This office has designed its share of large custom yachts, but our enthusiasm for smaller boats remains undiminished. We have found that small-boat sailors often derive far more satisfaction from their modest craft than jaded jet-setters do from one of their extravagant toys, and this has reinforced our continued determination to treat our smaller designs not as less significant, only less big. We have great pride in applying the same standards to all our work.

Our previous designs for Precision Boat Works are the Precision 18, one of the simplest and most affordable trailerables that can be practically cruised, and the Precision 23, one of the biggest cruisers that can be practically trailered. Our new Precision 21 design has been sized to fit right between her two sisters and is intended to appeal to sailors requiring neither the minimum cost of a mini, nor the extra space of a maxi-trailerable.

The great care that both designer and builder have put into the development of the Precision 21 is perhaps most clearly reflected in her interior. Her main cabin berths are laid out properly fore and aft. The optional head can be accessed without having to wake any children sleeping forward, and there is storage for toiletries under this same hinged cushion. The galley is not an awkward slide-away module, but a solidly built-in unit with a stainless sink, garbage bin and alcohol stove. A 48 quart cooler is convenient to both the cockpit and the cabin and there is a large, dry storage area aft, accessible from inside the cabin. The battery box is located outside the living space in the large cockpit locker to starboard, and the centerboard pendant tube is protected by being fully enclosed inside the molded companionway step.

For small cruisers, a winged keel is more an inexpensive expedient than it is sensible design. In order to be effective, the wings themselves need to be quite large, which makes them awkward and prone to damage at the launching ramp, and when it comes to mud-banks, it is with good reason that they are referred to as 'Danforth' wings! The Precision 21 features a more versatile and practical keel/centerboard combination, whose NACA 'wing section' foil can be fully extended for maximum efficiency upwind, fully retracted from minimum drag downwind, and left anywhere in between to fine tune the helm on a breezy reach. The board itself weighs only 70 pounds, and it will safely kick up and over underwater obstructions, giving ample warning of shoal water. "Easing off" after inevitable groundings can simply be a matter of raising the board.

The cockpit of the Precision 21 is over 7 feet long, and features seats and coamings precisely angled for comfort both with upright and when heeled. The inboard chain plates not only allow exceptionally close-winded performance to weather, but they leave ample side decks clear, providing unobstructed passage past the sleekly styled cabin house to the anchor locker forward.

Precision Boat Works shares our enthusiasm for small boats, and they have always executed our designs with meticulous care.

Jim Taylor