Lance Bennet always wanted a bubble boat to add to his fleet, so when Pete Rochelle’s old A Skeeter came along he decided to cut it down into a more manageable C Skeeter size. The plank went from 22′ to 16′, the mast from 26′ to 20′, and the fuselage lost a few feet from the stern and the rear deck was re-shaped.
Here he’s framing up the new aft deck. The idea was to remove as much material as possible to reduce the weight and windage. The loads on the smaller C are nothing like what the A’s experience. The whole project revolved around the desire to be inside the canopy, warm and out of the wind. They are very precious, and difficult to build, so Lance carefully set it well aside where it would be safe. He didn’t notice the bundle of DN masts directly overhead secured to the rafters with some thin string. Yes, the string broke, and yes, the masts destroyed the canopy. Undeterred, Lance soldiered on and got the boat back on the ice just last month.
He reports she sails beautifully. We look forward to swapping tacks someday soon on a lake not too far away.
Ice is wetting out nicely around here, and if we get the predicted cold there could be sailing again on Friday and Saturday.