|
Quick Search this Site Contacting me Home MUST SEE! The 5.5kg (12lb) Balsa Canoe The Rowboat Design "Blog" Making a canoe into a sailboat Slow boat into a ROCKETSHIP FAQ - Useful info Epoxy and Methods Saving Money Design Boat Building methods, Sailing FREE PLANS MY BOAT PLANS Canoes Sailboats Rowboat Sailing Canoes Motorboats Fishing Boats Canoe Sailing rigs Outriggers Riverboats Punts PD Racers DESIGN "BLOG" Diary of developing the rowboat design. DESIGN PROJECT Solarboat Norwalk Island Sharpies Custom Keels & Foils Custom Rigs & Sailplans ORDERING PLANS Plan Agents Site Map - Everything at a Glance |
Plans delivered by
email
available from - Duckflat - Australia - Duckworks - USA - Seawing Boats - UK (they also sell building materials and accessories) Plans are ideal for a first time builder 85 pages with dozens of drawings and photos We built two boats for $350 each. If you bought everything off the shelf it will still be <$1200 Not a FREE PLAN, but a REAL COMPREHENSIVE Plan $20 - building hull, mast and boom, centreboard and rudder, fitting out, making a sail  PDRacer Links - find out more.1/ www.pdracer.info - our website for the OZ PDR - full information 2/ What they are like to sail - VIDEOs too! - easy for beginners and feels like a "real boat" to satisfy experts. 3/ OZ PD Racer FAQ  4/
PD Racer building web
diary. Heaps of pics and
lots of witty commentary
(some more, some less). See just how easy they are to build.5/ Photographic Rigging Guide - pictures of how the PDRacers go together 6/ PDRacer.com - the international site for ALL varieties of PD Racer from the sublime to the ridiculous - excellent forum - wonderful people.  We think ...... Just because someone wants to build a cheap fun boat with their kids doesn't mean the design needs to be either dumbed down, second rate or complex and difficult. ... Just because someone wants to learn how to sail doesn't mean they should put up with second rate performance. ... Just because a plan is $20 doesn't mean it can't be detailed and tell you how to do almost everything to get your boat into the water successfully. ... Just because it looks like a kid's boat doesn't mean it can't be fun for one (or two) adults. Important updates There is an important update for some OZ PDR plans purchasers. I have just drawn up a new sailing rig for the boat - a balance lug rig. I am not sure it will have better performance than the original sprit rig, but it does reduce the length of the mast and also allows for reefing the sail in stronger winds. The picture above is of me sailing one of our OZ Mk1s with the hugely oversize lug rig off the Goat Island Skiff - a 16ft boat to attempt to take the record for the biggest sail in the PDRacer class. It handled it beautifully - one of the reasons for providing the lug version for the OZ PDRacer. The lug rig information is comprehensive including making the sail and is available free to OZ PDR builders with proof of plan purchase. The History The class was masterminded by David "Shorty" Roth who took the basic shape of the Phil Bolger "Brick" but decided to allow experimentation using that hull shape They are perfect as a first sailing boat for adults - they will carry two adults and maybe a couple of little kids too, and are very stable.  Making it better without changing cost Like many new classes the first PD racers were undergoing some teething problems - a few of the existing boats worked well - many others didn't.. From the info on the web it seemed that despite being incredibly cheap they seemed to be
I became very interested when I saw how many people were being introduced to sailing by this very humble boat. I thought it would be interesting to see how many improvements could be made without increasing the cost or complexity of the boats.  The PD Racer is a great portable boat for scooting around on the backwaters of the Mooloola River which runs near his house. By that time I had seen the potential of the boats - and I upped the ante by suggesting we build TWO - so we would have an instant racing fleet - or another boat to admire the first one from!  Also we both had started to think how the boats would be improved with some good old Aussie knowhow. So that was a start to this great project - the upshot was that we made two boats that were are delight to sail ... yes a box boat can sail so well that even racing sailors come back with a grin on their face ... but it is also a very forgiving boat for beginners. We carefully documented the build of the first two boats and used many of those photos in the comprehensive plan which are very thorough about methods and materials to make it easy to put a PDRacer together. We decided to have an experiment and make the plans deliverable by email and keep them dirt cheap ... only $20. Plans and more information now available PDRacer.info Updates about new developments and boats being built on the OZ PDRacer Blog Michael Storer Design Forum with a lot of PDR information including builds in Australia, England, Africa, Romania, Hungary, the USA, Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Slovenia, Russia and more.    |