We've seen just a little bit of JIPE98's Melanesia before, but he's really cooking in this one. The blurb beneath the video states that he hit 8.4 knots on this run from Ouemo to Uere, New Caledonia. That's really cooking for a 16' outrigger canoe!
The video appears to have been shot handheld by his crew, and details of his one-handed steering setup hover just outside the frame. But there are some stills of the canoe from above at the end of the video, and she's a very nice-looking example.
I look forward to seeing more of this Melanesia in the future. It looks like he's got a great boat, and a beautiful setting to sail in.
Meanwhile, in my own build, I wasn't able to apply further coats of epoxy to my fiberglass-taped fillets yesterday because a cold front blew through, bringing 50°F temps and a day of much-needed rain. So I continued stitching the second rope to my sail, which is almost complete now. Today looks favorable for epoxy work - higher temperatures, at least, and the rain has ended. So I hope to be able to finish coating the fillet glass today, and move on to installing the decks tomorrow.
Greetings, loyal reader. Between the frigid weather which keeps my epoxy from curing, and the long list of home maintenance/repair tasks I've been working on lately, there's not much new here in Coastal Colorado.
BUT there are a few exciting new videos to share. First, Austrian builder Tom Puchner has posted a well-made video of his beautiful Melanesia "Velella" under sail in force 3-5 winds. Velella has admirable finish quality, and I'm especially jealous of his bamboo spars, kiato and hiking poles.
Not only is it the best Melanesia sailing vid on Youtube at the moment, it's also the first one with a decent view of the steering and sail-handling work required. The video is shot using a GoPro HD camera lashed to the outrigger pole, providing a good view of what's going on. A few particulars I'd like to point out:
Tom's wearing a wet suit, and with good reason. The Melanesia is a very wet boat - it comes from a culture that never really had cold weather to contend with.
He moves around a lot when sailing it. Crew weight placement matters a lot in the Melanesia.
There's a tacking sequence that starts around 5:30 that gives an idea of how snappy these things are through the wind. Tom lifts the paddle from the water and sets it in the hull, then scoots forward to encourage the stern to slide around. He tries once or twice to complete the tack by handing the sail across to the other side, but that doesn't work, so he paddles the bow through the eye of the wind and sheets in. Elapsed time is close to a minute. The former casual monohull racer in me cringes at the idea of a tack taking longer than 15 seconds. I wonder if he'd do better with some ballast stored in the bow? I've read that can help with this problem.
Compare all that to the jibe at around 0:55. Just point downwind, flick the sail over to the other side, disentangle one's self from the sheet, and you're done. Clearly, jibes are far easier than tacking in these, and there was no violence to the transition like you'd expect from other sail shapes.
I wonder if it would be better to mount the mainsheet lower on the spar, and lead it to a point a little further forward, out of the ? It seems to be causing Tom some trouble.
In a strong breeze and when the wind's on the hull side (as opposed to the outrigger side), the outrigger float ("ama") dives and throws up considerable spray. I happen to know that Tom's using a very sleek and buoyant homemade foam ama, so when you notice that happening, imagine it being much worse on a boat with a timber ama like the one I'll probably use.
What else do you see in Tom's video?
Next up, another, much briefer Melanesia video from an unknown francophone builder. This one offers a few still shots of the canoe strapped to a van roof and being assembled on the beach, then cuts to some footage taken from inside the canoe while under way. The camera's POV is too close for the kinds of insights that we get from Tom's video, but there are some good views of the sail lacing and steering position, and the canoe scoots along nicely with two adults aboard.
The final video I have for you is the launching of James Wharram's latest design, the Melanesia's big sister "Amatasi." Like Melanesia, Amatasi is a design that carries strong ethnic influences. It does not use crab claw sails, but it does use the steering paddle and the general hull shape is very similar to the somewhat smaller Tahiti Wayfarer. The video doesn't really show the craft under way, but it does offer a chance to see designers James Wharram and Haneke Boon in a moment of triumph.
That's all for now. I hope to be able to bring my hull into the house for a couple work sessions after the holidays, but until then there's not likely to be much to write about in this boat building blog.
For a while now, I've been searching for video of a Melanesia under way. It would be so helpful to see the rig in action, to see somebody using a steering oar, to see the details of somebody else's finished boat. But there were none... until a few days ago. Here's Youtube user andy4us's video, taken during a sea trial in his almost-finished Melanesia:
