Piver Nugget 24

Description

The Piver Nugget (most commonly the Nugget 24 or 24' Nugget, sometimes listed as Nugget Mark II or Nugget 25 in early references) is one of Arthur Piver's early trailable cruising/day-sailing trimarans from the late 1950s to early 1960s. It was a step up from his first prototype, the 16 ft Frolic (1958), and served as a popular entry-level model in his lineup—lightweight, amateur-build-friendly (plywood/fiberglass sheathed, using lumberyard materials), and designed for coastal/bay/lake use with some coastal capability if kept light. Piver promoted these as fun, fast, and accessible multihulls, sparking the home-build boom via magazine ads. Jim Brown (later a famous multihull designer) sailed one in his early days, and rare footage exists of him tacking a Nugget in the late 1950s. Many were built by amateurs or small shops (some fiberglass production versions like "Texas Trimarans" in the late 1960s/early 1970s near Corpus Christi). It's not ocean-ready like the Nimble 30 (which Piver used for his Atlantic crossing), despite occasional exaggerated claims—overloading makes them dangerous, and they're best for lighter conditions.