The January 2017 edition of French sailing magazine Voiles et Voiliers had an interesting article on renovating an OVNI 36. The OVNIs are aluminium boats built by French boat yard Alubat and are regularly featured in lists of top “blue water cruisers”. Jimmy Cornell owned one…

The work was carried out by a well respected yard – Arzal Nautique – which is often referred to as the OVNI clinic by owners of OVNIs. The aim of the refit was too make the boat look “like new” in order to sell her. No major systems or hardware was upgraded or replaced. The refit was essentially cosmetic and consisted of a paint job and of changing all the hatches and port lights. Here is a breakdown of the costs:

There is unfortunately only one recently launched proto mini 6.50 in the Mini-Golfe 2017, the race which marks the start of the mini season. Arkema 3 is not competing. Andrea Fornaro’s Sideral is thus the only recent prototype competing. The boat has just been launched, and it marks a switch to the proto class by Andrea after a brief season competing an Ofcet 650 in the series class.

Arkema 3, will definitely be one of the most interesting boats on the start line of the next mini-transat this October.

The Vendée Globe boats are allowed to carry 9 sails. What are they and can the cruising sailor learn anything from these sail choices?

I’ve decided to use Seatec Standard Pro Antifouling on Faïal this year. I’m planning to sail a lot this upcoming Season, maybe up to the Baltic. So self-eroding antifoul is a good choice. Because I’m planning ahead and I know how much antifoul I need – I don’t have to buy locally – and I’ve been able to consider a wider range of options…

In this video, which compares two 8 metre sport boat, the Seascape 27 and the Saphire 27, we can see again the advantage of having the outboard on some kind of articulated arm. This allows the outboard to swing directly from a storage locker in the cockpit sole to the outboard well. No need to haul the outboard out of a locker and to fiddle trying to attach it to a bracket…. I wrote about a similar system on the Farr 25a few days ago.