Mini maxi surgery

We talk to McConaghys about the monster changes made to Nevillie Crichton's Mini Maxi Alfa Romeo

As mentioned in our article on the Mini Maxis on Friday, Neville Crichton’s Reichel-Pugh 68 Alfa Romeo was heavily modified (to put it mildly) over the winter at McConaghy’s facility in China to resolve some substantial balance issues relating not only to the positioning of her mast and appendages, but also to her chines. The new boat is now around 71ft 6in LOA.

At the Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup, Jon Morris, Managing Director of the Australian boat builder took time to fill us in about this - some of the most scary modifications we have ever heard made to a boat.

“Basically what we did was strip the boat out, took everything off and propped the deck up and left all the bulkheads hanging under the sheer. We cut every bit of hull away from all the existing structure.” Image of angry man taking angle grinder to the hull–deck join, like opening up a can of beans.

With the deck propped up and the bulkheads all suspended beneath it, they then set about enlarging the bulkheads to accommodation a new hull that Reichel-Pugh had designed to go underneath it. Up to around 150mm was added at Beammax on either side while volume was moved forwards and the chine in her aft quarters, part of the cause of her handling problems last year, was removed, replaced by a more rounded section.

“And we ended up cutting away all the keel structure. We were going to reuse that, but we got of it all and started from scratch in that area. So what happened was that the deck moved forward on the boat and the forestay moved forward and the transom got pushed out the back as well.” According to boat captain Wade Morgan the keel has moved forwards by around 500mm while the rudder is now around 400mm further forward.

Morris continues his woeful tale of extreme boat surgery: “The original plan was that the transom was going to stay attached to the deck and the whole boat was going to grow forwards, but what actually happened is that did happen, but the transom got moved aft a little bit so we could keep the traveller bulkhead and the mast gate and the cabin and the deck layout exactly as it was, as well as all the jib tracks.” So the deck on the Mk2 Alfa Romeo Mini Maxi has all the deck gear laid out exactly as before, except that the forestay is around 150mm further forewards with an extra strip added to the luff of the existing headsails.

So the main bulkhead has remained in the same place except that the keel (located aft of the main bulkhead) has moved forward relative to it. “That is why we ended up cutting up all the keel structure,” says Morris. “The keel went forward, but the sail plan remained the same except for pushing the tack forward a little.” While before the lift point for the boat was beneath the companionway, now it is directly below the cabin top, around 500mm further forward.

The new hull was laid up over a male mould and in the process of making the mods they not only changed the hull shape but replaced the longitudinal structure, generally beefing up the structure. “The structure has always been pretty marginal as well,” admits Morris. “Now the boat is quite solid and stiff.”





Of particular importance to the time it took to get the boat back together was that in the process of chopping the hull away from the bulkheads and deck, they also took out all the internal furniture such as the galley, nav station, companionway, etc so they could reinstall this parts back into the new hull. “The main thing we wanted to do with the rebuild was to retain the interior without creating an absolute major there,” says Morris. “So we were able to replace the longitudinal structure and everything to suit the existing interior with only a little bit of trimming of a couple of floorboards and stuff. Apart from that it was all fine.” The floorboard enlarging is particularly evident in the sail area forward where the floorboards have had to be enlarged by around 150mm on each side. But the layout down below is identical to the old boat and having reinstalled the same futuristic furniture, it is hard to spot the difference.

The only difference (and bear in mind we have seen a lot of other boats in the last 12 months) is that they have a spinnaker packing system down below. Like the other Mini Maxis they have a Cup-style line drop system with the grinders able to pull the kite down the forehatch at record speed, but down below on Alfa they have a hoop and sock arrangement going aft for the head (as the STP65s and Ran 2 have) but also another hoop/sock going forward into which the tack of the sail is pulled. The result is very fast packing and, if necessary, to untwist the sail, both useful features considering the predominantly inshore future for the boat.

So was this cheaper than simply throwing away hull and deck and starting again? “It is not the most cost-effective way to go about it!” Mirrson admits. “There are some savings with the whole thing. It is always the way that these things end up being way more complicated than anyone anticipates when they pull out a piece of paper and start scribbling.”

Apart from moving the forestay forward and enlarging the headsails, the rig is otherwise the same, except that they have added deflectors for the runners. The keel and bulb are the same but Reichel Pugh also came up with a new design for the rudder which they built and fitted.

The result has the thumbs up (and so it should after all this). As Boat Captain, Wade Morgan says: “She feels pretty good. She goes in a straight line. We are seeing the rudder angles that are proposed as opposed to it being very different last year. You come out of the box and sail to the right numbers, whereas last year we weren’t able to do that.”

From now Alfa Romeo is heading back to the shed in La Ciotat in the south France and will miss Voiles de St Tropez and the Rolex Middle Sea Race. Instead owner Neville Crichton is going to focus on his 100ft Alfa Romeo super maxi in the build up to December’s Hobart Race, before the contemplate the 2010 Mini Maxi circuit in the Med with the Mini Maxi.

Meanwhile McConaghys are also building a Lutra-designed 80ft canting keel cruiser racer for a Russian owner, due for launch in February 2010. They are just about to start a Reichel Pugh-designed canting keel 42 footer for Bob Oatley’s son, Ian (of Wild Oats maxi boat fame), while at their facility in China they continue to churn out the women’s Olympic match racing boat, the Elliott 6 and Mach 2 foiling Moths.

In addition to this they are also building a 40m composite motor trimaran designed by John Shuttleworth. The owner of this wants to be able to cruise it around the world. McConaghys are also building 45ft long hovercraft, mainly aimed at tourist operators. At present these are heading for western Australia and to Korea.

Read the full McConaghys account of the rebuild here
See our video guided tour to the 2008 Alfa Romeo here