Yacht design by decade
Rupert Holmes charts the designers and racing trends that shaped the cruising boats of the 1980s – influences that can still be felt today
Rupert Holmes charts the designers and racing trends that shaped the cruising boats of the 1980s – influences that still resonate today
The 1980s ushered in more change in the marine industry. A key trend was that boats were rapidly becoming larger and more comfortable, especially towards the end of the decade, when sales of boats under around 23ft plummeted.
Another obvious change was the adoption of the aft quarter cabin – at the start of the decade these were found on only a handful of designs, but they were ubiquitous by 1989. In addition, much effort was made to produce brighter interiors, with more natural light, than the typically dark interiors of boats from the 1960s and 70s.
To give more space in the aft cabins, the stern sections of yachts became wider. At the same time, the move away from skeg hung rudders to larger spade rudders was also in full swing. This helped to some extent to overcome the lack of balance a wide hull tends to experience when well heeled, provided better control downwind in a blow and easier handling in marinas.
Even then, a number of models were clearly optimised more towards providing as much internal space as possible than good handling characteristics at sea.
Masts also started to move forward in the boat, often in conjunction with fractional rigs. While these still had overlapping genoas, which wouldn’t
disappear on new yachts for at least another 20 years, in many cases the mainsail was now the main powerhouse. This was a stark contrast to many 1970s designs, where the main was little more than a trim tab.
The IOR rating rule, which dominated design thinking in the 1970s, with its influence spilling over into the cruising world, had retreated to Grand Prix events by the end of the 1980s.
The Channel Handicap System (since renamed IRC) was successfully introduced for club racing in 1984 and rapidly became more widely adopted. Importantly, this didn’t excessively penalise low centre of gravity keels in the way that IOR had, which gradually encouraged more seaworthy designs.
Nevertheless the design of cruising boats continued to be influenced by the racing world. After Australia ll’s historic win in the 1983 America’s Cup, which broke 132 years of American domination, there was much experimentation with different keel shapes, including bulbs and wings, plus tandem and Scheel keel types.