© Attainable Adventure Cruising Ltd and the authors, all rights are reserved.
Nothing on this website or in direct communications received from us, or in our articles in the media, should be construed to mean or imply that offshore voyaging is anything other than potentially hazardous. Dangers such as, but not limited to, extreme weather, cold, ice, lack of help or assistance, gear failure, grounding, and falling overboard could injure or kill you and wreck your boat. Decisions such as, but not limited to, heading offshore, where you go, and how you equip your boat, are yours and yours alone. The information on this web site is based on what has worked for the authors in the past, but that does not mean it will work for you, or that it is the best, or even a good way for you to do things.
We cruised alongside an IP40 for several months in the Caribbean. We were in our Morgan 382. We generally outperformed the IP everyday, but… going to weather? They might as well have not even tried – we skunked ’em every time. I understand that this doesn’t really have a whole lot to do with this article, but it’s a fun memory nonetheless. 🙂
Hi Ken,
Sure, that makes sense.
Hi John and all,
A very interesting comparison. I have always thought Valliants sailed “above their numbers” and that Bob Perry had nailed some sweet spots. But I am clearly not an uninterested party.
Since there is a frequent confusion that often comes my way, I will clarify that a Valiant 42 (which I have sailed for 20+ years), while having the same (or very similar hull) as the Valiant 40, has a taller rig with more sail area, an upgraded underbody with a newly designed keel, and a 2-foot anchor handling platform (hence the “42”) allowing the jib to be farther forward. These were among numerous cosmetic changes.
Both are great boats that have many miles under their keel. (And may hold the record for circum-navigations among production [semi-custom] boats).
My best, Dick Stevenson, s/v Alchemy
Hi Dick,
Yes, that was my point about being careful of variants when comparing boats.
I’d like to make a couple of points that will clear up this “mystery“.
1. Carl’s Sail Calculator, hosted at the Tom Dove website is a wonderful tool, BUT It’s subject to the same problem any calculation tool is vulnerable to: Garbage In = Garbage Out. In this case the source of garbage is that users supply the data on various boats. I have submitted quite a few myself, mainly because I was unable to find an existing entry with anything like correct numbers. I can remember looking at three different entries for the same production sailboat, with numbers that were all over the place. Some are so far off that you couldn’t even blame fat finger data entry, somebody just had to make some numbers up! You simply cannot rely on the data for any given boat without vetting it thoroughly yourself. There are lots of sources for doing that: Sailboat Data, scans of owners manuals and, sometimes, a factory website… Which brings us to my second point: the curious case of Island Packet.
2. Both the Valiant 40 and the IP 40 are cutters, and have similar sail areas. Wait, what did he say??? The graphs above show the IP 40 with a much greater sail area and a much better SA/D ratio! Yes, they do. And the numbers for the IP 40, seem to be drawn directly from information provided by Island Packet. But there’s one very big problem. The conventional, accepted way to measure sail area is to measure 100% of the fore trangle,. Stay sails on cutters are NOT counted. This makes a huge difference when comparing a boat designed by Bob Perry, who is very scrupulous about using accepted values, and a company that, let’s say, likes to provide numbers that present their products in the most favorable light. Plug in the accepted measurements for the IP 40 and you get a SA of 774 sq. ft., just about the same as the numbers given for the Valiant 40. This results in a ripple effect of other values and, when coupled with the reasons given above as to why the Valiant 40 should be faster, you quickly see why the V40 will be faster on almost every point of sail.
QED
Hi Gregory,
Yes, very good points. (I delve into cutter sail area here: https://www.morganscloud.com/2015/09/17/12-reasons-the-cutter-is-a-great-offshore-voyaging-rig/)
That said, the point I was making is not just one of data entry failure, but also to point out that even if the data entry were perfect a boat with the same numbers could be far faster because of other factors like a fin keel.
I guess this comes from Sailing Atticus given their recent videos.
I’ve had a quick look for our Rival 38 to see how it might compare (with a reputation for being slow in light airs).
PHRF 141 which is right in the range of values for a Valient 40.
Sadly the RYA system called NHC which replaced the Portsmouth Yardstick for cruisers doesn’t have the IP or Valient in its base list (which is now 6 years old so not sure if it is being maintained) https://www.rya.org.uk/racing/Pages/nhc.aspx
I guess there might be some with an IRC rating but from here http://www.phrfne.org/page/handicapping/asdg it looks like we can’t get a comparison without knowing the name of an IP40 or Rival with a rating.
Plus ours is the ketch version of the R38 (possibly the only one still rigged as a ketch) so everything is going to be different.
Thanks for the explanation.
Another thing I was thinking about for the older boats is that there will be a very variable take up of different technologies, particularly in terms of sails.
So how many boats have retrofitted in-mast furling without battens? How many have invested in asymmetric downwind sails, in code zero upwind?
I would imagine that there will be a much wider spread among these older classes now then there would have been when they were built.
I used to race my Cal 35-2 (modified fin 5’) and in my fleet there were 3 J 30’s. They always, always ate my lunch. HOWEVER, the last time I raced with them the wind was blowing 15-20 minimum. We were going upwind against some current/tide and 2-2.5’ waves. I did not reef and they could not stay with me. If you could’ve seen the look of WTF? in their faces, it was, to me, a very satisfying afternoon. I built up a large enough lead that they couldn’t catch me downwind ( broad reach, where my boat excels) and I took 1st place….I stopped competitive racing on my boat that afternoon, on top. Yea haaaaa.
Sailing a stumpy-masted, cutter-rigged steel motorsailer, I can relate. I was able to get 3.3 knots SOG in 8 knots of apparent wind sailing through a race course off Toronto on the most favourable point of sail for me, and the gap in the fleet was enough to make it through without affecting the race. I got unusual pleasure from seeing the racers looking at the boat, and then looking at the stern for the telltale sign of prop wash, and then looking at the boat’s serene progress. The point is that any boat can sail up to, and occasionally beyond, its “numbers” if the situation and the skill set permit, which is why I don’t think they should ever be taken as gospel, merely a set of probabilities. There’s too many club fleets dominated by old boats driven by canny skippers and a generous rating to really argue otherwise.
My understanding of PHRF ratings is they are based on past racing performance rather than design…… if you do well racing, your handicap changes so you do less well.
How this applies to a series of production boats as compared to one-off’s maybe reflects what type of sailor as well as the racing ability of the sailors that buy them.
Hi Dennis,
That’s a common perception. But, as a past PHRF handicapper, I can tell you that is not the intent of PHRF, or in most cases the practice. The core premise of PHRF is that only the boat is handicapped, not the crew, and that is done assuming that said boat has good sails, a clean and faired bottom, properly tuned, and in all ways optimized within the rules to race.
In practice, classes that have a lot boats in PHRF spread over several fleets are very fairly handicapped and the best sailors win consistently, just as they would in a one design fleet. With rare boats and custom boats it’s more difficult, but overall PHRF is surprisingly good at taking the crew effect out of the final number.
Hi John,
In 2002 I had the hull of my steel 45 ft motorsailor Delta Wing , faired, and I modified the rudder for slightly increased area.
My next race was the 400 mile Lord Howe Island race which I won on performance handicap. As a result my handicap was increased.
The next race 2 months later was the Sydney Hobart and we enjoyed a following wind for the entire race varying from 20 to 43 knots. Despite blowing out our only spinnaker and resorting to the much smaller MPS for the last 200 miles, we also won that race on performance handicap. Our handicap was really upped then.
Hi William,
Getting your handicap raised is always disheartening, but that does not mean that the handicappers were handicapping your sailing skills rather than the boat. I’m guessing that your boat is custom, which is always the hardest for PHRF to handle fairly. That said I would suspect the handicap committee looked at a heavy motor sailor that came out and won two important races back to back and concluded she was faster than they initially thought she was, regardless of crew skills. The fact that you won the S-H after blowing out your big spinnaker would have been a factor too, if the committee knew, and I bet they did.
If I were doing this comparison where the usual suspect parameters and ratios s tell a counter-intuitive story, I’d be inclined to also look at the hull lines and other particulars like prismatic coef. and wetted surface. I would venture a guess that the IP is considerably higher on both accounts. I also think published displacement numbers are merely suggestions. With boats like these that have 1500lb per inch immersion (which suggests waterplane areas are about equal), you are looking at a very considerable increase in displacement sitting only a few inches down, which is usually not perceivable to the untrained eye. Lastly, those IPs tend to use in-mast furling which produces a terrible mainsail shape. Just as good sails are unrated speed, bad sails are unrated drag.