Silk sailing in New Zealand

Silk is a Shannon 37 centerboard ketch - a beautiful traditional fiberglass ketch.

Designer:....Walter Schulz & Assoc.

Builder:.... Shannon Yachts LOA:....37' 9" LWL:....30'11" Beam:....11'6" Ballast:....6,500 lbs. Displacement:....17,500 lbs. Draft:....K/CB board up/dn....4'3"/7'7"  SA (sq ft) Ketch:....751

Water:....100gal

Fuel:....75gal

Silk running with twin jibs

She is a very pretty boat with lots of teak trim, a classic design that proved well-suited to a tropical circumnavigation.  

Silk had two side-by-side head stays, one fitted with roller furling and one for hank-on sails.  This arrangement makes it easy to set twin headsails on tropical downwind passages.

We carried a 130% jib on the roller furler.  We normally had an 88% Yankee hanked-on to the other stay and bagged. We switched from the 130% to the 'cutter rig' (e.g. Yankee and staysail) at about 20kts apparent.

We also carried a 110% hank-on Yankee, which was an old 130% we had cut-down.  This sail was used when running down-wind with two jibs.  We only carried one pole.  So, one jib (usually the 110%) was poled out and the other (usually the 130%) was either just sheeted normally or sheeted to the end of the boom if it was particularly rolly.

The inner stay carried a hank-on staysail on a club boom.

All these 'white sails' were standard woven dacron.

Silk's bowsprit & anchor platform

Finally we carried a 750sq ft, 1.5oz nylon general purpose asymmetrical spinnaker in a sock.

She has a 7-foot bowsprit, which stretches out her sail area and provides an excellent anchor platform.

We loved the ketch rig for offshore work.  It kept all the sails small and easy to handle, and the boat hove-to absolutely perfectly with just the mizzen up. However, the ketch rig is not so handy for coastal work.

We carried an 8' Trinka rowing dinghy upside down on deck and rowed everywhere. We did not carry an outboard.  With her shallow draft, we could always anchor Silk very close to the dinghy dock or beach. The rowing was both fun and great exercise. In addition it meant we did not need to carry gasoline or do any outboard motor maintenance.

Silk's cockpit & windvane

The biggest mistake we made when fitting out Silk was not installing a windvane.  We left Newport with two wheel-mounted autopilots (Autohelm 4000), and these proved undersized for offshore conditions.  After hand steering for one four-day passage - someone always at the helm, having to eat in shifts, being too tired for a chat -  we vowed never to have to hand steer again.  In Madeira, we installed a Monitor windvane and used  it for most of the next 25,000nm.  Under sail the Monitor windvane steered her perfectly all around the world.  We also got a different autopilot (a CPT) which we used in very light air and when motoring.

The centerboard arrangement gave her a 4' 3" draft with the board up, which allows her to sneak into shallow areas forbidden to deeper boats.  Her heavy displacement and small sails meant that it was very difficult to get into any trouble with her.  She took good care of us while we learned how to sail offshore.  At the same time, her cutaway forefoot and modified fin keel reduced her underbody surface area which meant she performed quite well in light winds.

Though she only had a 30-foot waterline, she averaged 130-135 miles per day on several long passages, with an all-time record of 178nm in 24 hours. Silk took care of us over the course of a 40,000-mile tropical circumnavigation.