New Facebook page for Kelsall Catamarans Ltd

Introduction.

Starting a Facebook account for Kelsall Catamarans Ltd., we should start at the beginning. The 45^th. anniversary of the first major Kelsall win seems appropriate. Derek Kelsall's Round Britain Race win with his first own design, the trimaran Toria was a defining moment for multihulls. Toria was the first foam sandwich yacht of note. She not only set the style for materials choice she set the style for all future racing trimarans, which have dominated offshore racing ever since. The 2000 mile, two handed race was the first open race to be won by a multihull. It was a great race – races usually are when all your competitors are behind you. The materials have since become the gold standard for all yachts. To summarize, this was a unique, designed, built, raced and won situation which also set styles for others to follow.

Kelsall design and build lead the way in 1966 and still leads today. Today, we do not hesitate to claim World leadership in boat building technique, with KSS. No designer can match the numbers and variety of designs produced by the Kelsall team. Our competitors are still behind us, by a very long mile, particularly when it comes to custom boat building technique.

The wide experience coming from a vast number of projects of all kinds, in designing, building, operating and even maintaining is the basis of all the decisions that make up a winning design. By making decisions only this way we differ from the crowd on many issues.

Fashion has an amazingly strong influence on both designs and boat building methods. We will address these issues with our detailed explanations and reasons not to follow fashion from time to time on our facebook pages.

Happy Boating.

Derek Kelsall. FRINA.

Youtube Kelsall history

Trimaran,Jonathan, kelsall, stripling 28, Golden Oldies,
and
Lápparition des premiers multicoques dans les annees 60.

Put these titles into search.

These are both in French language. The Stripling is a neat, very simple tri with a good race record, introducing guys like Mike Golding to offshore racing. Now in the French Golden Oldies fleet.

The second includes Toria as well Newick designs, plus a self righting cat coming back from a knock down. Toria was my first design, first foam sandwich and first multi to win a major open offshore event - the 2000 mile Round Britain in 1966. This trip from N. Cornwall to London Xmas 66 was Eric Tabarly's introduction to multihull sailing - and we all know how the French took up the challenge afterwards.

Happy boating.

Derek.
FRINA

Newly launched Kelsall Catamaran designs.

Giorgio in Peru has one more feather in his boat building cap from the launch of one of three 58 footers in build. All reports so far are positive. The rig will come from NZ, so operating on motors only for a few more weeks.

Aluminium is not our usual build material. However, the first power 43 has motored away from the S. Korean builders, GHI. Their second Kelsall is well underway - a 51 ft. sailing catamaran. Some of our KSS techniques can be applied to alloy build and we are happy to recommend this builder to any owner who has a preference for alloy. Generally speaking, we consider it more appropriate for 40ft. and upwards.

82 ft. Bonefish is on the water in Tauranga. This is the project that brought me to NZ ten years ago. There is an interesting story here for all kinds of reason. We will be telling it in instalments, starting shortly here and on our website. Watch this space.

Derek.

Tons of wet balsa

A few weeks ago a debate on the use of balsa core began on our KSSboat group on Yahoo. It was lively and informative. It also went onto the Multihull boat builder steamradio forum (email is: multihulls-request@steamradio.com). Anyone who has read what I have written will know my view – Balsa loves water and rots very quickly. It is impossible to ensure the water does not get to the balsa core and there is nothing at all to gain anyway. We got lots of feed back. We learnt of lots more reasons not to use it. We learnt of a very long list of designers who are promoting its use. The only explanation of this is that they have not seen what I have seen of cores and that they are swallowing the sales pitch, which has gone to the extent of balsa becoming an industry standard. It should never, ever be in any boat – unless the objective is to build in redundancy and reduce resale value. One only has to flip through one of the multihull magazines to see the extent of its use. It is in most of the boats in build pictures, particularly owner build. Seems that most plans come without any warnings of the dangers of balsa or instructions to get the best results.
If this sounds harsh on other designers, put your self in the shoes of an owner – here is a quote from one owner on Balsa core.

"If there are no voids in the layup, water doesn't spread through it and cause rot, even with such poor workmanship.? It is a better practice, of course, to completely seal balsa from all contact with water. As the owner of several tons of wet balsa core (in a C&C monohull) and some dry balsa (in an F25c), allow me:

1. Anyone who thinks balsa core is better than foam is either a sadist or is not the brightest bulb in the chandelier.
2. Even if he/she had the most perfectly laid up laminates on earth NOBODY will believe this when the boat comes up for sale.
3. He/she will NEVER recoup the cost of the extra labour involved in the utterly futile attempt to achieve a perfect balsa layup throughout the entire project.
Having said that, if the object of the exercise it to demonstrate that piss actually flows uphill, my advice is 'go ahead'." T.H

Catamaran designs and plans

Over 150 standard sailing, power, and commercial designs to choose from. Or create a custom design with our experience and knowledge of the sea, sailing, and getting the most our of your catamaran.
Let me know what you think of our designs.
We are not just a design site, we offer a solution to custom boat building - it is called KSS (Kelsall Swiftbuild Sandwich). KSS is available to anyone from the professional boat builder to the first time novice. KSS is the only way to build and we give you all the information you need.
We can even apply KSS to other designs.
Why spend hours longboarding. Resin infusion and foam composite panels made on a flat table produce the best quality, in the least time, in the best working conditions.
See how hulls are shaped from the flat panels.
We want to see every boat builder using KSS.

KSS Catamarans - State of the art in custom boat building