Wilderness 1230

Home-built from plans or kit

Brand:: Schionning

Designed by:: Schionning Designs

Description:

The Wilderness 1230, receiving orders though still on the drawing board in Autumn 2004, is a fast, sleek, ocean-going catamaran with an adequate payload for long-term family cruising or liveaboard. Like the other larger models in the Wilderness line, the 1230 can be more rapidly built from a kit comprising pre-cut panels for the hulls, bulkheads and furniture. However, with the 1230 kit, the compound curved sections of the decks and cabin roof can also be purchased pre-formed, speeding building further. Schionning Marine can ship the whole kit, including the mouldings, worldwide in one 40' container.

The 1230 layout allows the option of building in a swim platform with a walk-through to the cockpit, as well as a choice of 'galley up' (on the bridgedeck) or 'galley down' (in the hull) configurations.

With the help of a length-to-beam ratio of 12.5:1 and a lightweight construction the 1230 is fast and still can carry a cruising payload. In typical Schionning fashion, she is being designed to be fast, functional and well proportioned.

The Wilderness Range
The Schionning Wilderness range of cruising cats is especially designed for simple and quick home or professional construction. Most of the boats, including the hard chine hulls and the furniture, are built from joining ready-made, pre-glassed balsa or foam cored flat panels, for example, from DuraKore. These can purchased as pre-cut kits, available in several options, for most models in the series.

The range has good load carrying potential as fits its purpose as a cruiser, yet hulls are slender enough at the waterline to give a very good speed potential. A generous bridgedeck clearance helps avoid slamming when sea conditions deteriorate. The hulls are flat bottomed, as natural in a chine catamaran construction. The flat run aft encourages planing – but the bottom panel is Veed forward to prevent noisy under-hull slamming. The hulls are also flared forward, on the inside, giving additional buoyancy reserve and thus more safety at sea. The flare also helps to deflect spray from reaching the decks.

Though built mainly of flat panels, the Wilderness range does not have the angular look of a chined boat. Compound curves are strategically incorporated both to improve appearance and to reduce air drag. The deck sections are strip-planked using the already constructed parts as a mould; this allows the decks to be rounded on the turn of the hull. Strip planking the bridgedeck cabin roof also produces similar beneficial curves.

Type:: Performance cruiser

Multihull type:: Catamaran

Construction:

Hard chine hulls, bulkheads from pre-glassed balsa or foam DuFlex, flat panels
Kit with pre-cut panels for hull and bulkheads are an option
Reinforced hull bottoms; Kevlar reinforcing optional
Furniture from DuFlex honeycomb panels
Strip planked decks and cabin roof
Pre-formed compound curved panels for deck and cabin roof are another option
Speedy construction with no laminating required to build the hulls
The boat can be built in separate sections which are joined later
Composite chainplates

Sails and rigging:

Fractional sloop rig
Optional carbon fibre mast

Deck layout and gear:

Good visibility from the helm
Comfortable and secure cockpit
Optional swim platform with walk-through to cockpit

Keels, boards and rudders:

Kick-up rudders
Daggerboards

Accommodation:: Port hull: Head and shower aft; navigation area midships; double cabin forward, berths over the bridgedeck
Bridgedeck: Saloon with large sloping wrap-around window, dinette with rearwards facing seating, galley in 'galley-up' version
Starboard hull: Double cabin aft; galley amidships in 'galley-down' version; double cabin forward, berths over the bridgedeck