Copyright © 2006-2009 Schulz Boat Co.
Walter Schulz and the Shannon Yachts people have dedicated themselves for 25 years to producing sailboats aimed at one purpose above all others: going to sea. Semi-custom attention to detail, practical adherence to modern-day construction standards, and a mindset that lives offshore - all combine to give the Shannon line a rock-solid identity in a world too often wooed by the swanky notions of slickness and speed. The newest and perhaps most technically complete member of the fleet is the Shannon 47. Design, construction and philosophy are uniquely aligned; the boat is forward-thinking in concept, yet rooted in the unwavering tradition of sailing far and wide.
Schulz is the founder of Shannon Yachts. He is also the designer and builder, a role he's assumed throughout the evolution of the company. He brings an element of consistency to these boats that becomes altogether clear when you sit down in a cockpit with him or go off sailing with him or walk through his churning Bristol facility. At the core is his firm belief that a boat take care of its owner and crew. This involves issues well beyond the obvious ones of structural integrity and a vessel that won't break. It involves comfort at sea and at anchor; it involves a hullform at home in 15-foot seas and a turbulent chop; it involves a sailplan that balances in all condi-tions and remains manageable and unintimidating for a shorthanded or underpowered crew.
Design philosophy
The Shannon 47 is a medium-displacement, aft-cockpit cruiser available in its basic form as a cutter or a ketch. The boat shows pleasing traditional lines, with a well pronounced rising sheer forward, an elongated spoon bow, and a short but functional platform/sprit that follows the angle of the sheer. The stern features a contemporary but subdued reverse transom. Schulz avoids adherence to modern-day rating or racing rules, which means that he doesn't flatten sections, or substitute radical form stability for ballast, or go exotic and build skins featherweight light.
On the contrary, the underbody is full, with plenty of deadrise - all of it contributing to payload volume down low, good tracking, reduced pounding, and solid footing in a seaway. A long, low-aspect molded keel with internal lead ballast (either fixed at 6'6" or in a centerboard configuration with board-up draft of 5'7") resolves itself aft in a bit of bustle and then morphs into a hefty skeg to support the rudder and provide aperture protection for the propeller.
There is nothing space-age about any of this. Happily, like its forebears, the 47 is purposeful and straightforward in what it wants to do: Stay upright, go through the water without getting tossed, and move along with a comfortable, dampened motion. Notably, Schulz has made a great effort to keep the underbody generous without letting it become vast, which is to say that he gives the boat a powerful, loadbearing hull while minimizing the drag created by a traditional full keel and excessive wetted surface. The formula has worked in the past; Shannons are predictably capable, well-tuned voyagers in theircutaway configurations. The 47 in particular chisels a fine line to windward, with good acceleration and terrific response at the helm.
The numbers tell the story. Ballast/Displacement (B/D) tips in at 38 percent. It's good to see the ballast ratio at a third or higher in any cruising boat - which puts 38 percent well into the^ comfort zone, especially considering that the lead is low in this case and that the hull itself with its deep sections admits ancillary ballast in the form of pay load well beneath the waterline. Displacement/ Length (D/L) at 202 puts the Shannon 47 in the land of quite moderate displacement, mirroring boats such as the Beneteau First 35s5, Morgan 45, Freedom 29, Baltic 42DP, and the X-452. SA/ Disp at 17.8 (in the "Scutter" version) suggests plenty of horsepower, mirroring boats such as the Cal 39, Sweden Yachts 38, Swan 411, and Whitby 45 Mk II.
True to form, Schulz has zeroed in on medium-range design parameters that point to capable, if not aggressive, performance in a broad spectrum of offshore conditions. These would include enough sail area in conjunction with a carefully designed hull to move the boat through the light stuff, and enough stability and restraint to confront handily a gale at sea.
Sailplans & rig
Cutter: As noted, the 47 is available in its basic version as a cutter or a ketch. As a cutter, the boat features twin side-by-side headstays on the sprit forward designed to fly a working yankee and a more powerful genoa - your choice, at any given time, according to conditions. A staysail is rigged in the middle of the foredeck on an intermediate stay, and this comes either loose-footed or secured to a self-tacking club boom. The cutter provides the versatility of double headsails and an adaptable staysail rigged foretriangle.
Ketch: The ketch alternative involves a similar situation from the mainmast forward. Working aft, however, the mainsail is reduced in its "E" (foot) dimension by way of a shorter boom, rendering it a slimmer, higher-aspect affair with slightly less roach and less square footage, in order to accommodate 193 square feet of mizzen. The virtue of a ketch rig, of course, lies in the wealth of sail combinations it provides - most notably the classic jib-and-jigger configuration for shorthanded work in blustery conditions, and the opportunity for a friendly mizzen staysail when running downhill.
"Scutter": The possibilities don't end here. In his mission to develop ever-easier ways to handle offshore canvas, Schulz came up with an interesting variation on the cutter rig in 1994 - one designed to provide the efficiency and power of a double-headsail sloop, and the seagoing versatility of a conventional cutter.
He gave it the designation "Scutter," and it includes two headstays forward, one at the end of the sprit, and the other about four feet aft tacked at the stemhead. The foremost stay carries a furling high-clewed yankee; the stay just aft carries a furling genoa. The reasoning behind the rig tends to frustrate traditionalists unreceptive to how it improves upon either of the two schemes that comprise its name, but in a word, it works. And here's how:
A sloop on a beautiful day in 12 to 15 knots of breeze is a vision of simplicity and efficiency - big genoa pulling the boat along briskly, big main balancing the sailplan and providing lift. In Shannon's "Scutter" rig, the inner of the two headstays carries a 140-percent genoa on a furler, and this is the headsail you use in lower to medium wind ranges. The clew tacks easily across an unobstructed foredeck. As the wind increases to 20 knots, you furl it about 30 percent and sail with, essentially, a No. 2 jib. The sail is designed for that, and handles the job well.
What a 140-percent furling genoa doesn't do so well is reduce to heavy-weather canvas. A smidgeon of big genoa unfurled with the wind in the high 20s is painful to watch. The sail simply doesn't have the range or the cut to set well in these conditions, and you pay the price in a boat that won't balance and in an expensive jib ill-prepared for the task at hand.
In the case of a "Scutter" rig, you roll up the genoa - completely - as the wind builds, and then you energize the working jib forward. This does two things: It gives you high-clewed canvas designed and cut for heavy-duty service, and it moves the center of effort forward to alleviate pressure on the helm and keep the bow down.
Schulz challenges the notion that you need to consolidate the center of effort as the wind rises by reducing to a staysail. In extreme conditions, fine, but in the turbulent 20- to 30-knot range that voyagers confront so regularly, keeping the bow powered may make more sense. The "Scutter" rig is designed to provide the best of two worlds: an overlapping genoa for light- and medium-air work, and a working yankee for the dirty stuff. A detachable inner forestay rigged fractionally is available for spitfire jib service should conditions truly deteriorate.
Under sail
As advertised, the hull performs well and the rig balances nicely in a breeze. Our sea trials aboard a "Scutter"-rigged, center-board-equipped 47 occurred in blustery conditions on Rhode Island's Narragansett Bay, with wind settling in at around 20 knots, pushing the high 20s in gusts. We
eached along at first with a full main and the genoa furled 30 percent - slightly overpowered, traveler down, but under control. We dropped the centerboard all the way and hardened up, clawing nicely to weather although definitely feeling it on the helm in the puffs.
We rolled up the genoa and unrolled the working jib at the end of the bow platform; once we'd sheeted the new sail in and stuck the boat back in her upwind groove, the helm eased, we were able to bring a bit of the traveler back up, and the 47 charged off, hitting high eights on the breeze, tracking fine, and generally loving the conditions. Coming back away to a reach, we accelerated well into the nines and 1 Os with sheets eased and the little yankee still deployed.
Notable about the behavior of the boat was her response at the helm. For a sailing vessel with a fairly broad rudder foil operating off a sizable skeg, this one steers remarkably smoothly - in fact, not unlike a lot of boats with balanced spades. This bodes well not only for enjoyable stints at the wheel, but also for the smooth operation of an autopilot at sea.
Construction parameters
Shannon's approach to the building process emphasizes the meticulous pursuit of strength and structural integrity, using advanced materials and proven FRP techniques. The 47 is a cored boat, with j-inch semi-rigid PVC closed-cell Corecell foam applied from the sheerline to the turn of the bilge; the bottom and keel component is solid glass. The entire hull is laid up by hand in one piece which allows for continuous transverse glass reinforcement without the need for a centerline seam. It is Shannon's belief that Corecell offers better impact resistance than the less resilient cross-linked PVC foams such as Klegecell, and better resistance to moisture intrusion and rot than balsa wood.
The laminate schedule, reading from the outside in, features a layer of NPG isophthalic gelcoat, a layer of 1.5-ounce mat set in vinylester resin, a layer of 2mm Coremat to prevent glass print-through, then multiple layers of biaxial unidirectional 2408 roving. Next comes 3/4-inch Corecell foam core set in Corebond mastic, applied as noted throughout the topsides as far south as the turn of the bilge. Following the core is more 2408 roving, with a medley of 1708 45/45 bias roving, Kevlar/ glass hybrids, woven roving and epoxy judiciously applied in areas of high stress including the stem, chain plates, rudder post, bulkhead tabbings, and inward hull/deck flange. Noteworthy about all of this is Shannon's discrete use of a variety of FRP products, choreographed for maximum strength in critical areas and reasonable weight savings wherever possible.
The hull-to-deck joint is set in Sikaflex adhesive/sealant and mechanically-fastened with stainless bolts, washers and lock nuts directly through the mated flange, as well as through the teak toe rail applied later. The detail ends up fully-bonded chemically, and fastened mechanically every eight inches. The internal keel condition involves lead ballast cast in four separate molds to fit the insides of the hull/keel cavity, all of it encapsulated by laminating the top of the element to create what is, in effect, a second bottom.
Interior components begin as a subfloor grid composed of transverse mahogany floors laid across full-length fore-and-aft stringer/hull stiffeners. Individual bulkheads are tabbed to hull and deck with multiple layers of 1708 biaxial 45-degree bias laminates set in epoxy resin. They are held back slightly by means of polyester fillets to avoid hard spots. Furniture components, lockers and whatnot are custom installed using mortis-and-tenon glued joinerwork and screwed cornerpost construction.
Systems and mechanical
Systems aboard the 47 reflect the reality that life is getting anything but simpler as we advance, and that people genuinely expect more aboard a voyaging sailboat now than they did 20 years ago. You can't take a finished yacht and merely pile on components as was once the case; you have to design even minor installations into the boat from the outset in order for them to fit with any logic and be accessible for service and maintenance.
Shannon acknowledges readily that "almost anything on a boat that is mechanical or electrical will someday need to be repaired, if not replaced." The builder puts a tremendous amount of effort into systems installation, emphasizing issues such as organization, identification, accessibility and redundancy.
Consider just some of the components that make up the guts of 47 Hull No. 1: Three custom 316L stainless freshwater tanks totaling 250 gallons, fully removable, with dual ShurFlo pressure pumps plumbed in parallel; a 170-gallon-per-day Sea Recovery Crystal desalinator; a Westerbeke 7.6-kw generator; a 12-gallon stainless hot water heater hooked up to the engine cooling cycle or to 110-volt AC from shorepower or the generator; a MarineAir climate control system with zoned heating and AC; six 115-amp-hour gel-cells in a two-bank configuration, charged by a 150-amp high-output alternator with an external regulator and a spare pre-wired in place; Sea Frost engine-drive refrigeration; a larger-than-life 82-h.p. Westerbeke W-82B fed by twin 5052 aluminum alloy fuel tanks totaling 150 gallons; a washer/dryer unit (!) in the guest cabin aft... the list goes on.
Suffice it to say, upon careful inspectionof the vessel's innards, we discover that everything here fits, and it is clear that none of it has had to be crowbarred into place. You can get to any of these items without unreasonable contortion, and the cleanness of their installation makes identifying them and maintaining them relatively straightforward - despite the inherent complexity of all that equipment in the first place.
Accommodations
The interior arrangement is very much owner-derived. This is the way Schulz likes to build boats, and it sets Shannon apart as a semi-custom builder. The shop has gone a long way to raising the bar on the quality of its finish in the 47, if only to bring the product more in line with established gold-plate finish artists such as Hinckley or Nautor. What once was oiled teak is now gleaming with varnish. Hardware is all quality chrome-plated brass. Accents such as ultra leather on the settees, birds-eye maple for the dinette, sandblasted acrylic panels on cabinet doors, and custom Kohler head fixtures speak to a decidedly upscale approach to the interior design issue.
Amid all of this, however, Schulz's long-held belief that any vessel built to go to sea must be practical before it is polished reigns: Storage and provisioning are maximized, lockers and wet lockers abound, sea berths are provided, and systems take precedence over anything cosmetic.
Shannon 47 No. 1 has an elegant 3!/2-cabin interior featuring owner's quarters in the bow with a private head and shower; a roomy saloon with a generous U-shaped dinette opposed by a longitudinal settee; an outboard-facing U-shaped galley; guest quarters in the starboard hip serviced by the second head (which includes the washer/dryer); and a brilliantly conceived nav office in the port hip with a large desk/ chart table, a wall of instruments, and a pilot-berth outboard. The arrangement combines a sensible use of space with a lot of comfort and an easy-to-live-in ambience.
Blue Water thoughts
Shannons have always carried themselves off as a fairly homogenous family of sailing vessels - steadfastly traditional in appearance, conservative in their appointments, unabashedly geared towards voyaging cruisers. The 47 breaks new ground without relinquishing her ties to that lineage - in a way that many past and present-day owners of other Shannons are apt to find alluring.
Given our perspective atBWS, there is a lot to like about this boat. The numbers (D/ L 202; SA/D 17.8) point to a concerted effort by Walt Schulz to optimize her performance parameters, and our sailing encounter confirms that he has been successful at that. We like the notion that so much about the 47 is aimed specifically at seagoing service - from the hull and rig; to details such as a 110-220 VAC inverter custom-installed in anticipation of shorepower abroad; from calculated systems redundancy; to the limitless variety of owner-prescribed interior schemes for making the liveaboard experience as hands-on, comfortable and safe as it can be.
We like the functionality of the bow platform, not only because of the way it makes possible the double-headsail "Scutter" solution, but also because of how it handles two oversize anchors, each with a separate anchor rode and its own deck pipe into the divided chain locker. And we like the new reverse transom, developed by Schulz not as a fashion statement, but rather as the most logical means he could find to incorporate an internally-stowed, quick-deploy fast pin-activated liferaft cannister and an entry/exit platform in the stern. In short, the 47 appeals as much to the practical mores of going to sea as to the dreaminess of a truly well found yacht.