my new boat

Our 2014 calendar is now at the printers and we will have the first stocks ready for shipping in a couple of weeks. Get your orders in and we will ship as soon as they come in, well in time for you to use as Christmas gifts or to hang on your wall come January 1st. Order here.

We have a nice selection of photos again this year. Here are the cover photo and a few months as samples of what it contains.

Cover of our 2014 Calendar

January

May

July

September

Thank you to all who have allowed us to use your photos. For other builders who are not featured, we have already started to collect photos for our 2015 calender. This is a good opportunity to show off what you have achieved, so please send them to me by email.

We have changed suppliers this year, in the interests of keeping the price reasonable. The supplier that we used in the past has hiked their prices way up and would have necessitated a considerable increase. With the new supplier we can hold the price at the same level as the past two years.

To see our range of boat designs, please go to http://dixdesign.com/ .

Back in the late 1990's Roy McBride of Hout Bay, South Africa, asked me if he could build my steel Dix 43 design in plywood. He had been very impressed by my radius chine plywood method that I developed to build my Didi 38 "Black Cat". He built his boat from the steel plan set assisted by some new drawings detailing important aspects that I supplied. The resulting boat was "Flying Cloud", which resides at Hout Bay Yacht Club.

Roy McBride's "Flying Cloud", built to a very nice standard.

I have never added the Dix 43 to our plywood design list because it is not a fully detailed plywood design. But it does make a really nice boat in that material when a builder wants to build from plywood. Another of these boats has been launched in South Africa, this one built by Gert Bruwer of Saldanha Bay on the West Coast. He has built the aft cockpit version, whereas "Flying Cloud" has a customised deck that is a mixture of our centre cockpit and pilothouse versions.

Gert Bruwer's Dix 43 "Scylla".

Gert has been a very loyal customer. He has previously built a steel boat to this same design as well as a steel Dix 38 and a plywood Didi 34 . He preferred the radius chine plywood building method, so selected it for this latest boat.

"Scylla" on hull-turning day. Much of the interior is already in.

Galley of "Scylla", traditional finish of white with hardwood trim.

"Scylla" is sailing well but I don't yet have sailing photos of her.

To see our full range of designs, go to http://dixdesign.com/.

We all know what it means to "hit the nail on the head". Taken literally, it is so satisfying to hit a nail so square and hard that it drives a long way into the timber. Just a few such blows and it is home, securing whatever its destiny in life was to hold in its given place. Taken figuratively it means that we have expressed an idea very clearly and in a way that resonates with others.

In just the same way, it is possible to design something that is just perfect, that we would not like to do any differently if we were to start again from the beginning, even if armed with the experience that came from the use of that product. A designer can and should get tremendous satisfaction from his/her involvement in the process whenever that nail is so squarely struck on the head. I have been lucky enough to find that nail a few times.

The Cape Cutter 19 is just such a design. I really would not change anything at all about that little boat. I have not sailed them enough and hope that I will get many more opportunities to sail them. The sailing that I have done has always impressed me with the extraordinary speed, handling and ability of this little boat.

Two Cape Cutter 19s drying out in UK.

 It is not a racing boat, so don't expect it to plane downwind like a sportboat. It is a little cruiser that can sometimes make you feel like you can take on the sportboats. Take it out in light conditions and it will sail past virtually any other cruiser or cruiser/racer of similar size, as well as taking out many much larger boats that should be a whole lot faster. It is oh so satisfying to sail past a boat that looks much faster but isn't.

It is not only a light-weather boat though. Remember, I grew up sailing the waters of the Cape of Good Hope and spent most of my life sailing there. Most circumnavigators tackle the Southern tip of Africa with great trepidation because of the often violent wind and sea conditions. For those who live there, those are the conditions that are given, so they have to be dealt with. I designed the Cape Cutter 19 to sail those waters safely, with due diligence by the skipper, of course.

There is a really nice independent review of the CC19 and it's bigger sisters on the SA Yacht Blog . It includes observations by the author of boats to these designs that he has seen in action around the Cape of Good Hope and how they have managed in those conditions.

These boats are loved by their owners and they are very sad to part with them. One such owner is Russell Eden in UK, who sold his CC19 this past weekend. I received these messages from Russell, repeated with his permission.

"I sold my Cape Cutter 19 today after three years of ownership.

She was number 47, built in SA. I wanted to personally thank you for creating such a beautiful craft. Each and every day I sailed her I had people approach me to talk. People would sail/motor over to take photos and video. People offered me money for her, there, on the spot.

I've only sold her because my wife says she will come sailing with me more often if we had a boat with full standing room and a heads. I would have kept her forever otherwise.

I'm sitting here now wondering what I've done; I've let go perhaps the most wonderful piece of property I've ever owned. No doubt I'll get over it in time, but I doubt I'll ever own anything quite so easy on the eye, or so wonderful on the water.

Thank you for designing her."

Russell followed up with:-

"I really meant it too. You designed something which grown men cry after.

 That said, it was only ever the white ones I lusted after. I think you need to be able to see the lapstrake, which you can't always do on the darker hulls."

Yesterday I reworked the digital version of my book "Shaped by Wind & Wave". When I first released it last year it was in ePub format, readable on Nook, Kindle and the host of other Ereaders now competing for the contents of your wallet. The security features sometimes gave problems and eventually the publishing company that I use autocratically dropped the format. They removed my book and the thousands of others in their system from circulation and told us to rework the files as needed then re-issue our books without the security features.



As an interim measure we continued to sell the digital version in the form of html files, to be read on a web browser. Now I have taken the time that was needed to convert my book to the new ePub format and it is ready for purchase in the publications section of our website.

In this format you will be able to read it:-

1) On an Ereader such as Nook, Kindle or similar.

2) On a Computer by downloading the free Adobe Digital Editions .

3) On a smart phone using one of the many available Ereader Apps.

We don't sell this by automatic download because we don't use an automatic credit card processing system, for reasons of security. We process payments manually through our bookkeeping software to safeguard your sensitive information and to give us better control over the process. When the payment has been authorised we will send the ePub file to you by email.

As before, we continue to sell the paperback version of the book, which can also be ordered from the publications section of our website.

Thank you for your support in the past. Keep watching this blog and our website for new designs and other developments. We have some interesting things coming up in the near future.

Dudley Dix

I am starting work on our 2014 calendar and I am still looking for a few more photos to complete the 12 months plus cover that I need. If you have any nice  photos of your boat of our design that you would like to be featured in this edition, please send them to me. The boat doesn't have to be sailing or even in the water yet. If the photo is clear and interesting then we might use it. It also needs to be at least 300dpi resolution, preferably more.

Cover from 2013 Calendar, with Italian Dix 38 "Imagine".

August photo, Challenger 13 in Lithuania.

Boat size is not important, as long as the photo is interesting and high quality. We even have our smallest design, the Dixi Dinghy in the 2013 calendar in a photo that caught my attention.

To see our range of boat designs, please go to http://dixdesign.com/ .

Ole Ehlert bought plans from us in 2006 to build a Didi 26 for himself in Kiel, Germany. It took Ole 6 years to build his boat because he lived 40 miles from the cow-shed building site, belonging to his in-laws. Two new kids and a house got in the way also but Ole kept going and launched his new boat last year.

Ole has sent me some photos of "Mary Jo", named after his daughters. It looks like he has made a beautiful job of building her. She looks very pretty on the water.

Ole's new Didi 26 "Mary Jo".

 Ole says "I enjoyed building the boat from keel to mast top as well as sailing it now. It�s very fast and enters the waves as soft as cutting through butter with a hot knife!"

The Didi 26 is one of our most popular designs, a great option for those who want to compete round the buoys in a big sportboat that can also be used for weekending or short holidays. Added to that, it is of plywood construction that is within the abilities of most amateur builders, yet it looks like a round bilge GRP boat. With those benefits it is easy to understand it's popularity with our builders.

Bow view of Didi 26 "Mary Jo".

 Congratulations to Ole on the beautiful conclusion to his project.

See our full range of designs at http://dixdesign.com/

I have done it 3 times before and I am soon going to do it again. Sail in the Cape to Rio Race, that is. I have crossed the South Atlantic 4 times, so this will be my 5th crossing.

In 1993 I raced on the Shearwater 39 "Ukelele Lady" (yes, I know that ukulele is spelt incorrectly but the guy who carved the name board was a bad speller) as sailing master and navigator. The boat was owned by my friend Nick Taylor, entertainer and TV personality.

In 1996 I sailed on the Didi 38 "Black Cat", as skipper and co-owner. Between the 1993 and 1996 races I had designed and built the new boat for the race. After Rio, we cruised her to the beautiful Bay of Islands SW of Rio before I raced her back to Cape Town, double-handed with Jay Barnes, in the South Atlantic Challenge.

Built in my garden in Hout Bay, here we are turning the hull.

 In 2000 I sailed on "Black Cat" again, as skipper. By then my co-owner, Adrian Pearson, had bought my share and was sole owner. Clive Dick and Adrian sailed her back to Cape Town.

Now "Black Cat" is 18 years old and has many thousands of ocean and coastal miles under her keel. We are about to head out onto the South Atlantic Ocean again, in the 2014 Cape to Rio Race. We have assembled the same crew as in 1996 with the exception of the navigator. My good friend Brian Cole was navigator in 1996 but is now getting on in years, so we have a younger man in his place.

Launch day in 1995.

  I am skipper and you all know me. No more info needed.

Adrian Pearson is owner and has sailed about as many miles  on "Black Cat" as I have. He does not skipper, preferring to be one of the crew.

Sean Collins sailed many miles with me on my CW975 "Concept Won", racing in Cape of Good Hope waters. He was with me for many double-handed events as well.

Gavin Muller was the "baby" of our 1996 crew, having graduated from high school the month before the start of the race. Now, 18 years later, his age has doubled but he will still be the youngest on the 2014 crew.

Dave Immelman is the new member, sailing as navigator. Dave has done extensive international offshore and ocean racing and is in charge of the major refit of "Black Cat", which is currently in progress.

Flying out of Table Bay after the start of the 1996 race.

 "Black Cat" has gone through big changes since I last saw her. She has been prettied up on the inside with hardwood trims and teak/holly cabin soles. Some comfort items added, like hot and cold pressure water system, separate fridge and freezer and inside shower. She also has a lot more in electronics, like radar, chart plotter and sailing computer, with instrument repeaters and dual compasses in the cockpit. Rig and deck hardware are also seeing upgrades to carry the increased shock loadings of a new suit of tougher hi-tech sails. I am looking forward to sailing on her with all the new toys and go-fast goodies.

She will go back into the water when this work has been completed, then Dave Immelman will do extensive sea trials to test her thoroughly before I arrive in December to give her my own check-over.

Relaxing in the Bay of Islands, Brazil.

For anyone interested, you will be able to track our progress on the Cape to Rio Race website and we will have a blog for "Black Cat" to pass on stories from onboard.

And, if anyone has an interest in sponsoring "Black Cat" in this event, please contact me to discuss what we can do for each other.

To view my boat designs, please go to http://dixdesign.com