Corbin 39 Mk I helm balancing act

[dmalcol1]

I had 135 genoa sail made from far east sailmakers with high cut. When genoa furled to 100 or less high clew allows for cutter sail plan with many way to tweek helm ajustment. One time when sailing with my son inlaw at helm, he asked how to ingage auto helm I told him push down on the leaver. After several hours of sailing 5 degrees up and down with speed from 6 to 4 to 6 it was noted wheel was locked but auto helm was not on.

PH Hull 72 Short Rig Bowspit.

[lagunafreak]

So, the Mrs and I spent a couple of weeks this summer conducting our due diligence initial inspection of all the Corbin 39 MK I's listed for sale on the Great Lakes. "Disappointment" would be an understatement in describing our general impression of these vessels' condition. I'd say 1 was as represented in online ads, and 2 are likely worth roughly half of their asking price, to us... Of those 2, we've gotten no response from the boat yard that was to give us an "estimate" on work we would require to consider the purchase of the boat with the most "potential" and it's been 8 weeks since I spoke to the yard.

Looks like we keep shopping...

[model 10]

If you have not already, I think you should look at the Corbin, Rio Nimpkish. There is no BS with this boat.

[dmalcol1]

I understand your frustration!

My wife and i made a trip to Florida severals year back looking for solid Water boats">blue water boats in the under 80K price range leaving us 20k for upgrades. What we found was tired old boats that were in need of much refurbishment. We returned to Ontario and kept looking for older boats with good bones and ended up finding unwanted Corbin 39 at EYC. She was neglected by her owner who had developed dementia. At the time i looked at her she had no engine and was uncared for her mast was up but rigging was loose boom laying on deck and had several leaks. But she had professional finished interior the doors closed on latch like thay were just installed most baots we looked at the doors were pined open and were not serviceable. We considered her to be good boat in need of much refurbishment and made offer that ended up at 40K(yes to much).
I had her shipped to my driveway in Prince Edward County. There the work begain in the first year we redid topside and deck bringing teck cockpit and toerail back from the brink This was done first to give us results that were visually pleasing helping our moral. The second year machanical refurbishment took place new engine electrical refit, pluming and new sail. The third year of ownership she went in the water and some sailing was done I was disapointed, but continued resolving bugs. The fourth year i sold my house in preparation for retirment and we lived on the boat for one year in Hamiton harbor she was found to be comfortable. I made several trips between Hamilton and Prinyers Cove PEC totaling over 800kn miles that year these trips offered me the opportunity to allow her to show me what she wants in sail plan. I found when the wind is below10kn sloop is best when above 10kn stay sail cutter rig is best. My boat has inmast furling making mainsail foot length adjustments unlimited and between furing 130% high cut genoa and main sail over time you will learn what she wants to balanced helm.
The fifth year of ownership i retired and brought boat to cottage now our home in Prince Edward County with plans on going south and leaving boat there during summer returning in winters. But life does not always work out. TWO of my three daughters were to be giving birth in September of my retirment year, so i am now a grandfather of one girl in BC and a boy in Grimby. So i now have a ready to go anywhere blue water boat that travels back and fourth from PEC to Hamiton I have found her to be well balanced on most pionts of sail Definitely not a round the boys boat but definitely good at long distance passages, when she is dialed in she will take care of herself and you. She is being hauled out for the winter October 8 so i cannot offer you day out sailing but the offer is good next spring. She is not actively listed for sail but she realy would like to and deserves to be in salt water.

[Marcb]

I bought a Corbin 81 mk1 in Halifax in May after looking at most corbins in Ontario and Quebec, ok I overpaid her a bit, she had a new 55hp Volvo and in great shape, love her even with the weather helm, sometimes she is harder to helm And keep the course and she overpowers often my raymarine wheelpilot but she is great at most point of sail, not the fastest, not the biggest cockpit either, she is a mid cockpit aft cabin and not the pilothouse version.

[longjonsilver]

Originally Posted by Scaramanga F25

the Corbin 39 is a very solidly built boat, but has severe on the deck gel-coat cracking and is a very poor design from a relatively unknown designer.

This is also my assessment of the Corbin, altho admittedly without firsthand knowledge, so my search for a bluewater boat has moved on. You can't dance with all the girls, you gotta pick n choose.

jon

[dmalcol1]

Longjohnsilver you say your Searching for a trimaran why would you be commenting about a boat like Corbin 39 she is not your kind of date.

[Chenega]

Originally Posted by lagunafreak

Ahoy all!



Not sure if this is the right forum. If not, please excuse my stumble.



I've been lurking here for a little over a year. My co-Cap't and I have our eye on purchasing a Corbin 39. I've read all about the factory -vs- owner finished boat/joinery so we are going in with eyes wide open. Plus, I was a cabinet maker/finish carpenter in a previous life. I've pretty much searched all of the Corbin 39 threads on CF to no avail.



I am pretty adamant that I want nothing to do with a bow sprit; anchor bridles, higher marina fees, additional hull penetrations, bob stay, etc. So, MkII is a low priority on our shopping list. Though I would think the forward mast step of the MkII helpful.



Our question for the collective wisdom of CF arises from my tendency to believe that Dufour/Corbin would not design a boat (MkI) that is incapable of helm balance on all angles of heel to weather. Moving the dynamic CE:CLR relationship does not seem like rocket science to me. As such we are hoping for some helpful sailplan info that will best balance the helm of the Corbin 39 MkI. As an example, I have read of one Corbin 39 sailor whose sailmaker told him to shorten the foot of his main by 3 feet. He did so and bought a shorter boom too. He reports this worked well.



I am inclined to think there is an optimum heads'l and stays'l cut that will effectively move the CE adequately closer to the CLR on all angles of heel to weather with her heavy ballast to displacement and without cutting down the foot of the mains'l and boom. In general, this discussion is relevant to the 51 foot mast. Not sure I want the 46 foot shorty. But am open to all good ideas.



Thoughts?



Help please!



And thank you!

So here’s my 2 cents...
We own a Corbin 39 now for 3 summer seasons. After owning 14 boats over 30 years, from Cape Dory’s to Morris Yachts, this is our boat we’ll cruise with.
It’s an Mk11 factory finished boat. She sails well in light air, excels in wind 10-20 knots and is a dream to sail in winds to 30.
She is able to sail a course as on rails in any condition. We’ve experienced weather to to mid 40’s. She’ll get you there in comfort and bring you home safely. In our opinion an ideal cruiser to go anywhere....

SV Fascination

[longjonsilver]

Originally Posted by dmalcol1

Longjohnsilver you say your Searching for a trimaran why would you be commenting about a boat like Corbin 39 she is not your kind of date.

Like i said, i've moved on...

[cortezsailor]

Most Corbins were owner finished , I am lucky enough to own a factory finished and firmer display model . There maybe bigger but I doubt better . Sailing wise she’s super comfortable and predictable , comfort level she’s very utilitarian, nothing fancy , I have never felt the boat couldn’t handle any situation she was in . It depends on what you feel you want/ need . For two people it’s great for cruising, when I have 2+2 crew it simply doesn’t offer the privacy people expect now a days but it has more then enough space

[petit bateau]

For the benefit of anybody who looks in on this thread in years to come we in the Corbin 39 community have now done a pretty exhaustive study into this Corbin 39 weather helm issue, both from a practical study of owner reports, and from a series of theoretical analyses. The results of these are in agreement with each other, and can even explain to us why two different sailors, sailing the exact same boat (i.e. the exact same hull number / given boat name), came to different conclusions at different times for reasons we now understand.

May I suggest anyone interested take time to look at the results. You can either go to the Corbin 39 Association website and read through the Longform Articles section (Longform articles – Corbin 39 Association) or you can go to the same website and access via a FAQ entry (https://corbin39.org/ufaqs/weather-helm/) which gives a bit of direction.

In the course of these studies we also issued a set of lines plans, did the static stability analysis, the sailing performance analysis (VPP), and a dynamic stability analysis (ISO STIX), as well as the weather helm analysis, for several of the Corbin 39 sailplans. The pathway taken through this study, the tools used, and the interpretation of the results are all fairly clearly laid out and could be employed by other yacht classes, or might be of interest to students of naval architecture. Open source and/or freeware software tools have been used, and whilst we have verified results against (paid for) proprietary software it is not necessary to possess (paid for) proprietary software to repeat these studies if conducted as we have set out.

Now that we have concluded these studies I would like to take this opportunity, on behalf of the Corbin 39 community, to say that we owe an enormous debt of gratitude to Jean-Francois Masset and Alain Lebeau for their fantastic volunteer support, so willingly given. They are two retired naval architects, previously of the French research institute "Ifremer". They are also active contributors to Boatdesign.net . We could not have done this so speedily and thoroughly without them, though now that it has been done and documented we hope that other classes etc could read our documentation and carry out their own equivalent analyses unaided.