About the yacht

Auriga, in North Spain!

 

Hull

Auriga is a 1973 Albin Ballad. She is 30ft long and draws 1.55m. She displaces 3300kg, of which almost half (1550kg) is in the ballast. The hull combines long overhangs with a fin keel, giving good performance and a comfortable ride in waves. The low overall displacement allows her to get up to speed in light winds despite a moderately sized rig, while the large ballast ratio keeps her stiff upwind despite the creek-friendly draught. The lead ballast is encapsulated, making the keel an integral part of the fiberglass hull. This means there are no keel bolts to worry about, and the keel-hull joint - a weak point of many modern boats - is completely eliminated. The rudder is hung on a skeg, making it much stronger mechanically and protecting it from impact. Tiller steering (apart from being the only acceptable way to steer a boat) makes for a simpler system overall and allows both the electronic autohelm and the windvane to connect directly.

A view of the hull, before the first floating in 10 years.

 

 

Rig

The masthead rig with four lowers and capshrouds is typical of the time and very stable. Interestingly, the original drawings show both an optional inner forestay from near the masthead and a small stay from just above the spreaders. A hanked on (or steel-luffed) storm staysail would definitely be a nice addition for heavy weather - the standard storm jib rigged on the forestay does seem rather large.

Sailplan

The IOR rule the yacht was competing under in the 70s penalized boom length heavily, leading to the disproportionately large overlapping headsails and the tiny high-aspect mainsail. We are yet to get used to this kind of rig.
(data from sailboatdata.com)

Interior

Built in an era when comfort was given less priority than function, the interior is small, even for a 30' boat. That said, boat designers of the day learned to be efficient with limited space and Auriga is well layed out, and livable (if not as spacious as the yachts the three of us are failiar with - 72 foot Igor!?).

To port there is a rear facing chart table with plenty of room for charts and loads storage for all the usefull clutter that always builds up around a chart table.

The chart table, en route to Gibraltar

To Starboard there is a good sized galley. The cooker is in relatively poor condition, with only one working hob at the moment. It was enough to get the boat home, but is definitely on the list of jobs before we go any further. There is, again lots of room for storage around the galley - both for food and equipment.
The sink has a manual foot pump to bring fresh water from the tank in the bow, and a second foot pump to draw up seawater directly, a sensible feature on any ocean voyaging vessel.

The galley - time for tea?

The saloon features 4 berths, two bench berths on each side and pilot berths above them which we haven't tried sleeping in yet, they have only used for storage so far. Unlike many of the wider boats we are used to there is no permanent saloon table. There is a foldaway table that can slot into two holes in the bilge, or, for a warm evening in a tropical anchorage, be brought into the cockpit.

View forwards

Starboard berth, with pilot berth visable behind.

Forwards there is a large bow cabin, also containing the heads. The heads has a nifty space saving device - the sink retracts into a cupboard, but when you want it, it can be pulled forward and drains directly into the toilet. Not only is this efficient, it removes one further through hull fitting. With three of us sailing, on long distance voyages we are unlikely to make use of the sleeping facilities in the bow, using the space for storing sails, bags etc.

On deck

On the stern we have a wind turbine on a very well constructed stainless steel mounting. Not only useful for generating power it also makes a comfy place to stand lookout. On the transom is a Monitor windvane - a high quality wind operated self steering device. This equipment is a 100% necessity for sailing long distance short handed, and was a huge selling point for the boat. A new one would have been prohibitively expensive. Such wind powered self steering devices are a little overlooked these days, with most people opting for an electronic auto helm - with all the baggage of faults, and power generation issues that come with them. Our philosophy is to favour simplicity - kit we could fix ourselves, and that works at sea even in complete absence of electicity.

Wind generator

Dan buoy and Monitor windvane