Basic Boat Info
- Make
- Alerion
- Year
- 2008
- Condition
- Used
- Category
- Sail
- Construction
- Fiberglass
- Boat Hull ID
- ALE
- Has Hull ID
- Yes
Dimensions
- Length
- 26 ft
- Length Overall
- 26 ft
- Waterline Length
- 21.75 ft
- Beam
- 7.58 ft
- Max Draft
- 5.17 ft
Engines / Speed
- Engines
- 1
Engine #1 Specs:
- Make : Yanmar
- Model : 1GM10
- Fuel : Diesel
- Engine Power : 10 hp
- Type : Inboard
- Total Engine Power
- 10 hp
Other
- Heads Count
- 1
- Boat Class
- Daysailers, Other, Sloop
Additional Info
Standard equipment
Alerion Brochure Specifications- Hull Construction:
Divinycell-cored vinylester fiberglass hull with solid fiberglass bottom. Internally cast lead ballast. Bronze rudder post and hardware. Deck Construction: Balsa-cored vinylester fiberglass deck and house-top with integral canvas-textured non-skid surface. Mahogany house sides and coamings. Teak toe rails, cockpit seats, and cockpit sole, left natural. Louvered cabin doors and oak tiller. Rig and Hardware: Painted aluminum spars with jiffy reefing. Club for self tending jib. Harken blocks. Adjustable Harken main sheet and jib travelers. Cockpit: Large, six person cockpit with teak seats and cockpit sole. Storage under cockpit seats. Built in manual bilge pump. Canvas: Updated interior cushions, roller furling jib sail, mainsail with Stac Pac. New canvas cabin door cover. Interior: Port and starboard settee berths with open storage forward. Solid teak cabin sole. Porta potti located under berth.
Evolution of Design
By Dieter Loibner- company Alerion 26 brochure
The Herreshoff Alerion 26 evolved from some logical sources and one serendipitous incident. First, it possesses the genes of Capt.
Nats personal daysailer, the Alerion III, which was built in 1912 (he had two others before). Right around that time my grandfather started spending winters in Bermuda, so he designed a boat that he could sail there, says Halsey Herreshoff. My father, Sidney, had worked on Alerion III, so he asked Capt. Nat how he liked it. My grandfather expressed satisfaction with the sailing
abilities, but found it a touch too tender and wet in choppy conditions.?
So Capt. Nat added some ballast to Alerion and modified the half-model to increase beam, forward volume and overall length by
about 1 foot. This boat was built in 1914 (No. 732S) for Elias Cornelius Benedict, a Wall Street investor who named it Sadie. It was
one of Herreshoffs most beloved designs, with a long and successful career under various owners.
At the end of her sailing career, Sadie was donated to the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum, but eventually found its way back
to the Herreshoff Museum where she was restored to mint condition and is taken out to sail again.
Also in 1914, Capt. Nat scaled up the modified Alerion by a third, which became the Newport 29 cruising class. That boat was 36
feet overall with 29 feet of waterline. It had a fixed keel while the original Alerion and Sadie had centerboards and external ballast. The yard initially built three (Dolphin, Mischief and Comet) in 1914 and a fourth one, Paddy (now known as Teaser), in 1926.
Comet was lost in the Hurricane of 1938, but the three survivors still are cruising and participate in classic regattas. An updated
version of the Newport 29 also is on offer by Herreshoff Designs and Brion Rieff Boatbuilders.
The last piece of the development puzzle for the Alerion 26 came in the person of Isaac B. Merriman Jr., a Herreshoff supporter
and the last owner of Capt. Nat?s Alerion III, which he donated to the Mystic (Conn.) Seaport.
