I've just sailed from Vladivostok to Fukuoka with an amazing crew, to see my sons in Japan. My captain - highly experienced and professional - hadn't finished his university degree years ago, and thinks that he's now too old to go back to university. With the growth of online degrees, I told him I expected that there would be a good course on yacht design and construction that he could follow online - and promised to look into it. My quick search on the big MOOCs (e.g. Coursera, edX, Udacity) hasn't found anything. Does anyone know of good design & construction courses that can be attended remotely? Thank you, Colin
There have been some successful yacht designers who've studied at Westlawn. They have a "guided independent study" course. http://www.westlawn.edu/gis/gis.asp
Thanks both: @NYCAP123 , agreed - however, in this case, I'm working with where my captain's starting from. @Ken Bracewell - that's a great recommendation - I'll pass it along. Best, Colin
Best of luck to your Captain, I wish him or her all the best. The tassel is worth the hassle. Now when do we get to hear about your sailing vessel?
@fr8trn: the Tiburon, a Farr 44. As I understand it, there have been five hulls of this design laid, four racers, and the Tiburon, a racer cruiser. It's kevlar and epoxy. Fitting out the cabin for cruising added, I think, about a ton and a half, bringing it to c. 9.5 tons, I think - about 4 tons of which is the keel. It sleeps ten, so was quite spacious for the four of us. I don't remember the spec of its engine, but we could do about 7 knots under steam alone. We were travelling deliberately slowly (as we needed to spend 14 days at sea to satisfy Japan's COVID entry restrictions) so just used the jib sail. I didn't see spinnakers stowed. They've sailed it as far south as Phuket: they work the east Asian coast coast Vladivostok southwards for regattas. Apparently, when they bought it from Japan a decade ago, one of the Japanese crew was in tears. I can understand that. (As I non-sailor, I'm aware that I may be missing important details - prompt me with further questions if so?)
@Colin Rowat thanks for that. There are very few Farr designs that I can find fault with. Well done. Congrats on your successful passage and welcome to Japan.
@fr8trn: for all the difficulties that this pandemic has brought, I got a number of good breaks, without which the trip would not have been possible. I think that reaching the Tiburon and its crew is #1 on that list. If anyone's looking for a sailing excursion along the Vladivostok - Phuket coast, I can highly recommend them: professional, knowledgeable, experienced, welcoming and much more affordable than you'd get chartering out of Japan, South Korea, HK or Singapore. More generally, the Seven Feet Yacht Club in Vladivostok was a delight to discover as well: a happy, active, capable community. At one point during the trip, I mentioned to my crew that I'd also written to the yacht club in Busan, but hadn't heard back. They weren't surprised, saying that they had a real 'community' in Vladivostok, which they didn't think existed in Busan yet. I saw repeated examples of this: we stored some of our fresh produce in another yacht that was connected to the mains for the day before we set sail; when our car didn't start, a neighbour took us shopping in his big Toyota SUV; at lunch, people sat down with each other.
When you are too stubborn to learn anything new (or unable to due to loss of senses or cognition.) Oh and for Colin, I came up with these two hits on my first search: https://www.brighthubengineering.com/seafaring/106554-correspondence-courses-for-boat-design/ https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mechanical-engineering/2-996-sailing-yacht-design-13-734-fall-2003/
thanks @AnotherKen : the brighthubengineering page looks good - I'd not seen it. I've been in touch with Jerome Milgram, who taught the 2003 MIT course, asking him about the Westlawn course mentioned above. He confirmed its good reputation.