These Sailors Won’t Knock Wood : Venerable PCs Race This Weekend on San Diego Bay

The controversy has been growing steadily.

Wood or no wood?

There are people, right here in Southern California, who made the choice years ago. And this weekend, they are gathering to reinforce that choice.

We’re not talking baseball bats, by the way. We’re talking boats. Wooden boats.

So excuse the Pacific Class sailing community for a while this weekend while they discuss the merits of wood. The 59th PC Nationals will be run through Sunday on the San Diego Bay with the wooden boats, 32 feet long and six feet wide, that have been around since World War II.

Just 85 PCs were manufactured, from the 1930s to the 1950s. They were designed by George Kettenburg in 1930 as he searched for a lighter boat with more sail area. What he came up with was a design that was all wooden, masts and booms included.

Until the United States entered World War II after Pearl Harbor, the boats were made with Philippine mahogany. Then, when Kettenburg Boatbuilders could no longer obtain it because of the war, they switched to Honduras mahogany. Thirty-five sloops were manufactured with Philippine wood.

“The Philippine wood is a lot softer; it soaks up water and then dries out,” said Bruce Gresham, San Diego Bay PC Fleet captain. “It swells up like an old beer barrel. The Honduras wood doesn’t swell up. It’s a lot tougher.”

Anyway, the big race for the Philippine mahogany vessels the first year wasn’t the PC Nationals. No, it was a challenge race in Hawaii.

It was 1932, and four PC fleet members came up with the idea of racing their boats against the Herreshoff S fleet. The PCs were new, their owners curious. They wondered how their wooden sloops would do against the Herreshoff S class, a popular East Coast class that had made its way to Hawaii. So with help from the Navy, the PCs were transported from San Diego to Hawaii for a six-week series of races.

It was run on weekends, and the series came down to the final race. The PCs won, 106-100, and the Herreshoff S skippers were so impressed that they purchased all four winning PCs on the spot for $600 above the original purchase price of $1,900 per boat.

This weekend, the PCs will race again, in the same boats that have been racing since 1932. The sloops are still completely wooden, kept that way by strict one-design class rules.

Peter Peckham, who has skippered Confusion to the PC National championship in each of the past two years, purchased his PC six years ago when his wife threw him a surprise birthday party.

“One of the fellas brought one of these boats and told me I could have it, but I would have to pay for it,” Peckham said. “I did, and I’ve been in it ever since. Other boats are more modern, and there’s less upkeep, but it’s a classic feeling. Plus, there’s the camaraderie (with the other PC owners).”

Of course, because there is more upkeep, wooden boats can also present problems.

“Our boat leaks like a sieve,” Peckham said. “But we probably sail them harder than they were designed to sail.”

PC owners paint the bottoms of their vessels once a year. The biggest worries are the seams splitting and deterioration of the wood.

The opening of seams simply comes from the tough workouts.

“We probably sail them harder than they were designed to sail,” Peckham said. “The more we pull on it, the more the mahogany is going to spread. That’s when the seams open up.”

Deterioration sets in when the vessels are exposed to fresh water (salt acts as a preservative), and dry rot sets in.

Still, for all the extra work, few in the fleet would update their boats.

“It just goes to prove it was a good design to start out with,” said Paul Kettenburg, George’s brother. “It’s just like some people will only drive a certain kind of automobile.”

George Kettenburg died in 1952, so Paul is left to carry on the family legacy. He no longer owns Kettenburg Boatbuilders or a PC, but said he receives a couple of calls a month from people interested in purchasing one. He isn’t sure how many of the original 85 boats remain.

“Some weren’t maintained, and they’re difficult to restore,” Paul Kettenburg said.

Fourteen boats will be racing this weekend. Peckham will be sailing for his third consecutive championship.