Plans for dinghies, dayboats, sail and oar craft
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Holly Blue 15 day boat plans are for a very light-weight, hard chine, stitch and glue plywood sailing boat. Batten seam carvel planking or even clinker topsides with batten seam carvel or strip or glued double diagonal bottom where wood is cheap and plywood expensive could be a simple, viable, though not light-weight alternative.
Intended to be light, pretty and agile like her butterfly namesake, Holly Blue should grace any body of water. While by no means intended to be a performance day sailer, the centreboard versions will give a spirited performance in all but the lightest of winds, while the shallow long keel motor sailer version is intended for the fisherman frequenting weed prone lakes and estuaries; the somewhat deeper keel version should give a better sailing performance than a certain Swallow of fiction and fact with a 21" maximum draft and fully protected rudder, though it won't give the windward performance of the centre board version in deep weed-free water.
A single or hard chine 'V' bottomed day boat with conically developed bottom and topsides, for building inverted over keel, stringers and inwales or upright by the stitch and tape method are the intended constructions. The topsides could be glued clinker ply if desired. Plans consist of 11 A1 sheets plus one study sheet and A4 keyed sail plan notes.
Four versions are offered: conventional centreboard version, skegged fixed rudder with centreboard, and a shoal draft full keel motor sailer fishing version for shallow, weed infested waters, and a slightly deeper full keel version for sailing those waters where mats of weeds constantly snare foil shaped boards and rudders. If additional performance were required for the fisherman version it could be fitted with an offset centerboard, but it would encumber the open cockpit space.