There’s no gentle way to say this, but I have long felt that cockpit enclosures are for those who don’t really want to sail their boats. And, of course, I’m also well-known as an advocate of clean decks.
But now we have a cockpit enclosure, and…I’m loving it. OK, I nearly gagged on that statement, but it’s true. And…I was…wrong…about cockpit enclosures—ugh, that was even harder to say.
This is the story of how and why we ended up with a cockpit enclosure, together with the design we came up with and the usage we are adopting to make sure we can still sail our boat efficiently and safely.
Hi John,
About 18 months ago we upgraded from an Ovni to a boat with raised saloon and an indoor watchkeeping station with 270 degrees visibility. After 6000 miles one of the clear benefit of a protected and warm watchkeeping areas is the very positive effect of less crew fatigue leading to more active watchkeeping and better decision making . It is stating the obvious but managing fatigue better has a direct impact on safety at sea. How many boat are getting in strife because of fatigue leading to poor judgement, loose watchkeeping or reluctance to take action early enough? The main down side is less reactivity when something goes pear shape as it takes a fews seconds to get on deck, but when things are tricky we are back into our open and uncluttered cockpit. Cheers. Chris
On our old dutch 27ft boat we could extend the dodger to enclose the whole cockpit, although we lost the option to sail. (Motoring was still possible) That may not sound very practical, but made living at anchor a lot more comfortable in moderate latitudes. It’s very comforting to put up the Kuchenbude (cake-booth, the German colloquial term for an enclosure) after a wet sail to enjoy a hot after-sail-grog without having to move inside.
The dutch knew what they were doing.
Hi Jo,
I love the “cake-booth” name.
Hi John,
We actually went the other way this year. When we got our current boat a few years ago, it had a full enclosure but we have really only ever used the dodger and occasionally the bimini. For the second half of this season, we removed the bimini as it takes up cockpit space when down and were very happy without it. I plan to sew up an awning for use at anchor only this winter so that we can keep the bimini and its bulky frame off the boat.
What works best really depends on where you are. At anchor, we like to sit in crazy creek chairs under our dodger facing aft and this stays pretty warm in most conditions thanks to the dodger. We basically don’t go to docks so we don’t need to worry about being angle in funny ways to the wind. Underway, we almost never need additional protection but we did occasionally motor with the bimini up. At night, we can get pretty cold but I am not comfortable looking through the plastic so we don’t allow any of that stuff to be up. For long distance sailing, I have always had open cockpits but I would think that the Boreal system would be ideal. For the tropics, a bimini but no dodger is often good unless it gets really splashy. For the mid latitudes, I like just a bimini with the ability to get cockpit shade on a really hot, still day. I have done some pretty cold weather deliveries and the boats with pilothouses were really nice for that but I really struggle to sail a boat with a windshield or anything over my head as I use the wind on my ears so much (I also hand-steer more than most which probably contributes to my dislike of this). The Boreal with an awning that could be put up at anchor would seem to be ideal in my mind.
Eric
Hi Eric,
Good points on the drawbacks of enclosures. In part 2 I will be writing about some of the things we have done to at least ameliorate them. Also, I suspect that the willingness to put up with said drawbacks may scale with age!
Hi John,
We sail with only a dodger which works just fine in most conditions as you have noted. We are planning on taking our 37′ sloop south in the next year, so I’ve been investigating various bimini designs. I’m particularly concerned about maintaining a view of the mainsail and telltales. I look forward to your design thoughts on how to incorporate this important feature.
John,
I think you dismiss the idea of a cockpit enclosure in the tropics too quickly. We have both isinglass and textilene enclosures for our cockpit. After you spend a long time in the tropics or even sub tropics, temperatures as low as 70’s starts to feel cold. In the early winter when the xmas winds howl we get out our fleece and bundle up! Its nice being at anchor and keeping most of the rain out of the cockpit. During the warmer months we drop the isinglass and put on the textilene to keep the strong sun at bay late in the day. We also like to shower in the cockpit to keep the moisture out of the boat. We have extended out our living space and in the winter we can sit in tshirts in the cockpit while ice forms on the Chesapeake. Overall, we feel it was one of the best improvements we made to the boat. The only improvement we will make it changing soft bimini to a hard bimini when the time comes to replace it.
– a
Hi John,
Good point about how much our bodies get acclimatized to temperature.
On the hard bimini, yes it can be a good change. Our’s has worked well, but we were very careful designing it to make sure that it would not compromise our ability to handle the sails properly. I see a lot of hard biminis, particularly the ones that are covered in slippery solar panels that make it very difficult, or even dangerous, to say tie in a reef.
The reason that many of us have been averse to vinyl–Eisenglass, etc.–is that it gets cloudy and difficult to see through. There are several reasons for this including UV degradation and abrasion of the surface from wiping salt off instead of washing it off with fresh water, but the most important may be crushing the vinyl by folding the dodger down. When vinyl develops wrinkles it distorts vision through it and becomes frustrating to use.
We recently had an enclosure built and went to a hybrid solution. The three front panels of the dodger are made of Lexan, a polycarbonate, and are as clear as glass and almost as stiff, but can be curved for the corner pieces. We made the center panel as large as possible because I wanted to be able to get wind into the cockpit for cooling and for data (the sound in your ears and the feeling on your skin) when I wanted it. It can’t be rolled up, but it will swing up against the underside of the dodger and then zip back down when needed.
The rest of the enclosure panels are vinyl and remain attached to the bimini in a rolled–but not crushed–position until needed. This creates a bit of inconvenience in entering the cockpit from the deck because the roll lowers the entrance heiight by a few inches, but it eliminates the need for storing them so carefully that they can’t get crunched. The vinyl panels will lose their clarity faster than the Lexan panels, but with proper care and cleaning both should last many years before needing to be replaced.
Hi Larry,
Good points. We will be writing about, and discussing, the details of a good enclosure in part 2 in a few days.