Interesting Com-Pac news - New Model

[brackish]

I've been hearing about a possible Pilot house version of the 23, guess it is true:

http://www.com-pacyachts.com/news/

[jimyoung]

Intresting indeed.

[lostsailor101]

I like it.....probably can not afford it but what a great idea, to have standing head room in a Com Pac 23, brillant.  Keith Scott at the Sailboat Company is also working on a similar build. He is using an 80's vintage 23, with a shortened gaff rig, I believe from a Horizon cat, for his project. He has pictures posted of this project on his web page.

[Bob23]

Quite interesting.
  As I was standing in my 23 with the hatch open, I began to wonder about the feasability of converting her top end to a pilothouse design. Not quite as high as Hutchins (that looks a little out of scale to me) but I'd like to stand up. I'm only about 5'7" so I wouldn't need that amount of height.
 Can't wait to see the Hutchins brothers at Annapolis one week from today. I'll try to get more info out of 'em!
Bob23

[romei]

wouldn't it be neat if they made 16 and 19 models or conversion kits :-D

[newt]

Wow guys- I am wondering how it would sail....

[Tom Ray]

Wow guys- I am wondering how it would sail....

I met a guy once who put a short stick and a big diesel into a commercial grouper fishing hull. I asked him how fast it would sail. He said it depends on where I set the throttle. He said the only time they really tried to get anywhere under sail was when they had 20 knots on the beam.

It's a motorsailor. It'll probably sail just fine with an appropriate throttle setting, or 20 knots on the beam.

I like it for what it is, and think it will appeal to the kinds of buyers who are getting into little trawlers these days. Some of them still want at least some kind of sailing ability.

I'm vaguely irritated that I have to learn about this new model here. My wife does the Com-Pac website. I think I'll go give her a hard time.

[Shawn]

The sailboat company is doing something similar and adding a mast tender sort of rig to the 23.

http://www.ipass.net/sailboat/events.htm

A little less sail area then stock though.

I'd think in either case you would want the sail up as a steadying sail if nothing else. With the round hull the 23 rolls quite a fair amount when under power alone.

Shawn

[brackish]

Tom Ray said:

I like it for what it is, and think it will appeal to the kinds of buyers who are getting into little trawlers these days. Some of them still want at least some kind of sailing ability.

Exactly!  I'm pushing 64 and I'm the last still sailing from my group of folks who all were sailing together in our twenties.  All the others have gone to power.  What they all wanted were trawlers or luggers, slow, roomy, stable and safe.  Grand Banks or the their wannabes, but the problem is they are too expensive for the average guy.  One in our old group lives on a Fisher 30 MS and it can't get out of it's own way sailing but he's happy as a clam.

I'm thinking they may have the demographics here.  When I look at my 23, I don't care if it is a bit slower, but it would be nice for my old back to have standing headroom somewhere down below.  If I want to sail fast, I'll get a hot little one design on the side.

Some suggestions (listen up Gerry and Rich):

The standard diesel is great but you took the cooler spot so scrap the slider galley units and put in across the aisle sink/cooler/stove/flip up table units preferably forward against the bulkhead.  Leave the berths long enough to still have two behind the galley units.  Weight distribution and trim will be better and the water will no longer creep up the scuppers.

Raise those main cabin cabinets and leave a space under all the way to the hull to widen the berths a bit.  Some of us (not me of course) have put on a few pounds as we gracefully age.

Design a really good mast system for this boat, like the mastender system to make ramp time minimal and easy.  With the higher mast step and boom maybe a combo gallows/mainsheet traveler or midboom on the aft end of the new higher pilot house.  We old guys still want to travel to new areas, but want it to be easier once we get there and my number one desire is an easy effort, sub 30 minute ramp experience.

23's don't have a high initial stability today and you're raising the center of gravity a bit, what can be done to offset that?  It would be cost prohibitive to retool the hull, but might consider doing something as an offset.  Would pure lead ballast concentrated lower do that?

The rest of you can chime in anytime, you're going to get old enough that this will look attractive some day.

[newt]

Brack, I never figured you for a old codger. Maybe you just write young. I agree that the limiting factor is going to be the hull and the Center of Gravity. Putting the diesel down there will help, of course. I would go with one of those little Beta's. Lead Ballast, and driving the keel down to 3 feet would also help. If they shorten the main, why don't they put a staysail in? They could still keep sail area, just get creative.

[Bob23]

WOW, BRACK-YOU SURE ARE OLD!! jk.
   I'm gettin' there...a motor sailer sounds ok. My back would love standing headroom also but I'm not so sure that the 23, with her rounded chines would be a comfortable a motorsailer. But the Hutchins brothers are no dummies and I'm sure they've gone over these things already.

   But the more I think about this, the closer I am to cutting the cabintop off my 23 and raising the headroom.  I'm gonna have to really think this one through!
Bob23

[lostsailor101]

Ahoy mates,

For all the CP23 owners if you can't have standing headroom in the cabin then how does standing headroom under your bimini sound to you. Here is another project brought to you by the North Carolina fellows at the Sailboat Company.

I hope Keith doesn't mind but I pulled the following right off his web site, it is located in his "What's New"   section along with photos.

Sun Shade When It's Hot:

Sailing during the summer can be hot. Being on the water helps, but you need to stay out of the sun if possible. A solution to the sun problem is a bimini. Our yard is full of projects with a cool bimini as a part of the overall project. A major problem with a standard CP-23 is headroom under the bimini. I spent several days in the rain at Ocracoke under a 23 bimini. A taller bimini with headroom would have been nice. Our green 23 project boat currently has a Sun Cat sail for a mainsail. The sail can go up the mast and still have room to clear the bimini and the boom gallows. The new bimini has "almost standing headroom" under the bimini for a 6-foot person. The 23 bimini will have rigid supports forward to improve entry and exit from the cockpit. The Coastal Trawler 20 has a semi-rigid bimini as well. The bimini top follows the slope of the cabin. This design gives the cockpit more headroom and still looks good.

[Tom Ray]

Brack, I never figured you for a old codger. Maybe you just write young. I agree that the limiting factor is going to be the hull and the Center of Gravity. Putting the diesel down there will help, of course. I would go with one of those little Beta's. Lead Ballast, and driving the keel down to 3 feet would also help. If they shorten the main, why don't they put a staysail in? They could still keep sail area, just get creative.

Trading out concrete for lead would definitely help, if it is really needed.

Deeper draft is fine in deep water, but deep water is considered a myth in these parts. They start to get hard to launch at about 2 feet of draft, and three foot draft would require the deepest ramps and a high tide.

[brackish]

Brack, I never figured you for a old codger. Maybe you just write young. I agree that the limiting factor is going to be the hull and the Center of Gravity. Putting the diesel down there will help, of course. I would go with one of those little Beta's. Lead Ballast, and driving the keel down to 3 feet would also help. If they shorten the main, why don't they put a staysail in? They could still keep sail area, just get creative.

Trading out concrete for lead would definitely help, if it is really needed.

Deeper draft is fine in deep water, but deep water is considered a myth in these parts. They start to get hard to launch at about 2 feet of draft, and three foot draft would require the deepest ramps and a high tide.

Yep, I'd pass on it if the draft were increased.  Too many other choices when you start to get past the 2'3" draft.  I'd like to gunkhole all of Southwest fl, from Port St. Joe to Key West, and wouldn't want to be ramp restricted or restricted from the best anchorages.  My last two boats had drafts of 4' and 4'-10" respectively and I spent plenty of time fetched up on sand bars trying to get into that nice anchorage or waiting for a tide change so I could get out.

Already hit a couple of marginal Florida ramps with my 23.  Got in and out, but with some difficulty.  Extension helps to give a little more range, but then you have to worry about hitting a ramp end drop off.

[Bob23]

   The more I ponder this, the less I like it. Sure, you can pop a pilothouse top on and change the rig and add the diesel but increasing the draft or even keeping it at 2'3" (which is not really correct) is not going in the right direction. Why not start with a hull that has inherently greater form stability? Where are the old CP 25 molds? Sure, they have the freeboard of a small skyscrapper but, if my memory serves me ok, they were a much flatter bottom which would require a smaller keel. Or maybe Rich and Gerry should start from scratch, like they did with the Catboats.
   But I guess one's gotta start from somewhere and the 23 being the great boat that she is, isn't an all bad place to start.
   I've seen cars and trucks "adapted" to do things they were never designed to do, and, yeah, they did it but not as well as ones that were designed from the ground up.
Bob23