Hobson Design

If you were wondering why Hobson Design had gone quiet...
Peter is now working with Alex Thompson Racing designing the new Hugo Boss IMOCA 60 for the Vendee Globe 2020!

Wonderful early morning view servicing the composite hatch we installed on Penshaw Monument last year.

We completed the first prototype production rudder stock for the Hartley Boats Contender this morning ready for the Düsseldorf Boat Show.
This is an intricate 3 part aluminium tool, we have been playing with some tight tolerances on this one to archive a light weight, stiff production specification rudder stock.
We haven't seen one produced quite like this before.

The Hartley Contender has been launched at the London Boat Show today.
Such a lot of work and so much detailing and optimising has gone into this package some features a lot more subtle than others and some hidden beneath the skin.
We will be sharing more details and a more technical write up on what Peter has done soon.

We have been working on a new Hartley Boats Contender. The deck is to be machined by mouldCAM later this month.
Whilst Peter Hobson will be getting out of the office and back in to the workshop shaping the new tool hull by hand.
More details to follow throughout the Summer.

Great to see the 505 hull Peter Hobson designed and developed when he worked for Ovington Boats doing so well at this years European Championships.

We have been busy teaching epoxy resin infusion at Hartley Boats, producing their latest production Sail Osprey last week.
Hartley’s previous experience with infusion had been much like we had seen at other production companies where a third party comes in shows you how easy it is to infuse a flat panel and leaves you to it…looking at a small tight shaped dinghy mold that is in no-way representative of what you have just been shown.
In the past most of our experience has bee...n working with much larger boats where infusion has been quite straight forward.
The complex shapes of the Osprey fore-deck, multiple sharp hull chines, deck side tank curvature are all aspects that make infusion more challenging with respect to both successful execution and importantly still achieving a light weight result.
The route we have gone down has brought the first infused boat in on weight and met with the current production times; and although there is always room for optimization - the results have been excellent.
We are looking forward to working through more of Hartley’s epoxy production lines in the near future.
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A huge contrast on scale to the boats and composites I have seemed to become accustomed to working on in recent years.
It was nice to get back towards the size and scale (well half way) that I worked on when I first started working professionally in the industry, and those boats that technology most holds my interest.
It's a quick modification to the Open 50 'Pegasus' daggerboard struts and bearings, works that will have to be completed cosmetically when I devote more 'proper...' time to the boat later this summer.
It is also perhaps sort of a full circle (or at least a nice narrative), because Dad is the new owner of this Owen Clarke designed boat.
I got my first interest and learnt my initial skills following my father working on his offshore racing boats from a very young age. I have then had the good fortune to have Owen Clarke Design - Yacht Design and Naval Architecture , and Merf particularly devote his time and experience as I have learned from them and him over the last 10 years.
I hope to get my teeth properly into this boat later in the season and into next.
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The new mk5 Osprey we have been working on debuted at the RYA Dinghy Show this weekend.
We had two boats on display, one on the Sail Osprey class stand and the second on Hartley Boats stand.
Is been a huge amount of work to get them to this point and I thank everyone from the show for your kind comments and positive feedback.

Its the little details..
We have designed a custom bow bar for the Osprey to get the forestay as far forward as we can whilst maximizing the chute.
The bar then sends these lines down under the foredeck.
... Allen Sailboat Performance Hardware have produced a range of bespoke fittings for the boat, including this really nicely finished bar and a new low profile chain plate fitting.
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The new Mk5 Osprey is coming together Hartley Boats.
We are now on the final push to get the new boats ready for the RYA Dinghy Show and you will be able to see the new boat on both the Hartley Boat's stand and also the Sail Osprey class association stand.
We will publish an album soon showing more details of the project.
... We hope the design and its outcome reflects the care and passion we have poured into this project.
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