Stitch and Glue Piccup Pram, Build to Launch. A handy fast sailing boat designed by Jim Michalak

The boat was just launched in July 2021. Sails GREAT! I just hope Neptune likes Grappa.
Sailing starts at 16:25.

Piccup Pram uses taped seam construction from five sheets of 1/4" plywood.

PICCUP PRAM, SAIL/ROW PRAM, 11' X 4.5', 90 POUNDS EMPTY

Filmed with the assistance of my brother and chase boat rower son. :)

Building and sailing an 11’ long, stitch and glue construction boat. This handy and fast pram is a good sailor and was fun to build.
While building this boat I watched every Piccup Pram video on YouTube and tracked down any building pics I could find. I hope this video helps others who would like to build this boat.

I used the Michael Storer Lug Rig video to guide my setting up of the sails:    • Part 2 Lug Sail The first sailing day...  

To order plans:
https://duckworks.com/piccup-pram-plans/


Notes from the designer:
Piccup Pram was the first boat of my design to get built, back in 1990, I think. I still have the prototype and use it regularly. I designed it to be the best sail/row boat I could put in the back of my short bed pick up truck. But I found it to be a good cartopper, too. It has capacity and abilities I had previously thought impossible in a 90 pound cartopper. The photo above shows the original 55 square foot sail on Pensacola bay a long time ago. Piccup is a taped seam multichine hull which can take a fair amount of rough water.

Piccup continues to be one of my most popular designs and I get nice photos from builders. Here is one of Richard Donovan hoping for more wind up in Massachusetts.



Richard's Piccup has the larger 70 square foot sail that prefer myself. It's the same as the original but is 2' taller. This balanced lug sail sets on a 12' mast and rolls up easily for storage on its 9' yard and boom. The idea was to be able to store the rig easily in the boat during rowing and it works. There is a pivoting leeboard and kickup rudder on the boat and they can be left in place raised while rowing. Converting to full sail takes a couple of minutes as you step the short mast, clip on the halyard and tack lines, hoist the sail, lower the boards, and off you go. And the balanced lug sail reefs very well although reefing any small boat is best done on shore.

Here is a Piccup by Vince Mansolillo in Rhode Island, a nice father/son project. Piccup will be large enough to hold both of them. You can see the large open frameless cockpit, large enough for sleeping. And you see the buoyancy/storage boxes on the end.

Vince's

But Piccup will take two adults as seen in the photo of Jim Hudson's boat. Jim's boat has a polytarp sail as does my own Piccup.



These boats have proven to be good for sail rig tinkerers (be sure to read and apply the Sail Area Math essay before starting). Here I am in Piccup with a polytarp sharpie sprit sail. The rig is different from the originals but the hull here is totally unchanged (except for paint) from the original shown on the beach at Pensacola.



I think my own Piccup has had about six rigs of different sorts and was always the test bed for the polytarp sail experiments.