New Corby 50 launched

James Boyd spoke to designer/builder John Corby about his first all-carbon boat

Her hull shape bears some ressemblance to Charles Dunstone's Nokia, but her hull is much shallower, simply because she is so much lighter and therefore does require as much buoyancy.

Over the winter Corby has been tank testing appendages and the result can be seen on Flirt, as well as a number of his other boats which have upgraded over the winter. These include Gloves Off which dismasted at the Scottish Series and Highland Spirit. "In total this winter I've designed five keels and four rudders..." Corby admits. Corby denies the rumour that Flirt's keel is similar to the Farr 52's. "It is very different. It is more like a Flying 15. If you look at the back of my keel the trailing edge of the bulb is sharp, not rounded. At first glance they might seem similar, but in fact they're very unsimilar". The bulb is also faired into the fin. Towards the blunt end Corby says the rudder has very high aspect ratio, thereby requiring very little helm to turn it.

Above decks Flirt has a double spreader carbon fibre mast built by Formula Spars. The spreaders are swept back and the forestay is "slightly fractional" in Corby's words.