels this would be 
not so much in the case of open water sea of solid nature, 
but in that of steep, hollow waves, found in all tide rips 
in a fresh wind, and in the short, lumpy sea of a fre-li- 
water lake. Going at speed before the wind such a bjw is 
very apt to burrow or plow under and to turn her 
against even a powerful rudder, and any open-water man 
knows the danger of a broach-to, especially if it happens 
to be the wrong v^ay round, and so brings a heavy gybe 
as well. , 
Another objection of practical importance is that riding 
to moorings with a ram bow means constant chafe of the 
planking by the chain or rope, and consequently pos- 
sible -damage, and certain ruination of the varnish or 
paint, and of any fancy head ornament. , The bowsprit 
is necessary, to set the stay down to, and to properly tack 
the foresail ; but it is all in the way if towing is under- 
taken, and towing at great speed astern of a steam launch 
or tug is a common and to be expected part of the life 
of any small sailing boat. In addition to the above work- 
ing objections, the cigar ends arc very difficult of con- 
struction., and very, expensive ; the tumble-home of top- 
side of the body, is not expensive to build;; it only needs 
more care ihan ordiriaryV flare sides, in" setting tip, and 
the moulds may liave- to be in half-pieces joined; at mid 
line so as to' be able to lie taken out when the;frame and 
planking are finished; but the cigar ends can only be 
fastened with screws from outside, and any damage to the 
frame needs a complete opening up and rebuilding of 
that end, more or less. 
Iri regard to tumble-home of topsides, we can at once 
say that all experience is decidedly in favor of such form ; 
there arc only two points against it. We will therefore give 
them a free sheet. The tumble-home topside reduces, in 
a 42in. beam canoe, the side deck width by some 3in, on 
each side at and about midship of length, and thus the 
deck seating for crew is curtailed somewhat. The fittings 
for fore sheet lead and for the shrouds are not so far 
out as might be desired ; but then, as gentlemen from 
another isla,nd might say, they are as far out as they 
could be in a 36in. canoe. The second point is that the 
tumble-home exposes a lot of planking to damage, such as 
collision or bumping and rubbing when alongside any- 
thing, whereas the flare side offers a beading or rail for 
such rough treatment. Well, better keep out of collision, 
and when lying alongside any vessel or pier protect the 
sides with fenders. 
The first advantage of tmnble-home side is the clean 
body which it presents to be driven through the water 
when she is heeled to a breeze, long after the flare model 
has been dragging her angular lee deck, shroud plates, 
headings, etc., deeply through the water. The swinge of 
a sea along the lee side takes kindly to the round section 
and separates; whereas the flat angular submerged ordi- 
nary deck seems to invite such lumps of water into the 
cockpit. With equal depth of hull, or height of deck 
center above water, a roll-home of 3in. requires 10 degrees 
more heel of the craft to put the deck awash than will 
wash the flare or straight sider's deck. Now with certain 
weight of plate and of man sitting up to windward, a 
particular cruising class canoe will heel over to a certain 
angle where the keel, especially if a bulbed keel, comes 
into its best balancing work; after that angle has been 
taken, great power is being exerted both by man and keel 
against further heeling over; and so it is common to sail 
miles and miles at about one set angle. In most canoes 
this is about at the angle of 25 degrees. In a straight 
sided canoe of usual freeboard, say a 42in. canoe of Sin. 
freeboard, this 25-degree heel means the lee gunwale 
awash, a dragging of shroud and backstay plates and 
lanyards, blocks, etc. ; but the tumble-home sided craft 
has another 10 degrees to go before the deck gets in, and 
so, on the same pressure, she is still showing a clean side. 
On the windward side the tumble-home presents less 
hold to the wind, ■ and a sea lopping on to it seems to 
break much more quietly than it does when meeting a 
flat side. But as Ave have above said, this rounding of 
sections may be dropped when about 3ft. from the bow 
end, as .a fair amount of positive flare at the bow is dis- 
tinctly useful in taking short, hollow seas; they have to 
be sailed into, they cannot well be dodged like big seas in 
the open often can be. Of course, the flare of the bow 
is a windholder, but as an adverse factor to speed it is 
nothing compared to the man's body perched out on the 
weather side deck. We have said that the Nautilus of 
1897 had over 3in.; tumble-home, and this was carried 
right aft, and forward it went to within about 3ft. of the 
bow. No drier boat for her size ever floated, though, of 
course, any small boat, if driven hard in. rough water, 
throws shcrwers of -spray about ; but it is asl to heavy 
water.- we compare her -with other boats we have sailed. 
It may naturally here be asked why -the next Nautilus 
(1899) was only given ij^in. of tumble-home^ and also a 
beading on at that. Well, it was Avith the idea of getting 
the more rdoiriy side deck for sitting out on, and for 
best spread of shrouds and backstays. In the design for 
the 1900 Nautilus these' points have been ignored, and 
tumble-home, more severe than ever, has been- given from 
right ,aft up to -Nvell into the bow — -that is, about the mast, 
but the ends a"re not. of cigar form. 
We ' have "gcjiiF into the question of rounded side rather 
fully because scA'eral men are about to build just now, 
and . will., of course, be interested, even though perhaps 
"it; is a bit late for altering-iiesigns-;- but as the question 
of cost" has come forward very -mttcli lately, it is certainly 
"advisable to say that peculiar forijis, "or shapes out of the 
common line of boat building, arfe bound to be expensive, 
and at the same time the buildSr, to carry out _ such de- 
.^■igns faithfully or correctly, must begone having some 
knowledge of naval architecture. There arc crude rule 
of thumb ways of working "near enough" from drawings 
practiced in some small boat-building esJiablishmcnts ; 
these ways may A\'ork out quite successfully in models of 
ordinary nature, but in an attempt upon a design Avith 
ram" bow and stern and tumble-home sides there Avould 
be much backing and filling, unless the drawing.s are .got 
out at full size for the builder to Avork from ; a builder 
inexperienced at ship' draftsma.rrship would probably pro- 
duce a craft something like-^he design if 1ug1c\s^v 
