The following information and photographs are displayed as a service to anyone researching yacht types. HOWEVER THE PHOTOGRAPHS AND TEXT ARE COVERED BY COPYRIGHT, AND MAY NOT BE REPRODUCED WITHOUT THE PERMISSION OF YACHTSNET LTD. Details and photographs are normally based on one specific yacht, but could be a compilation. No reliance should be placed on other yachts of the same class being identical.  Where common variations exist, we have endeavoured to indicate this in these archive details. 

The Nicholson 35 was designed in-house by Camper & Nicholsons in 1970/71, and remained in production from 1971 to 1990, with various minor model changes from Mk I to Mk VII. Whilst the hull mouldings of some boats were contracted out, always to quality moulders, all Nicholsons 35s were finished by Camper & Nicholson themselves, to a very high standard.

About 230 were built over their long production run, and they have a superb reputation as a safe, fast passage-maker. It is is thus very rare now to find one that has not had the wear and tear of multiple extended ocean passages, or hard racing early in her life.

Various sources quote slightly different ballast and displacement figures for these boats: the figures here being taken from a Nicholson-supplied manual for a Mk VI boat, shown in most of the photos here. The later boats had a more conventional shaft drive to a P-bracket instead of the hydraulic drive to a prop mounted in the aft end of keel that was fitted to early boats, as shown in the small plan at left. Later boats also have a slightly different internal layout with a quarter berth aft of the chart table. The last boats built had a taller rig, a feature probably introduced for the American market, where a significant number of Nicholson 35s were sold by a dealer in Annapolis.

Photo above - the earlier built versions had the prop at the aft end of the keel, driven by a hydraulic drive, whilst the later boats had a more conventional sternshaft and P-bracket as in the photo below

Above: early boats had an aft-facing chart table with a small hanging space and seat squab aft of it, later boats had a forward facing chart table with a quarterberth aft - at the expense of a much smaller port cockpit locker - see lower photo.

Engine installations vary, the yacht in some of the photos here having a 29 hp Ford-based Watermota diesel driving a conventional sternshaft via a Z-drive gearbox, instead of the bigger 50 hp Perkins engine with hydraulic drive that was fitted to most early Nicholson 35s. This change in the later models was a definite improvement, as 29 hp is entirely adequate power, and the older boats engine compartments were very cramped with the bigger engine, and access was more awkward for the hydraulics to drive the keel-mounted prop. The photo below shows a Perkins engine with hydraulic drive.

The photos below show a much-travelled Nicholson 35 fitted out for extended cruising, with a fixed GRP doghouse instead of a canvas sprayhood.