34 ft Sailing Dory Badger: builds and build times

Design number 170, drawn in 1978, and 28 ft 0 in on the waterline with a beam of 11 ft 0 in. She draws 4 ft 6 in on the fin keel, or 3 ft 6 in on the optional long shallow keel. Displacement in coastal cruising trim is 10,400 lb, of which 4,160 lb is ballast, a ballast ratio of 40%, for a displacement-length ratio of 211. She carries 600 sq ft for a sail area-displacement ratio of 20.15, has 6 ft 3 in of headroom below, and the drawings allow 18 hp of auxiliary with 100 gal of water and 40 gal of fuel. This is the boat the range is known by. Annie and Pete Hill built a 34 to go voyaging on very little money, named her Badger, and Annie wrote a book about the life they had aboard. When they visited the design office the boat was inclined and showed positive stability to at least 125 degrees of heel, loaded with everything they owned and carrying the heavier junk rig. The 34 is the size in the range that loads down gracefully and still sails, which is why it is the voyaging choice rather than the fast one. The dories are all built the same way, and the scheme is the point of the type: plywood planking glued and fastened to the bulkheads and the furniture, so the interior is the structural framing and there are no ribs and no deck beams to work around. Floor timbers run chine to chine to carry the keel bolts, and the ballast keel, cast lead or concrete and scrap metal, bolts on near the end, which lets the hull sit low in the shop for most of the build. The straight-line hull lofts in hours rather than days, and because almost nothing has to be fitted to a curve the joinery goes faster than it would on a round-bilge boat. Flat-bottomed boats are expected to pound, and these do not: heeled, the hull presents a V to the water.

The displacement above is coastal cruising trim, tanks full with the crew and their stores aboard, not a shipping weight. Loading down for voyaging can add half as much again. Plans are sold to owner-builders, and study plans are sold separately for anyone wanting to look before committing.

Medians from the build logs kept on this site, not the designer’s estimate. Nobody has logged this boat here yet, so they are empty until the first builder does.

Design	Plans from	LOA
34 ft Pinky Ketch Sunrise	Benford Design Group	34′ 0″ (10.36 m)
Sanderson 34	Dudley Dix Yacht Design	34′ 1″ (10.4 m)
Hout Bay 33	Dudley Dix Yacht Design	33′ 8″ (10.25 m)
Didi 34	Dudley Dix Yacht Design	34′ 5″ (10.5 m)
Pratique 35	Dudley Dix Yacht Design	34′ 5″ (10.5 m)
34 ft 6 in Schooner or Cutter	Benford Design Group	34′ 6″ (10.52 m)

34 ft Sailing Dory Badger

What building a 34 ft Sailing Dory Badger actually takes

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