PDRacer Sailboat - Free Plans

Free Plans
Officially speaking, there are no plans, only a hull shape that you must conform to as specified in the rules. You can build the boat any way you want, the most common and easy method is the "nail and glue" method where you use a chine log to join pieces of plywood. For a pictorial of how this is done, see the Building BucketEars article.

A couple of plan sets have been made. If you would like to draw up a set of plans, that is great -- there is a folder in the yahoo discussion group called "Free PD Plans", go there and create a sub folder, and upload your plans there. Please make sure your your plans conform to the hull shape requirements. NOTE: To download these plans to your computer, right click on them, and save to local hard drive.

Free PD Plans at our Yahoo Discussion Group [click here]

Shorty's Simple 18 - Basic 18" hull with airboxes on the ends, everything can come from Home Depot
s18-1.gif overall plan
s18-2.doc building key
s18-2.xls bill of materials
s18-4.gif cut plan for 2x materials
For pictures of this building process, see Building Bucket Ears Article

2006 World Championship Loaner Boats - The boats that John Wright built, so that out of town visitors could borrow them and compete in the big race. [click here]

Tim Cleary's Photo Essay - side airbox design [click here]

Michael Storer's OZ Mk-II PDRacer
These plans are not free, they have to be purchased. You know the phrase "you get what you pay for" ? If you pay for these, you get 95 pages of very complete, professional detailed plans with lots of photographs and drawings. Even if you don't build your PD exactly like the OZ version, the details in the plans are well worth the small purchase price. Available from DuckWorksMagazine.com

Andrew Linn Plans - Basic 16" hull with airboxes on the ends
robsnot0.gif Overall Layout
robsnot1.gif Cut PLan for 16" sides and leeboard
robsnot2.gif Cut Plan for decks & bulkheads
robsnot3.gif Mast Plan
robsnot4.gif Chinese Junk Sail

Pete's Plans - Basic 18" hull with airboxes on the ends
pete1.gif Overall Layout
pete2.gif Cut Plan
pete.hul Carlson Hull Designer file
For more info on the Carlson Hull Designer program, see CarlsonDesign.com

Other & Old Boat Plans
Here are some other boat plans, some of them old time plans that have been around long enough for the copyright to expire. They aren't PDRacers, but they have interesting details which might be adapted to your PDRacer.

Boyscout Canoe Sail - Convert a regular canoe into a sailboat
canoe1.jpg
canoe2.jpg

Harley 8 - One sheet skiff with lots of other great sailing info
harley-8.pdf

Minicup - Has a great detail of one way to rig a lateen sail, see Mini Cup at Stevenson's site

Corky - Convert truck tire innertube to a sailboat
corky1.jpg
corky2.jpg
corky21.jpg 2 tube version
corky22.jpg
-- Corky's that have been built --
unknown builder
Jason Nabor's Corky
Corky Plus by Mark Suszko, Springfield, Illinois

Paddle Pusher - Child's kayak using the plank construction technique
paddle1.jpg
paddle2.jpg

Wheelie Willie
[click here]

Three Dollar Scow
This is the oldest reference to simple box style boat that has been found so far. The design was published in Scientific American Supplement, June 17, 1876. See Craig O'Donnell's Cheap Pages for the article.

Various free plans old enough to have their copyrights expire:
Stevenson's Projects
Plans at Polysail.com

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