Destinations like Lewrick in the Shetland Islands are great places to look at yachts. You have boats from all over the world, and the location insures that they have to be sea worthy to get there.

This French Integral 12.5 stood out amongst the more conservative cruising designs. She is like a small Open 60. Excessively beamy, with a wedge shaped hull, twin rudders, tilting keel, and daggerboards.

And she doesn’t give any waterline away. Note the flat bow section. This is an efficient way to build the boat, and makes for a good topside weld. But it is more vulnerable in a collision than if the topsides were welded to a heavy stem bar.

25 degree aft swept spreaders eliminate the need for a permanent backstay. This allows for a nice roach on the mainsail. We have used swept spreaders like this on our designs going back 20 years and really like the system.

A keel which tilts to weather has enormous leverage, but poor lift to offset sail forces. So daggerboards are used as lifting foils. These high aspect ratio shapes are very efficient, but add complexity to the cruising formula (as does the tilting keel).

Wide beam lifts the center of the hull with heel, so twin angled rudders are used. The leeward rudder is immersed and vertical while the windward rudder is out of the water giving good control for minimum wetted surface. But the rudders are vulnerable in collision with sharks, whales, and debris.

Here is the clever part. These wide boats tend to be stable when inverted. To make the boat unstable you need a low center of gravity and volume shaped to make the boat tippy when upside down. That’s what this curved house and high volume cockpit seat backs are for (along with interior space).

And now another French aluminum boat, this one built by Garcia and also unpainted. Note the high stack of the mainsail due to the height and quantity of the full batten hardware. This makes attaching the halyard and fitting the sail cover a pain. A lower boom, tighter slide design (or less of them) will reduce the problem.

Speaking of sail covers, you will want to protect the forward part of the sail from UV degradation.

These extrusion style hatches had gasket leak problems which were attenuated with the addition of breakwaters. The breakwater then provided a base for handrails for working at the mast.

There are good and bad points about this detail. On the positive side it is easy to do, provides for some drainage of deck water, yet retains enough of a lip that the deck can be used to catch rain water. The relatively hard edge is a negative, and will wear on the dock lines.

A thickening plate to which the hatch base is bolted has been welded to the deck. This thick ring reinforces the cut out and allows the hatch base to be blind fastened.

You don’t often see aluminum rails and stanchions. These look good and are efficient cost wise.

Note the upstand to which the rope clutches are bolted. The fasteners are easy to reach and no holes through the deck are required.

We used to do angled toe rails like this, until we were hit by a sailboat which folded over ten feet (three meters) of rail. Since then we have always used a closed angle or extrusion, which gives the toe rail a better chance when it is hit.

Finally, an all aluminum steering pedestal. Clean and in keeping with the rest of the boat.

Switching boats now, we liked this anti-chafe wrapping on the bowsprit of a steel Scottish cruiser.

Here is a detail which will eventually lead to trouble. The head stay tang which wraps around the bowsprit butts up against timber. The timber to stainless interface will collect salt and moisture, and crevice corrosion could easily result. Stainless is happiest when exposed to the air. Semi-sealed situations, like this, are always a problem, given enough time.

We’ll end with a tribute to Nick Franklin, the original developer of the Aries servo pendulum wind vane. These are wonderfully powerful steering devices. Apparently the Aires business continues under new ownership (Nick passed on some years ago).