Review of Offshore 1/4 ton

Basic specs.

The Offshore 1/4 ton is a small sailboat designed by the maritime architect Bernard Olesinski in the early seventies.

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Hull

The hull is made of fibreglass. Generally, a hull made of fibreglass requires only a minimum of maintenance during the sailing season. And outside the sailing season, just bottom cleaning and perhaps anti-fouling painting once a year - a few hours of work, that's all.

Interior

The interior is like few other boats made in fibreglass.

Keel

The Offshore 1/4 ton is equipped with a fin keel. The fin keel is the most common keel and provides splendid manoeuvrability. The downside is that it has less directional stability than a long keel.

The boat can enter even shallow marinas as the draft is just about 1.37 - 1.47 meter (4.49 - 4.79 ft) dependent on the load. See immersion rate below.

Engine

The boat is typically equipped with various Petter diesel engines at 5.0 hp (3 kW).

Sailing characteristics

This section covers widely used rules of thumb to describe the sailing characteristics. Please note that even though the calculations are correct, the interpretation of the results might not be valid for extreme boats.

Stability and Safety

What is Capsize Screening Formula (CSF)?

The capsize screening value for Offshore 1/4 ton is 2.27, indicating that this boat would not be accepted to participate in ocean races.

Immersion rate

The immersion rate is defined as the weight required to sink the boat a certain level. The immersion rate for Offshore 1/4 ton is about 125 kg/cm, alternatively 700 lbs/inch.
Meaning: if you load 125 kg cargo on the boat then it will sink 1 cm. Alternatively, if you load 700 lbs cargo on the boat it will sink 1 inch.

Sailing statistics

This section is statistical comparison with similar boats of the same category. The basis of the following statistical computations is our unique database with more than 26,000 different boat types and 350,000 data points.

L/B (Length Beam Ratio)

What is L/B (Length Beam Ratio)?

The l/b ratio for Offshore 1/4 ton is 2.99.

Compared with other similar sailboats it is slimmer than 54% of all other designs. It seems that the designer has chosen a slightly more speedy hull design.

Ballast Ratio

What is a Ballast Ratio?

The ballast ratio for Offshore 1/4 ton is 42%.

This ballast ratio shows a righting moment that is higher than 62% of all similar sailboat designs. A righting moment (ability to resist heeling) just above average.

Maintenance

Rig

If you need to renew parts of your running rig and is not quite sure of the dimensions, you may find the estimates computed below useful.

**Guiding dimensions of running rig**
Usage	Length		Diameter
Jib sheet	7.5 m	(24.5 feet)	10 mm	(3/8 inch)
Genoa sheet	7.5 m	(24.5 feet)	10 mm	(3/8 inch)
Mainsheet	18.7 m	(61.3 feet)	10 mm	(3/8 inch)
Spinnaker sheet	16.4 m	(53.9 feet)	10 mm	(3/8 inch)

Boat owner's ideas

This section shown boat owner's changes, improvements, etc. Here you might find inspiration for your boat.

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Finally

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References

[Ref 1]: ISO 8666 Small craft — Principal data.
[Ref 3]: ISO 12215-5 Small craft — Hull construction and scantlings.