© John Burnham

Reynolds 33 Review

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You could say the Reynolds 33 is a multihull version of the recent trend in fast, classy monohull daysailers.
Only it's a whole lot faster, and it has a range of gears that allows
you to easily shift between racing and cruising modes. You can sail the
33 with a full or reefed main, and use headsails of progressively
greater area-from jib, to blast jib, to screacher, to spinnaker.
Working with Morrelli & Melvin Design, Randy Reynolds spent a
couple of years on prototypes, finally settling on a powerful 48-foot
aluminum rig and a 14-foot beam that fits in a slip. Reynolds likes to
call his creation "just another cruising boat," but with tongue
somewhat planted in cheek. Yes, it can sleep four sailors in single
berths, but speed is what makes this former windsurfing sailmaker's
blood move. When he recruited the likes of Charlie Ogletree, Johnny
Lovell, Howard Hamlin, and Pete Melvin to race separate boats in last
spring's overnighter to Ensenada, they didn't cross the finish line
talking about the accommodations. Reynolds beat them all, but it sounds
as if they'll be back. Ogletree, who has become a dealer, says he's
done 24.5 knots under blast jib and full main, "It is like sailing my
A-Cat…the boat is a Ferrari with seating for all your friends."
For my sail with Reynolds last May, we sailed out of Newport Harbor,
Calif., in light air. After raising the square-top mainsail and
unrolling the 133-percent high-clewed "blast" jib, a light breeze
quickly pushed us out past the breakwaters and into the ocean. There we
turned north on port tack and unrolled the biggest jib, a
600-square-foot screacher, mounted on a Harken furler on the tip of the
sprit. Sailing in 5 to 7 knots of wind and without fuss or any water on
deck, the boat began averaging 10 to 12 knots. There we were, a mile
off the beach on an oily swell with one of those tantalizing breezes in
which many monohull fleets swelter under a postponement flag-and we
were clicking off the miles, often flying a hull. Reynolds
reminded me several times how much sail we had up (nearly 1,200 sq.
ft.) and pointed out whether I was above or below a beam
reach-important because you need to know which way to turn to bleed
power if you catch a puff and your windward hull really starts to fly.
The boat sometimes felt a bit light under me, and Reynolds occasionally
encouraged me to head up a little, but most of the time the boat just
felt good and really fast. As the wind freshened to 8 knots, we cracked
off a little and maxed the GPS at one point at 14.7 knots. That's when
I began to wonder how it would feel at 16 or 18. After we got
up near the Huntington Beach pier (about 8 miles north), we rolled the
screacher and shifted into cruise mode to eat our sandwiches, idling
along at about 7 knots under main alone. While we ate, Reynolds
described his experience capsizing a 33 some months earlier, explaining
how, with one powerboat to assist, they'd been able to right the boat
within an hour, with no damage. He didn't make light of the capsize,
but emphasized his efforts to make a capsize a "non-event." In later
phone conversations, he said he's experimenting with buoyant hiking
racks that should help prevent capsizes and said he'd publish
information on them at www.r33.com-where his detailed capsize-recovery
account can also be found. With 18 boats built, Reynolds said he knows
of three capsizes, but only by racing sailors who were pushing hard.
Most owners, he says, will likely sail in a cruising mode, keeping both
hulls in the water and skating along faster than windspeed, although
not approaching twice windspeed. One key to staying upright
is to make it easy to reduce sail quickly, and the roller-reefing
(around the boom) mainsail and furling headsails accomplish that. As
long as the boom topping lift is marked so you can make sure the boom
is close to horizontal before you get started, the main will roll
easily; Reynolds has also added a second topping lift so there's always
one to windward of the big mainsail roach that is easy to tension.
While I steered, he and R33 dealer John Papa rolled a quick reef into
the main in 45 seconds, start to finish. Heading south again,
we set the nearly 1,300-sq. ft. chute for a while, and despite only 5
knots of breeze, I could heat it up and average 8 or 9 knots, or sail
it deeper-as if heading for a leeward mark-and make 7 knots. Reynolds
said that the last nine 33s he's built have had 14 feet of beam, which
proves to be faster downwind than the 16-foot beam versions he built
earlier. Upwind, the narrower boat is also faster in light wind because
it flies a hull sooner, but it gives away a little in full-power
conditions. The 33 has lots of details to study, several of
which are visible in the photos. The odd-looking pair of "wings" are
really a combination lifeline, backrest, and spray shield, and are
extremely comfortable. The middle of the three athwartships beams sits
on top of the blister cabins, so the mast is stepped well above the
level of the full-length trampoline and the dolphin striker that
supports the mast will never get near a fish or a wave. While this adds
clutter and a hurdle for the crew, it creates a secure working space
with plenty to hold onto. It also offers a good mounting position for
the jib tracks and creates more rigidity in the boat's structure. When
going through waves, the two hulls felt as if they were moving in
unison. Earlier in the day I visited the shop in Huntington
Beach where Reynolds' partner Bob Long oversees assembly of the boats.
A retired contractor and enthusiastic sailor, Long also manages the
flow of components from mostly California subcontractors-hulls from
Corsair Marine and trailers from F.E. Trailers, both in Chula Vista,
blades from Finco in Santa Ana, spars from LeFiell in Santa Fe Springs,
and hardware from Harken in Pewaukee, Wis. In the shop, it
was easy to examine some other unique design aspects, such as the
daggerboard trunks. These are molded components that lie against the
inboard side of the hulls, angled outboard about 10 degrees so that the
board is vertical with normal heel and the interior remains undivided
by a centerboard trunk. The shoebox hull-to-deck joints looked beefy
enough, as did the reinforced "beam plants" where the three beams mate
with the deck. At press time, Reynolds and Long had signed on
10 dealers to sell the boat at a sailaway price of $139,900 (and
race-equipped for less than $150,000). Reynolds did the initial design
three years ago and has taken his time working through the variables,
but the details all seem to be on target now. The Reynolds 33 has two
clearly functional performance modes, and either is fast. Reynolds 33 LOA         33' Beam         14' SA U/W     705 to 927 sq. ft. SA D/W      up to 1,840 sq. ft. DSPL         2,250 lbs. PHRF         -100 Price (sailaway)      $139,900 (800) 366-8584        www.r33.com