Sailing the Argie 15

I designed the Argie 15 in 1988 for the Argus Newspaper Group in South Africa. They named it after the street corner sellers of their newspapers, the Argie Boys, as a dedication to them. In the more than 30 years since many hundreds of these boats have been built and they are to be found in 60 countries.

I was the first person to sail an Argie 15, the prototype that was built by journalist David Biggs. He produced the weekly DIY supplement for the newspaper and commissioned the design as a DIY project for his readers.

That is a young me at the helm, journalist David Biggs as crew, on the maiden sail of the Argie 15 prototype.

We sailed among the moored boats of False Bay Yacht Club, in about 8-10 knots of breeze, with the boat behaving beautifully. Many boats were built from the articles in newspapers and magazines, as well as plans bought from us, generating a strong following.

I didn't get to sail an Argie 15 again for nearly 30 years, when we launched our own boat three years ago. In all that time I only heard good reports about the handling characteristics of boats to this design. Then, a few months ago, a new builder asked me about the comments that he had read of these boats having lee helm and how to remedy it. I had not seen these comments and told him that I would do some testing with my boat when on a planned sailing trip to North Carolina in June.

That sailing trip was a few weeks ago. I went out by myself in light and fluky conditions that gradually built to about 15 knots and gusty afternoon sea-breeze. This gave me opportunity to test in a range of conditions.

I like to sail from well forward in my boats in light conditions, so I fitted my long tiller extension, a 6ft length of bamboo connected to the tiller by a short length of flexible hose on a pivot bolt. This would enable me to sail from anywhere in the cockpit, from far aft through to sitting on the centre thwart. I had seen in photos that some owners helm from aft, alongside the tiller, so I needed to test this position although I knew it would create problems.

This proved to be the case, with fore/aft trim having a big effect on helm balance. With weight aft, she trims bow-up and the bow gets blown downwind because the centre of lateral area moves aft. The hull should float close to the attitude shown on the sail plan to get the balance between sails and underbody correct.  If sailing alone, sit well forward, alongside the daggerboard. With other people aboard and sitting toward the front of the cockpit the helmsman can move aft, as seen in the photo of the prototype, keeping the boat fairly level. Just because you can sit next to the tiller is not a good reason to do so, trimming the boat level is what is needed.

Trimming the boat so that it heeled to leeward or windward also had a large effect on the helm balance. Sailing in steady light breeze while sitting on the windward side gave me lee helm but sitting on the leeward side gave me weather helm. In light but gusty conditions, sitting on the windward side, I had lee helm in the lulls and weather helm in the gusts. I then sailed downwind, standing in the middle of the cockpit, with one foot on each side of the cockpit. This allowed me to push down on either foot to change the heel angle. With the rudder on centreline I was able to steer the boat to either side as much as I wanted, with my feet. Pushing down on the windward side heeled it to windward and gave lee helm, pushing the bow toward the leeward side. Pushing down on the leeward side did the opposite.

This results from changes in the shape of the immersed portion of the hull with changes of heel angle. When heeled over to leeward, which is the correct attitude when sailing, the leeward side of the hull becomes more curved and the windward side becomes less curved. The neat symmetrical hull shape when upright changes to somewhat of a banana shape when heeled and that banana shape turns the boat toward the high side.

At the same time the centre of the sail area, through which the wind drives the boat forward, moves off to leeward of the hull. The drag from the water, holding the boat back, stays at the hull. This results in a lever with the sails pushing forward at the one end and the hull holding back at the other end. This causes the boat turn to windward, i.e.to have weather helm.

Those two effects from heel that create the desired weather helm will also work in reverse. Heel your boat to windward instead of to leeward and those effects will move to the other side of the boat and give you lee helm.

The effect of fore/aft trim and heel on helm balance is common to most boats of all sizes that have a fin keel, centreboard or daggerboard. I used these affects on my Didi 38 "Black Cat" to maximize boat speed in light to moderate conditions. In light breeze I had most of my crew to leeward on the foredeck. As the wind increased I gradually moved crew aft and to windward, one person at a time, thereby adjusting the amount of weather helm by changing the fore/aft trim and heel angle. It works exactly the same in a dinghy like the Argie 15.

The take-away lesson from this is that you can adjust the helm to suit yourself, between lee helm, neutral and weather helm, by moving weight around the boat. For the Argie 15 the main points are:-

1) It should not be sailed bow-up but it does not mind sailing bow-down. In light conditions I would sail it bow-down but would trim it level fore/aft for most other conditions. In strong conditions downwind I would get weight further aft, as is normal with most boats.

2) It should not be sailed heeled to windward. Crew don't have to sit on the windward side, they can sit wherever needed to get the nicest feel for the helm in light conditions. In stronger breeze the boat will naturally have weather helm and will need the crew to windward for stability. Again, this is the same for most other boats.

There are also sail adjustments that can affect the helm. More power from the sails increases weather helm. Sails that are full (lots of camber) generate a lot more power than sails that are flat, so they create weather helm. Increase power in the mainsail for light breeze by slacking the foot to increase camber. With a jib that has the forestay inside a sleeve at the luff there should be a line at the bottom of the luff, tying it to the eye of the stay. This line is used to adjust the tension of the luff, which adjusts fullness of the sail. Tighten the line to flatten the sail and loosen it to make the sail more full for more power. If you have Cunningham lines rigged on your boat for jib and mainsail you will use them to adjust luff fullness.

Whether you have an Argie 15 or some other dinghy or small keelboat, you can test these principles on your own boat. When you know the characteristics of your boat you will improve its performance and your racing results.

To see our range of boat designs, go to our main website or our mobile website.

Argie 15 for Okoumefest

Chesapeake Light Craft (CLC) hosts Okoumefest on Saturday 19th May, next weekend. This annual event is a day on the beach with a whole fleet of plywood boats of all types available for the family to try out.  CLC cut kits for us for the Argie 15, as well as a few of our other designs. I will be there and will have the Argie 15 that we exhibited at the Wooden Boat Show at Mystic Seaport, CT, ready for sailing. This boat was built by Kevin Agee from a kit supplied by CLC and was runner-up in the sailboat division of the Concourse d'Elegance at that show.

Argie 15 at the 2017 Wooden Boat Show at Mystic Seaport.

The Argie 15 is big 3:1 dinghy, for family fun under sail, oar or outboard power. It has a multi-chine hull built by stitch-&-glue plywood methods and detailing. It can comfortably carry a family of 2 adults and 4 children for day-sailing and is also well-suited to camp-cruising. Come to Okoumefest on Kent Island, Maryland. For more information, visit CLC Okoumefest.

For more info about this and our other designs go to our main website, mobile website or our plywood kits page.

Another Argie 15 Build in Russia

Our designs have been built in 90 countries, including well over 300 boats across the length and breadth of Russia, even in the middle of Siberia. They span most of our design range, from the little plywood Dixi Dinghy yacht tender through to the steel Dix 57 world cruiser. Nearly half of those boats are to our ever-popular Argie 15 design.

The most recent launch of an Argie 15 was by amateur builder Ilia Bogdanov, who lives in Khadarovsk in Far Eastern Russia, 760km north of Vladivostok. Ilia is a cardiovascular surgeon in his day-time job and built his Argie 15 in his spare time. Compared with the very delicate and intricate work of repairing a patient's heart, building a wooden boat must be a big change of scale.

Ilia has built a good boat of nice quality, in sometimes unpleasant conditions, certainly far from optimal. Seeing what Ilia has accomplished, with the help of a friend, should be an inspiration to boatbuilders in other faraway places, where finding suitable materials and build location can be a major challenge. It shows how fortunate we are if we are able to build our boats in a moderate climate or a heated/cooled/dry workshop and with a wide choice available to us of plywoods, epoxies, hardware etc to craft into a beautiful and safe vessel.

I see criticism sometimes of materials and methods used by builders in other countries but those resourceful builders have to hunt out the best materials that they can find to go into their boats. Those materials may not be as workable or as aesthetically pleasing as what more fortunate builders may choose but they are available and they do what is needed by the builder.

I will let Ilia's photos and my captions tell the story of his build, an achievement of which he can be proud.

Ilia's workshop was his garage, 2nd from left. It has water in it when the snow melts or when it rains.

Ilia started with a kit, bought from Peter Tatarinov, our Russian kit supplier in Irkutsk, Siberia. The water on the slab is snow melt.

Ilia unpacking his Argie 15 kit.

Hull completed, seat framing going in.

Scuppered gunwales with a difference, the slots are on the outside rather than the inside. 

Ilia filled the side seat compartments with foam flotation.

Home-made access covers using the details on the drawings.

Ilia and his children ready to use their new Argie 15.

Running under power from the 6hp outboard.

And here Ilia is racing in a mixed yacht club fleet on the Amur River.

Congratulations Ilia on your project.

To see more of this and out other designs, go to our main website or our mobile website.

Argie 15 Nearing Completion

It has been a long time since my last post about our Argie 15 project. Work has been going on but big life events have taken away from the time needed to write blog posts. The main event was a change in the status of builder Kevin  Agee, now our son-in-law after marrying our daughter Michelle last month.

Newly-married, our daughter Michelle and new son-in-law Kevin Agee.

OK, time to get life back to normal. The Argie 15 is nearing completion and looks very different from when you last saw it. It took its first road trip, on my Paper Jet trailer. The destination was my own garage, for painting.

Ready for preparation for paint.

After turning the boat upside-down, final inspection, masking the rub-rails and other bright-finished surfaces, blowing off the dust with a leaf blower then cleaning with acetone, it was ready for spraying to start.

First coat was a high-build epoxy primer, to give an easily-sanded layer to form the foundation for a good finish.

Next came a white primer. This was needed to cover the grey epoxy, which can cause blotchy problems with finish coats.

When I sprayed my Lotus, I changed the colour from the original red to yellow. I sprayed the yellow over a grey primer and found that yellow paint has problems covering grey. What initially looked like good cover is a bit green and blotchy in low-light situations. The green tone is the grey primer showing through and the blotchiness is caused by variations in the yellow film thickness. I must spray another coat over the car to get a uniform yellow colour. Lesson learned, we added a coat of white primer to the paint schedule of the Argie 15 to ensure good cover.

A coat of high-build epoxy primer also went onto the vertical surfaces of the cockpit because these will be gloss white. The horizontal areas will be beige non-skid, so a perfectly smooth surface was not needed.

The transom was to be white, so that was sprayed first, then masked off with paper before spraying the rest of the hull.

Completed hull painting, with yellow hull and white transom

The varnished rub-rails laminated from cedar and poplar set off the hull nicely. The holes through the hull sides are to drain the leeward side seats if any spray comes aboard when sailing in lumpy and breezy conditions.

 The new boat made its first public appearance by doing bar service at the wedding. It worked as a giant cooler, holding beers and soft drinks on ice for the wedding guests.

The other work that has been going on is building the spars. I am doing that work, having decided to make wooden spars using the birdsmouth method. In keeping with the varnished woodwork on the hull, I have made the mast and boom from alternating strips of cedar and poplar. I won't go into the details of building the spars in this post but will do that in later posts on my Boatbuilding Tips Blog. The Argie 15 plans show the mast in two sections, so that the rig can be stowed inside the hull. I could have made the mast in one length by scarphing the strakes into long lengths but elected to stay with the two-part mast. This allowed me to work with lengths that fit more comfortably inside a single garage.

Gluing a mast section using the bidsmouth method.

Mast sections and boom shaped and being epoxy-coated. The one closest to the camera is the boom, the other two being the two sections of the mast. The long mast higher up in the garage is my Paper Jet mast, built by a similar method.

Launch day is approaching. The sails have been made and hardware will soon start going onto the deck and rig.

See more of this and our other designs on our main website or our mobile website.

Finishing the Bottom of the Argie 15

My last post was about making the rudder and daggerboards for the Argie 15. While I was doing that work, Kevin Agee was making good progress on the bottom. He has glassed all of the outside seams, sanded, filled and faired them so that the chines are smooth and fair curves, cut the daggerboard slot and installed the bottom runners and skeg.

This work all needs to be nicely done because the hard chine edges are what defines a hull like this. Unfair and wavy edges with lumps and bumps catch the eye very quickly and also cast odd shadow lines, spoiling the overall look of the finished boat. It is worthwhile taking this work slowly and being very happy with your own work before moving on to the next step.

The tapes have been sanded smooth and the tape edges have been feathered. 

If this boat was to be clear-finished then sanding and feathering the tape edges is about as far as fairing can go before final epoxy coats and varnish are applied. Our boat will be painted, so fairing can be more conventional and more extensive. This photo shows epoxy fairing compound  that has been applied then sanded down to fair it into the surface, making it completely disappear.

A closer view of a chine after fairing. It fills the slight hollow alongside the tape because of the two thicknesses of glass sitting on the surface of the plywood.

Runners glued to bottom. They are being held by temporary screws, assisted by a ratchet strap at the bow.

A sliding bar clamp in the daggerboard slot helps to keep the end of the centre runner in contact while the glue cures.

Sliding bar clamps secure the aft ends of the runners and skeg at the transom. The runners will be trimmed off flush.

Junction of the centre runner with the skeg.

The final coat of epoxy resin before turning the hull back upright for deck finishing.

The next post will likely be about laminating the rubbing strakes to the gunwales and other finishing work on the decks and transom.

To see more of this and our other designs, go to our main website or our mobile website.

Argie 15 Framing

It has been pretty cold here the past few days, with winter starting to bite. Today the high temperature was just on freezing. As it grows colder over the next few weeks, a snug workshop is a good place to be spending productive time.

Kevin Agee is spending most evenings in his workshop, working on the Argie 15. Current tasks are fitting the framing for the seats and the transom doubler.

If you are fortunate enough to source timber longer than the hull, you can do the side stringers each in a single length. For the rest of us, it is necessary to join two pieces together to get the full length. This is done by scarphing (or scarfing or scarph-jointing) them. Each joint is done by cutting or planing the ends to be joined at an angle to form sloping mating surfaces. For an application like this and using modern adhesives, the slope angle need not be more than 1:6, so for timber 20mm thick the joint would be 120mm long.

One half of the scarph joint. This was cut on a saw but it could also be done with a jack plane.

The two pieces to be joined, dry-fitted to check accuracy.

The joint has been glued and here is shown being glued into the hull with temporary screws to hold the stringer until the glue has cured.

Stringers are glued in along both sides to form landings for the seats against the hull sides. Edge frames are also glued to the bulkheads to support the transverse seat edges.

Stringers fitted full length of both sides to form landings for the seats.

Edge framing being glued in for transverse seats.

Working neatly all the time will ensure a good finished product. This joint is an example, no scrappy edges, nicely filleted internal angle, all contact surfaces glued for a solid joint. 

View into the structure at the stern. The extra plywood layer on the centre of the transom is a doubler to strengthen it for the rudder pintle fittings. The notches in the tops of the transverse frames are for half-jointing the seat stiffeners. Those will be added in a future post.

You can see in all of these photos just how neat Kevin's work is. This is important if you are to have a really nice boat at the end of the project. If you don't think that you can't work to this standard, consider that Kevin is an amateur boatbuilder, not a professional. He is working with normal hobbyist woodworking tools. He has only built one previous boat, his own Inlet Runner 16.

To see more of our designs, go to our main website, our mobile website or our Flickr albums.

Argie 15 Hull Glued together

The stitch-&-glue boatbuilding method is also known as stitch-&-tape. Our Argie 15 build being done by Kevin Agee has now reached that stage where both of these names can be seen in the process.

The hull skin has been stitched together with electrical ties, with a few copper wire ties at high-load points where the electrical ties are not strong enough to hold the panels close together. In the photo below, the bulkheads have been secured in their correct positions, changing the floppy panels into a hull shell of the proper shape. At this stage it is still somewhat flexible and can still be adjusted to remove any twist that may have occurred when tying the panels together. Get behind the boat and sight over the top of the transom, lining up the tops of the bulkheads with the top of the transom in your sight-line. Any twist will be obvious and must be pulled out before starting on the gluing process. You can see the ties holding the joints together.

The next step is to glue the outside joints of the panels between the ties. For this boat we are using MAS Epoxy products throughout and the glue that we are using is MAS Gluzilla in the 185ml cartridges, applied with a standard caulking gun. The glue comes out pre-mixed from the mixing nozzle and can be applied directly into the V-shaped joints between the panels, filling the joints flush between the ties. In the photo below the ties have been left in place to hold the joints until the epoxy has cured. Epoxy can stretch for days after it has hardened, so don't be in a rush to pull the ties out.

While the epoxy in the joints is curing you can glue the bulkheads in place. This is done with epoxy fillets, which we have chosen to also do with the MAS Gluzilla. It is applied in a large bead on each side along the perimeter of each bulkhead against the hull. They are finished smooth to a cove-shape using a tongue depressor or similar tool. In the photo below, there are two semi-circular cutouts in the bottom edge of the aft bulkhead of the middle seat. There is a matching pair in the forward bulkhead of that seat. These are to take PVC half-pipe drains that bring water from the forward compartment of the cockpit into the aft area where crew can bail it more easily or it can be drained through dinghy self-bailers.

 Next step is to pull out the ties and fibreglass the insides of the joints. The epoxy glue on the outside will hold the joint while the inside of the joint is taped. All of the seams must be taped, taking care to finish neatly against the bulkheads. When the epoxy has set and started to cure you can feather the edges with a small block plane with a very sharp blade set fine. If the epoxy has already cured then it may be better to feather the edges with a small finishing sander.

Close-up of taped seam before feathering the edges

Taped seams in the bow. The centreline seam has first been epoxy-filleted to form a good surface to receive the glass tape.

In areas where the taped seams won't be seen, like inside the seats, they don't have to be feathered but must be sanded smooth and the weave filled with epoxy to give a smooth surface. If you don't do this then there will be rough surfaces and jagged edges that will rip your knuckles when cleaning those places in the completed boat.

When that has all been done, lightly sand all of the internal surfaces of the boat and remove all dust, then apply three coats of low viscosity epoxy. The first coat will soak into the wood to create a good bond. By the third coat you should have a full coating of epoxy that can be sanded smooth to prepare for paint. Try not to leave more than 12 hours between epoxy coats, so that they can bond chemically to each other. If more than 12 hours has passed then lightly sand the epoxy before applying the next coat.

Three coats of epoxy on all inside surfaces.

To see more of this and our other designs, go to our main website, mobile website and Flickr photo albums.

Pulling the Argie 15 Hull Together

Our new Argie 15 is coming along nicely. Kevin Agee is building it in his garage, shared with the Inlet Runner prototype that he built two years ago.

The hull has a bottom panel and two side panels each side. Assembly starts by joining the lower side panels to the bottom panel and to each other at the bow. This is a stitch-&-glue boat, so the panels are joined with plastic electrical ties threaded through paired holes.

The port lower side panel has been joined to the bottom panel. The ties are left a little loose at this stage, to allow fine-tuning when all panels are together.

Both lower side panels have been fitted and the port upper side panel is going on..

Bottom and sides all connected with electrical ties. The lines that are visible along the upper side panels mark where the stringer will be that supports the side seats. At this stage the hull panels are setting the shape of the hull. When the transom and bulkheads are installed they will reshape the hull to the intended shape. The grey patches on the panels are where the panels have been joined into single lengths with jigsaw joints.

Next step is to fit the transom. There may be a bit of excess length on the side panels, some projecting aft of others. Dry-fit the transom with the bottom edge aligned with the end of the bottom panel and the sides aligned for a "best fit" situation. You will need to press the transom down into the hull so that it presses the aft end of the bottom panel into a slight V-shape locally and the corners of the transom fit into the chines (joints between the panels). The hull panels are then marked along the outer face of the transom to show where they must be trimmed to fit flush with the transom.

Dry-fitting the transom into the hull panels, tied in place for marking the panels for trimming to an exact fit, if needed.

Next the transom is removed from the hull and the panels trimmed along the lines that were drawn. Then the transom is fitted back into position and permanently tied with electrical ties. Now is a good time to check the hull, to make sure that it is straight, not twisted out of shape, comparing the two sides of the hull by sighting over the top of the transom. If out-of-true it can be adjusted now, before tightening the ties.

Panels all tied together and tightened once the hull is straight. Some of these ties are copper wire, where it was found that a bit more tension was needed than electrical ties could provide without breaking.

Installing the bulkheads is next, in positions described in the building instructions.

Bulkheads (seat fronts) secured in position. The planks are temporary stiffeners to keep the plywood straight. 

Our Argie 15 is now starting to look like a nice boat. My next update will be bonding the various panels together permanently.

To see more of this and our other designs, visit our Flickr Albums, main website or mobile website.

Argie 15 on the Dnieper

Nick, a builder in Kiev, Ukraine, sent me photos of his Argie 15 build and the finished boat in use. Part-way through the project he bought a bigger boat, so the need for the Argie 15 fell away. He continued with the build, completed it, then donated the boat to a local sailing school. Nick says that the Argie is ideal for this kind of use, as a load-carrier it is able to carry an instructor plus as many as 8 children for introductory classes.

Nick's Argie 15 nearing completion. The large cockpit is
great for carrying a bunch of people.

Nick says that the the new boat proved to be such a hit that someone else has undertaken to finance another Argie 15 for the school, to expand its sail-training capabilities. That 2nd boat is now being built. Aside from being able to carry groups of children or adults, the Argie 15 also has a surprising turn of speed. That makes it suitable for more advanced sail-training as well, with an instructor and one or two students, to teach them how to handle a planing dinghy at speed in stronger breezes.

Argie 15 with a load of children, giving them their first experience of sailing.

These photos are shown courtesy of photographer Lubov Kotlyar.
See more of her work or make contact through her Facebook page at
 https://www.facebook.com/kievsails/

I get to meet many many wonderful people through long-distance relationships, most of them building my boats. It is always interesting to read their stories and to see their homelands and local sailing waters. Many people have built my boats in Ukraine and I have seen photos of some of them sailing on the beautiful local lakes. Nick sent me an aerial photo of Kiev and the Dnieper River, which flows through it.

Dnieper River where it flows through Kiev. This photo is in winter, with ice
on the water.

The large body of water at upper right is known as the "Kiev Sea", formed by a dam. Nick says that most of the sailing in Kiev is away from the city. His own club is downstream, out of view below the bottom of the photo.

We have about 50 boats either built or in-build in Ukraine, from 10ft to 55ft. Phil Semenov built his Didi 34 "Estra" in Kiev and sailed it for a few years on "Kiev Sea". Since then he has travelled on her down the Dnieper River to the Black Sea, through the Bosphorus into the Sea of Marmara. Now he is cruising the Aegean and other idyllic locales in the Mediterranean Sea.

I look forward to meeting many more interesting people this way. Some of them I may be lucky enough to even meet personally.

To see more of our designs, go to our main website or our mobile website.