The Boat
The Australian Sailfish is a single-hand centreboard dinghy designed by Bruce Scott and Jack Carroll. It carries a single Bermuda-rigged sail bent to a stayed mast of up to 4.9 m (16’) length.
Dimensions:
Length 3.5 m (11’6’’).
Max. beam 88.6 cm (2’10 7/8”). This measurement excludes gunwales, which are not to exceed 25 mm (1″) in width on either side of boat.
Minimum hull weight 28.6 kg (63 lb).
Sail area 6.04 m2 (65 sq ft).
The Sailfish is a scow with a fully-enclosed, fully-decked hull. A shell, of marine ply for the deck and bottom and solid timber for the sides, is built over a skeleton of deckplank and keel, frames and stringers.
The design and this construction method produce a very strong and durable boat.
With its squared-off ends, and deckplank and sheer parallel with the waterline, the Sailfish has simple lines which make it very easy to build, by even an inexperienced woodworker.
It is also very easy to build well and to the minimum weight. And the boat is light at its minimum weight of 28.6 kg (63 lb).
It is comparatively inexpensive .
The boat is unsinkable and safe. It is easily righted after a capsize and bailing is obviously not necessary. It is a single hander but was designed with sufficient buoyancy to carry 2 people in safety.
The Sailfish is car-toppable. A minimum weight hull can be lifted on and off car roof-racks or a trailer by one person with some effort, and easily by two people. This is a very useful feature, regardless of whether the boat is used for non-competitive off-the-beach fun or for racing. They are very quick to set up and sail.
And, after a day of sailing, they are easily stowed in garage or car-port.
It is a one-design class with strict tolerances (+/- 3 mm sides, bottom and deck; +/- 6 mm for length). This provides for a uniformity of hull and sail plan among racing boats.
This combination of strength, durability, light weight and one-design has the potential to produce boats of great longevity which can remain competitive for many seasons. There is no need for expensive new hulls or costly modifications to old ones. ‘Janus’, sail number 1918, was raced solidly for 8 years and the only thing that limited its performance in that time was between the ears of the skipper. That boat, built in 1970, remains in good nick and on minimum weight more than 50 years on. ‘Furyous’, sail number 2135 seen in the photo below, was third in the 1976/77 National Titles and then, in new hands, was National Junior Champion for five consecutive years from 1982/83. In 1986/87 it was also Open Champion
The Australian Sailfish is undeniably a utilitarian rather than a classically pretty design. It nevertheless provides pretty sparkling performance in a race-tuned boat. It is both responsive in light breezes yet able to punch along in heavy conditions that can force the retirement of other dinghies. The hull form produces exhilarating sailing off the wind where, with the sheet eased and the skipper hiking, the boat will plane easily, freely and thrillingly.
Origins
In 1956, two friends in the eastern bay-side suburb of Mordialloc, Melbourne, Victoria had a discussion about sailing. They were keen dinghy sailors, both at the time competing in club, state and national competitions in the VS Class (Vaucluse Senior, 15’, 3-person wooden centreboard dinghy). Bruce Scott sailed his boat ‘Osprey’. Jack Carroll sailed ‘Debonair’.
Bruce had seen some articles in North American yachting magazines which had featured the Alcort Sailfish and Sunfish. He showed the articles to Jack. “Look at these boats”, Jack remembers him as saying. “We should have something like them. You don’t need a crew, they’re quick to rig, and you’re sailing”.
A short time later, Bruce presented Jack with a single-page drawing of what he wanted and what he planned to build.
Jack took that drawing and laid it out full-size in chalk on a school-room floor he was constructing at work. He faired the lines to produce a plan view of the hull. He then drew what would have been the side and front elevations. From these full-size drawings he was able to take the overall dimensions of the hull and extract the dimensions for the frames, sides and centreboard case.
Bruce completed his hull first, and rigged it with a very low aspect Bermudan sail, influenced (Jack thinks) by the squat unstayed lateen sail on the Alcort Sailfish. It had a relatively short luff and long foot, and no boom vang. This was Australian Sailfish number 1, and he called it ‘Little Osprey’. A photo of this boat on Port Phillip Bay is incorporated into one of the trophies that to this day sits on Jack’s bookshelf.
For his own boat, Jack redrew the sail plan to match a taller mast, with a longer luff and a shorter foot, and he added a boom vang. This boat was ‘Debonair’, Australian Sailfish number 2. The hull and sail plans have remained unchanged ever since – the Australian Sailfish had been conceived and delivered fully-formed with the first two boats!
Bruce Scott produced a sail insignia for his boat based on an arrow passing through the ‘O’ for ‘Osprey’. It could be argued that it is a stylised fish.
Is it possible that Bruce, a signwriter with undoubtedly an eye for graphic design, produced an abstraction of the Alcort Sailfish emblem as a nod of acknowledgement to the inspiration for his new boat?
Who can know? In any case, Bruce’s simple but lovely design has remained the class insignia we are all familiar with.
The Alcort Sailfish may have been the stimulus, but the Australian Sailfish is a distinctly different craft to the North American boat. It is considerably lighter and it carries a more powerful and stayed rig. But the more fundamental difference, however, is that the Australian Sailfish is a scow.
A scow has increased righting moment both transversely and longitudinally when compared to a craft with a wedge-shaped bow. Transversely, the centre of buoyancy moves further outboard when the boat heels. Longitudinally, the large reserve buoyancy in the bow mitigates against nose-diving. This increased righting moment both athwartships and fore-and-aft gives a scow the capacity to carry a more powerful rig than a boat with a wedge-shaped bow. Further, the dynamic lift generated from the flatter forward hull form causes the boat to plane earlier and faster, this benefit being evident only off the wind in the Australian Sailfish. Unlike the Moth, a more famous Australian scow, it won’t plane to windward. Its fine bow, however, allows it to punch through the short chop of Port Phillip… and the chop of Lake Macquarie and Botany Bay and other relatively open waters. Flick around the weather mark and an Australian Sailfish in a good breeze can plane for much of the remaining legs of a race.
This performance was eye-catching. The boats of Bruce Scott and Jack Carroll on the beach at Parkdale Yacht Club on Port Phillip in 1956 and 1957 attracted the attention and interest of other sailors. It was a classic example of a local design for local needs. When asked for plans for their new design, all Bruce and Jack could offer initially were sketched drawings and hand-written building instructions. Subsequently plans were developed and made available to the public.
CLOSE REACH
Interest grew through the late 1950s and many boats were built, often with the direct assistance of Bruce and Jack. Australian Sailfish began to sail with the club fleet at Parkdale Yacht Club and then later at Elwood Sailing Club. These two clubs were to develop strong Sailfish divisions which would dominate Sailfish racing in Victoria for many years. Jack Carroll reports that at one time there were forty Sailfish racing regularly at Elwood Sailing Club.
Boat numbers increased rapidly through the 1960s. From the foundation clubs of Parkdale and Elwood, the Sailfish became part of club fleets down the east and south borders of Port Phillip, at Beaumaris, Chelsea, Frankston and McCrae. By 1966, Beaumaris had a fleet of twenty boats racing regularly each summer weekend. The class became established on Albert Park Lake in South Melbourne, and also spread to the western side of the bay at Hobsons Bay, Port Arlington, Indented Head and St Leonards.
The Sailfish was also taken up enthusiastically by sailing clubs in country Victoria. Highly competitive and influential fleets developed at Cairn Curran, at Ballarat on Lake Wendouree, and on Lake Eppalock near Bendigo. Boats appeared at Paynesville on the Gippsland Lakes and in western Victoria on the lakes around Colac and Camperdown. The class spread also to inland waterways in northern Victoria, at Lake Boga, at Yarrawonga on Lake Mulwala, and to Lake Mokoan near Wangaratta.
The numbers of Sailfish racing became such that in 1961 a Victorian Australian Sailfish Class Owners Association was formed to formulate class rules, distribute plans, measure and register boats, and promote the class. Promotion took the form of displays at the Melbourne Boat Show, the distribution of the Association newsletter (‘Sailfish Newsreel’) to clubs, and articles in boating magazines such as ‘Seacraft’ and ‘Modern Boating’.
The Association conducted the first annual Victorian Championships for the class in the 1961/62 sailing season at Parkdale Yacht Club. That event was won by Jack Carroll.
BROAD REACH
Word about the class began to spread more broadly. Plans were sold and distributed by the Victorian Association to all states and territories of Australia. Many boats were built, including many built purely for non-competitive fun and hence not necessarily recorded by the association and registered for racing. Doubtless on occasions more than one boat was built from the one set of plans, unbeknownst to the association.
It is known, however, that the Australian Sailfish became popular for competition in south-east Queensland during the early 1960s, with class activity centred mainly on Sandgate Yacht Club on Moreton Bay. A Queensland Division of the Class Association was formed in 1964 under the guidance of long-term President, Colin Guy. Interstate Team Championships were conducted between Victoria and Queensland for several years.
A New South Wales Division was formed in 1967, centred on Narrabeen Lakes Sailing Club. It conducted the first annual NSW State Championships in that year, won by Peter Chapman.
The fleet at Narrabeen actively promoted the class, travelling frequently to other clubs to introduce the Sailfish. As a consequence, Sailfish became established at Blue Mountains Sailing Club on Wentworth Falls Lake and, somewhat surprisingly, at Botany Bay Catamaran Club. In 1971, the Nepean Sailfish Sailing Club was established on the Nepean River at Penrith. It would become a strong rival to the Narrabeen club in state and national competition through the 1970s. Subsequently Sailfish were introduced to the Toronto Amateur Sailing Club on Lake Macquarie. It is a superb sailing venue and was the host of several state and national title events.
The broad reach of the Sailfish class even extended to Papua New Guinea, where there was also a division of the class, centred around Rabaul Yacht Club.
National Championships commenced in 1968. The first Australian title was hosted by Elwood Sailing Club and was won by Leigh Marriott from Cairn Curran Sailing Club. National Championships were held annually thereafter at venues alternating between Victoria and NSW.
The last National Titles were held in 1987/88. Sadly, like so many of the wooden racing dinghy classes in Australia and worldwide, the numbers of Sailfish competing at club level had slowly declined in the 1980s, and the Sailfish Association folded in 1988.
SAILFISH ZOMBIES
The Australian Sailfish, as an active class, seemed to be dead . . .
That is, until the Inverloch Classic Wooden Dinghy Regatta of 2016 unearthed a minor treasure.
Andrew Chapman, a member of the regatta organising committee at South Gippsland Yacht Club, had been given an old boat which he restored and then relaunched at the 2016 event. This was Australian Sailfish ‘Debonair’. A knowledgeable participant at the regatta recognised the name as one often used in the past by Jack Carroll, co-designer of the Australian Sailfish. Jack was informed about the resurrection of ‘Debonair’, and he rang Andrew to confirm that it was indeed Sailfish number 2, built by him in 1957.
Reports of the 2016 event, which included details of this discovery, were posted online on several sailing sites. One or other of these reports were read independently by three former Sailfish skippers, Ian Milton, Greg Barwick and Chris Cleary, each of whom had raced the boat as teenagers and young adults. Each of them still had a Sailfish.
In mid-2016, this trio made contact with each other. A visit was made to Jack Carroll, a hale and hearty 87 year old, at his home in Bendigo in central Victoria. Personal recollections and old class newsletters were collated, new information from Jack and other sources was gathered together, and this website was kicked off in October 2016.
Jack Carroll authorised the digitising of his master copy of the Sailfish plans and building instructions and gave his blessing to the release of the plans and building instructions by free download from the website.
The three decided that they would attend the Inverloch Classic Wooden Dinghy Regatta in 2017. Jack was rung and persuaded to also attend. When that news went up on the website, interest snowballed, and by December 2016 there were eleven Sailfish committed to the 2017 event.
And eleven Australian Sailfish did indeed line up on the beach at Inverloch on Australia Day 2017, day one of the regatta. It was the first congregation of any Sailfish in thirty years.
The Australian Sailfish was undead as a class. The Sailfish Zombies had risen from the past!
The Inverloch regatta has remained the key annual event for the reborn Australian Sailfish class. The Sailfish have participated in the regatta each year it has been held since 2016, always the largest single class. It is always a time of joyful renewal of acquaintances, many formed up to fifty years earlier. There have been some wonderful highlights, the most notable being Jack Carroll, at 90 years of age, sailing ‘Debonair’ again for a short time in front of a large crowd lined up on the beach.
There were admiring cheers and laughter, and many tears.
Jack on Debonair at the 2019 ICWDR
Since ICWDR 2017, the website has coordinated the participation of Sailfish at other regattas, usually at events which highlight classic wooden dinghies and/or have a history with the Sailfish class. Venues have included Cairn Curran, Lake Eppalock and Lake Wendouree in central Victoria, and Paynesville in Gippsland. Toronto on Lake Macquarie and Wallagoot Lake near Tathra have also been visited, as well as Narrabeen Lakes, the traditional home of Sailfish in NSW. Two boats represented the class at the South Australian Wooden Boat Festival at Goolwa in 2019.
The website has also assisted in locating old boats. Such is the strength and durability of the Australian Sailfish, there is unquestionably many such boats stored away in garages, carports, sheds or under houses. Several have been successfully sold through the Classified section. Many of these boats have been dusted down, rigged up and given a splash at one or other of the previously listed venues.
The website published a new edition of the Plans and Building Instructions online in November 2019. Well over two hundred copies have been uploaded at no cost from the website to recipients in Australia, but also around the world, including the UK, USA, France, Germany, Italy and Brazil. New boats have been built from those plans in Australia, the USA, Europe and in South America.
Very sadly, the world has been stricken by the coronavirus pandemic during 2020 and 2021. Among the least consequential effects of this has been the cancellation of many of the things we have taken for granted, like sailing regattas, and a severe limiting of our ability to sail in company.
The website lists events that are planned for the forthcoming southern hemisphere 2021/22 sailing season on its blog and calendar pages. It is currently uncertain how these events will be effected by the continuing public health emergency created by the coronavirus pandemic but it is hoped that it will be brought under control in the shortest possible time. When that occurs we may once again be able to enjoy the privilege of sailing together in company, and adding to the history of the Australian Sailfish.
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