Jeff visits the Nickels Factory

Hey all,

I just got back from delivering my boat back to Nickels Boat Works for some warranty repair. To make a long story short, the trip took me much longer than I originally anticipated (the webmistress has taken some literary license here).  Never the less I met Dave Nickels and had a very interesting conversation with him.

When I arrived, Hugh was not there but Dave was and he was working on the new plug. For those who do not know what a "plug" is, it is basically a Lightning hull that is fabricated in order to make a new mold. Nickels has a new design coming out this year and the plug was in the final stages of preparation to create that mold. Dave was very nice to take the time to explain all the changes and how they hoped it would make the new Nickels Lightning faster. Dave told that the Nickels Lightning Hull was originally designed back in the 60's and has remained largely unchanged since then. The only changes were to the top deck, interior, flotation, rigging, and chain plate position. The hull, however, is the same as it always was, and was designed at a time when reaches were very popular. The boat was designed to maximize speed on a reach. Today, on the other hand, we don't reach very often. We sail mostly windward-leeward courses, which puts a premium on down wind speed, so they have made some changes to maximize down wind speed. The first change was to the Keelson. On our boats the keelson is about 5-6 inches wide all the way down the center of the boat. On the new boat it starts of at the prow a little narrower than ours, and widens to about 9 inches just at the forward end of the centerboard. It then slowly tapers back at the stern to the same 5-6 inches we have. They seem to think this will help the boat get up on a plane easier. The next difference is in the curvature of the hull aft of the centerboard. Where the stern rises out of the water it is not as curved as ours. It is flatter. Now here I was not quite clear how they expected that to help boat speed, but they feel confident it will. None of this affects the measurement points. In fact, they are using the original plug and have just modified it. The top deck will also be different. The coaming will be curved in more like the Allen boat, and the gunnel will also curve down and out to keep more water out of the boat. Everything else about the new boat will be much the same as our boats. The hotshots already seem to be lining up to buy one, rumor has it that Alan Terhune is negotiating to buy one. So we might get a look at one sooner than we think. 

I left the next day after a good nights sleep, and had an uneventful trip home. My GPS behaving nicely for me. Well that’s my report.

Hope everyone had a great New Years!