Sexy Lady

This past Friday, my son and I got the chance to travel to Rhode Island to visit the US Watercraft factory site.  Some of my non-nautical readers may now be asking what is "US Watercraft"?  Well they are a designer and manufacturer of some of the top sail boat brands including C&C and Alerion. They also build power boats under the True North brand, but we don't talk about stink pots on this blog.

Given most of what they do is proprietary, we couldn't take a lot of pictures but I was able to grab a shot of an Alerion Express 28 in the final build stages.  When most people think about a sailboat they focus on the sails or line layouts but what really determines speed is what's going on under the waterline - these Alerion's are superbly designed to reduce drag and focus of efficient water displacement.  Oh, be still, my beating heart.

We also got to see one of the new C&C Redline 41's in the build process, which have not yet been shown to the public.  It's fascinating to see all that goes into building a performance sailboat and the level of craftsman's ship that required.  We spent as much time in the cabinet making area talking to the wood workers as we did on the main floor looking at the hulls.

The trip was productive for Sean, as he was offered a summer internship with them.  They have a few CnC cutting machines (computer controlled cutter) and Sean mentioned he knew how to run one and boom! out came the lead engineer to talk with him.  He's thinking about it.  While I'd prefer to have him around this summer it's a pretty cool opportunity.  It also may be part of my sinister master plan to get Sean to become a naval engineer so he can design sailboats for his old man.....

We had a great day and are very grateful to our US Watercraft hosts for taking the time to show us around.