The Winklebrig Forum

When sailing in a fresh breeze sufficient to reef the mainsail, my wife can find it difficult to sheet in the jib adequately. As an experiment I decided to rig up a 2:1 jib sheet arrangement and it certainly seems to work well. Two blocks, one for each side, are attached to the jib clew by a snapshackle. One end of each jib sheet is tied off to a redundant fairlead, led up to and through the block on the jib and returned to the cockpit as normal, in much the same arrangement seen in some racing dinghies. The double block on the jib clew passes across our second forestay easily enough when tacking, the only downside is in light winds the windward sheet might need active easing because of the increased drag. Although experimental initially, it works very well and I think we will keep this set up.

This evening I checked YouTube to see if there were any new videos about Winkle Brigs. To my surprise our WB 93 is the star of a 1993 video about how to rig a WB, posted about a year ago by John Bergqvist. At least the sail number is 93 and the video was made in 1993 which is the year I understand ours was built so I presume it is our boat. Strangely though the hull is white above the waterline with what seems to be green on the lower part, which was the colour scheme present when we purchased 93 a few years ago. It also has white sails as ours does and a high peak gaff. However there are photos on the gallery showing our boat some years ago looking rather forlorn with a green hull above the waterline but with definite features that identify it as ours. It seems strange that when new it had a green hull over painted white which was later taken back to green. An alternative explanation might be that the filmed boat was not 93 but was using sails with 93 on them, I see 95 is a white hull so was this the boat that was filmed? An interesting video anyway showing almost certainly Eric Bergqvist rigging a WB.

Happy Christmas everyone and all the best for the New Year. Hopefully we can get more sailing in 2021, our WB Cressy has been confined to our barn all this year as we have been in tier 3 for most of the time.
Christmas arrived early today for Cressy with the delivery of a Torqeedo 1103. We have grown tired of the noise and fumes of our petrol outboard and as we only sail on Coniston Water with no tides or currents, a Torqeedo seemed the obvious choice. Can't wait to try it out!

Peter Cook once said that he learned from his mistakes and can now repeat them exactly. Hopefully I have learned from my mistakes during our first year with Cressy and can now not repeat them this coming season.
It was a steep learning curve coming from dinghies, but helped enormously by the Forum, Martin Cartwright's book and most especially the help given by David Bone.
So Cressy is now in my barn and I am enjoying working on her almost as much as sailing her.
What needs putting right after last year?
Firstly the rigging. The 3 strand halyards that came with the boat looked fine but twisted infuriatingly leading to several embarrassing moments when the mainsail was jammed half way up. However often I untwisted the ropes, they always conspired to twist again when I looked away. I have replaced all the running rigging with multiplait, I understand new 3 strand doesn't twist and certainly looks the part, but the cost put me off.
Secondly I had used the port aft locker for storing the outboard petrol tank and had "sealed" the locker by applying expanding foam to all the gaps. Unsuccessfully, a mistake. The cabin had a very strong petrol smell, so the aft locker now has all its joints and gaps sealed with glassfibre tape and resin, an awkward job but hopefully it will fully isolate the locker. I have also installed a ventilator just aft of the locker lid to encourage air flow.
Thirdly, the bilge slowly filled with water over the summer, a few gallons but surprisingly the bilge pump never removed any. The suction is good but presumably the hose end is curled up above the water level. A session with the hosepipe when Cressy returned home revealed a surprising amount of water trickling down into the aft lockers from the gallows tubes. Over the wet summer that had slowly accumulated. Now I found lowering the gallows at the start of a sail was a bit of a nuisance, but raising them up at the end to lower the sail was often awkward, sails flapping, trying to find the holes to insert the split pins etc. So now I am going to  bring the mainsheet attachment forward instead of behind the gallows and always leave the gallows in place. That means I can tape over the base of the gallows tubes where they meet the bronze deck fittings with self amalgamating tape and stop the water getting in. I couldn't find any other leaks and the cabin portholes were water tight. I use the cleats on the aft lockers for several purposes, so have attached two eyes near the front outside edges of the locker openings and will use a rope strop for the mainsheet attachment, although a traveller would look nice at some stage.
Lastly the bilge boards stick when raised up and just as we moored on the last sail of the season the port side board detached and surfaced by the side of the boat, still attached by its cord. luckily there was no damage to the hull, just missing bolts, but the board had obviously had a hefty bash in the past driving the pivot hole an inch backwards. Two new boards to make and I will be following David Bone's method off adding some lead ballast to increase the weight. It was interesting that the board floated when it became detached, I would like some extra ballast.
So some enjoyable fettling still to come and hopefully the little niggles and mistakes of our first season will be put right.
Happy New Year everyone!

After a really enjoyable winter sorting out WB 93, we are ready to go sailing. It's been a steep learning curve after only having sailed dinghies in the past plus the fact that our WB was all in bits when bought.
The Forum has been immensely useful, and Martin Cartright's book invaluable, but I have learned an enormous amount through two meetings with David and Margaret Bone. We met once at their place and once at ours and David was extremely generous in his time and advice, very many thanks.
So what have I managed to achieve? In no particular order, this is the list.
Second shrouds. I obtained some 8mm stainless plate and made two extra chainplates and used Dyneema rigging.
Second forestay, 10mm stainless threaded rod through the stem, below the mast rest for transport, with an eye nut. Again dyneema rigging, through a block back to the cockpit.
Belt and braces in the rigging department.
I've made some mahogany cleats for the cockpit in order to tidy up all the ropes and added one on the foredeck. I've also fastened a thin strip of mahogany across the aft end of the cabin hatch with a handle. The overhang will hopefully make it more weatherproof.
The bob stay is now stainless chain with a bottle screw and the bowsprit has a half round steel clamp where the eyebolt goes through, courtesy of David. He also kindly gave me some cockpit boards which saved me a job.
The gallows seemed very flimsy being only attached to the hull at the base. I found the stainless tubing used was a sliding fit inside 28mm copper pipe, so using this I put a length in both aft lockers, fibreglassed onto the hull at the base and clamped at the top into a piece of wood fastened with bolts through the original bronze fittings at the base of the gallows. The gallows are now much more rigid.
I've put a false floor in the port aft locker and sealed any gaps with builders foam. I can now put a petrol tank for the outboard in there safely.
I've learnt about mooring strops etc from David including his very elegant method of preventing the strop rubbing against the bobstay.
A sail cover is being made.
The trailer received new bearings, seals, brake cables and extra lights on the mudguards, new tyres, a spare wheel and tyre and a new winch strap.
Inside the cockpit I put in a mast support made from an old Laser mast, made some small shelves just inside the cockpit either side plus some led lights running off AA batteries.  A new step, there wasn't one before, and a new Porta Potti, again there wasn't one.
I repainted the anti slip areas with grey anti slip paint and had to repaint most of the cockpit white. Probably a change of hull colour next year, the finish is not particularly good.
So all ready to launch and put on our Coniston mooring, unfortunately a holiday booked long before we bought WB 93 means this will not be until towards the end of April, can't wait!
Thanks for all the information on the Forum, it would have been much more difficult without.

Hello and thank you for admitting me to the Forum, this is my first post.
Our family has sailed dinghies for over forty years, mainly on Coniston Water. It was there that we first saw "Hope" WB 107 and immediately loved the look of such a beautiful traditional boat. I see from this Forum that she belongs to David Bone. A month ago we saw Hope under sail and were very impressed, the internet search began!
There are two Winkle Brigs for sail at Apollo Duck, numbers 93 and 103.
No.93 has featured in this forum with much work being done over the years. The boat is being sold as the owner has passed away and his Widow has asked someone to sell it for her, very unfortunate circumstances. The boat is on a Snipe break back trailer.
No 103 has apparently been stood for a couple of years and needs a good clean. This one is on a Indespension trailer.
I appreciate both these boats need some work, but that seems to be reflected in the price and I would find it difficult to stretch to the cost of an immaculate boat. Although used to working on dinghies  I would greatly appreciate advice as to what specifically to check out when viewing a Winkle Brig. I have extensively read through the forum about repairs etc and have gained some very useful knowledge, but any further advice would be most welcome.
Very many thanks in advance.