All-black Canoe

We look at the features of Steve Clarke's new AC, Jet

At the RYA Dinghy Show the International Canoe class were showing the new Jet. This was designed and built by Steve Clarke - a little confusing this as there are two gentlemen of this name in the Canoe class. In this case it is the UK-based one, rather than the C-Class sailing, US-based Steve Clark. 

Jet’s hull was built based on a moulding from Razorback Boats, but Clarke designed the rest of this new Asymmetric Canoe which he also built himself after having been on a composite construction course. Considering this is his first boat, the finish of the carbon/foam sandwich build was very good. The spars and foils were developed respectively by son and father duo, Mike and Terry Cooke at Aardvark Technologies and Alistair Warren.

Aside from looking very cool with its black clear-coated carbon fibre finish, the main development with the boat is its new cockpit and deck layout. A principle aim of this was to clear the metre-wide cockpit and foredeck to enable a more secure footing when hoisting the 23sqm kite. Thus the usual kite sock has been replaced with an internal tube, the kite pulling into a recess in the boat’s rounded foredeck, the kite tube itself running aft beneath the cockpit – hence requiring the cockpit floor to be raised marginally. The tube has its own drain hole.
Also new is the spinnaker pole being on the centre line, as opposed to being offset slightly to one side. The pole runs in its own channel back from the bow and this also serves to hide the lines and blocks for the forestay and jib controls. This channel is hidden by a removable cover.

Efforts have also been made to minimise friction in the spinnaker system from the halyard to the pole launching to fitting a roller inside the mouth of the spinnaker tube aperture in the foredeck, to allow for smoother drops and hoists.

The mast post area has also been tidied up considerably with great thought going into the ergonomics of the control lines.

The most obvious innovation is Jet’s sliding seat. Built in carbon/Kevlar/this slides laterally across the boat, as is the normal Canoe way, but rather than the helmsman slithering out to the end of the seat, Jet has an extra buttock-profiled seat within the main seat and this slides in and out on rollers – a system similar to some rowing canoes. The lateral seat also moves fore and aft and the tracks enabling this movement have been recessed into the deck and a set more inboard.

The International Canoe class this year have their UK Nationals in Weymouth over 28-31 August, while the class is looking ahead to its three yearly World Championship, due to take place next year at Travemeunde Week in Germany.