Newsletter No.23, March/April 1984

First Trailertri 720 Launched

Pictured Is Peter and Sharyn Steller's Trailertri Aquilo, recently launched in Mackay, Queensland, Australia. Peter reports that he is very pleased with her performance, particularly after the way she performed on her first sail with some 12 people on board!

Only non-standard items, are a modified rudder case, with a pivoting tiller (up and down) to give more versatility in the cockpit, while float decks between the beams have been rounded to follow the curve of the beams, also forming the rail for the wing nets. Looks very neat and efficient.

Peter's only problem after joining up was one beam hitting the cabin side while folding. This is not unusual, particularly if the "arms" of Frames 3 & 6 have twisted slightly during construction. Don't try and move the beams. Once fitted, the whole folding system is rock like, and they will just not move. Simply take a plane to the cabin side - there's plenty of "meat" here to allow for such an adjustment. To avoid this problem, just make sure that these cabin "arms" don't twist particularly when fitting the cabin sides

With the designer on his way to the USA, his Tramp FLYING FOX was commandeered by its usual crew - Graham Healey and Keith Cutcliffe, while the Brisbane Trailertri Club Commodore Cliff James was pressed into crewing The fact that Cliff was also able to supply a good towing car for the 2400 mile round trip was said to have nothing to do with it! (Only joking, Cliff.).

Anyway, this intrepid bunch managed to make it down to Victoria, and with Graham Healey impersonating the skipper, proceeded to once again carve up the multihull fleet easily taking line honors and 1st on handicap. Lacking the steadying influence of the designer, however, all was not wine and roses, and both Keith and Cliff fell overboard sometime during the night, while Graham even further refined his impression of a man asleep steering.

The race as usual had about 600 starters, mostly monohulls of course (but we are working on this), and 2nd over the line in the multihull section was a Seawind 24, with another 3rd. Further mutterings were heard about next year!

Another good effort by the Tramp, particularly considering that it was the smallest multihull competing. Tramps or Trailertris have now won the multihull section of this prestigious race for the last four years in a row.

Handicap results were as follows, 1st FLYING FOX, 2nd LIBERATOR (P. Cooper - Super Tramp), 3rd TCHET TCHET (G. Plumley - Super Tramp).