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and cruising powerboats. Other tasks included boat parts, such as carbon fiber masts and rudder posts and crossbeams for multihulls, as well as composite auto bodies, skateboards, a helicopter rotor and a bicycle used by the Olympic team. For many years, however, the one thing Antrim didn’t have, except for the 15-foot singlehanded Wing Dinghy (which enjoyed only a short production live in te early 1980s) was a signature design or production boat. Mull had his Santanas, Wylie had his Hawkfarms, Lee had Merlin, but Antrim, well… All that changed in 1990 when the 40-ft Trimaran Aotea hit the water. The yacht’s inception actually dated back to 1988 when Mill Valley’s Peter Hogg was introduced to Antrim, who expressed an interest in designing him a trimaran. Hogg’s craft at the time was another Multihull, the 40-foot catamaran Tainui, designed by the legendary Dick Newick. While Hogg appreciated the boat’s design, he had encountered structural problems. He also had trouble being so far away from Newick, who resides in New England, and the builder, who had his shop in West Virgina. Hogg’s efforts to sell Tainui were neatly resolved when he hit a whale on the ’88 Windjammers race to Santa Cruz and totaled the boat. “We didn’t do it on purpose,” Hogg laughs, “but it was a blessing in disguise.” Although Antrim’s Multihull experience was limited, Hogg chose him as the designer because of his |
strong background in structural engineering. The third member of the team was builder Marc Genesty, an expert in multihull construction. Together the trio worked well, producing a state-of-the-art singlehanded racing machine. The boat was launched on April Fools Day, 1990. “Part of the reason things came together so well was that Jim was open to Marc’s ideas about simplifying the construction process,” says Hogg. “For example, the main panels for the sides of the hull were laid up flat and vacuum bagged on formica tables. We then torqued them into position and they required no fairing at all. Things like that saved tons of time and money.” Aotea proved her worth right off by winning first-to-finish honors in the 1990 Singlehanded Transpac. In 1992, Peter set a new record of just over 34 days for the San Francisco to Japan passage. Aotea is also the boat Antrim and Richards used to notch this year’s Doublehanded Lightship mark. Peter is currently preparing the boat for the upcoming Singlehanded Transpac, where he hopes to get the breeze to threaten the 10-day, 10-hour race record set in 1986. Despite her speed and accomplishments, Hogg feels the boat is only sailing at only 60 percent of its potential for lack of any real competition. It has, however, put Antrim on the map. When Cape Horn sailor Isabelle Autissier and her French crew (who possess considerable bluewater multihull experience) saw Aotea sitting on her mooring off Tiburon, they expressed |
amazement that such a sophisticated vessel could have been designed by an American! Aotea’s follow-up has been the Antrim 30+, a smaller, production version that incorporates several of the design concepts of the bigger boat. The first prduction edition, which was built by Alameda Multihulls, is now sailing. Looking not unlike Luke Skywalker’s Jedi fighter, the 31-footer has folding amas that reduce its beam to 10 feet beam for trailering, and cruising accommodations below the hull. It also has a top speed somewhere near 25 knots, which should keep the speed freaks grinning for a while. Meanwhile, there are bills to pay and other jobs to complete. When Bill Koch needed someone to do composite engineering for his 1992 America’s Cup effort, Jim spent five months in Rhode Island cranking out numbers for deck laminates, chainplates, keel support structures and hatches. The latter provided a bit of amusement, at least to Jim. Since the entire belowdecks was cloaked in black carbon fibers, the syndicate brass wondered if he could design a hatch made with translucent S-glass to let in a little light for the sewer personnel. When Antrim calculated that the resulting structure would weight 4 ½ pounds more then the opaque carbon fiber version, “The said to hell with it!’ Other projects now occupy his drawing table. One is redesigning of a Mull 27-foot ultralight with a lifting bulb |