I am thinking about building a galley overhead cupboard with a cutouts for appliances like a coffee maker recesses and fixtures to hold plates, bowls, cups nested goblets, and cookware, in a compact and easy to clean assembly. Everything will have it's place. Once built, it just needs to be tabbed in with fiberglass tape, or bolted in place. Do I make it out of wood or out of foam and fiberglass? I have an design ready to be finalized. I'll have to scan that in at some point.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Short Tacks and Tacking Depths.
I was thinking about a certain spot in the Caribbean where the wind and current are always against you. The island to the north is a notoriously deep drop off. You could never anchor there because the water is 65' just off the bluffs.
One thing I've done many times is tack up through there. Tacking is the zig-zag process of sailing upwind since sailboats can sail at most 45 degrees to the wind. So this is a challenging tacking situation--worthy of your full attention.
It is also a good exercise in choosing a tacking depth. Usually my tacking depth--the depth of water where I feel it is necessary to tack is on the order of 10-15'. This particular spot I used 70 for many years and dropped it to 65 and occasionally saw depths around 35 in the course of the tack as the stern swung through the turn.. We were a softball throw away from cliff side and a small thin tiny beach.
Why cut it so close? Because this spot was narrow, the wind and current was particularly strong. Every time you tack you lose a boat length of distance upwind. The fewer of these tacks the better. Also while the water was deep near the shore, it was still shallower than the center of the channel, and much of my progress upwind was made close to shore is current less swift than the middle. Hugging the edges makes sense.
Frequent tacking in a narrow channel is called short tacking. So short tacking through this narrow passage is zig-zagging back and forth trying to make headway against the current and wind both in the most adverse direction.
I've sailed many boats down there, and I think I'd like to sail my own at some point. My boat was made for the trade winds. It would power up and sail upwind beautifully. One difficulty would be handling my Genoa. It is a huge sail to sheet or trim in on every tack. So what I decided I wanted was a self tending stay sail, or possibly a jib also on the same track. That makes it easy to tack, you throw the helm over. It makes for a smaller sail without overlap which develops much more power, so I thought a double or triple head sail configuration would work best.
The idea is the outer sail is a spinnaker or drifter, set flying. The next in is an overlapping Genoa, for longer tacks. Inside of this is a stay sail with a single sheet going to a track just in front of the mast. So if you are in a short tacking situation, you don't use the Genoa or the lighter sails of course, and instead. The self-tending stay sail flops back and tacking only involves one person at the helm or someone steering with the auto-pilot. What could be easier?
Then on longer tacks, when you need more power, you unfurl the Genoa or perhaps a high cut Yankee. My plan is to make a curved track and support it at the ends--through bolted thru the deck, or else a glassed in structure. For the former, I might be able to buy a whole track system from Hanse--and voila--done. Nothing to it but bolting it in, which means it could also be removed if desired.
I think that little stay sail is the perfect place to fly a storm jib. My third reef is pretty deep. At most I'd need a hollow cut trysail about half that size and the pair of sails would keep me going upwind in any conditions.
A bigger problem would be light air downwind sails. In my case, I'd just as soon motor. Light air sails can make it hard to steer unless the winds are very light. I feel they are only necessary close to the equator, and even then a motor and lots of fuel are better. I don't like bobbing around. I like to keep moving--which means that at my heart I'm a cruiser not a distance racer. I don't like hours of tedium going nowhere with flapping sails.
So my boat sails well in light air in flat water--Long Island Sound for example, or the Cheasapeake Bay. It is even better in places like San Francisco or my favorite, the Carribbean Trade Winds. In fact the trade winds are perfect for my boat. It would blast through the Drake Channel light chop like it's nothing. Even the north side waves are not a problem for my boat in those conditions. While in the open ocean, it would be fine, but stuff the bow from time to time.
And because ECHO is heavy, it is one of the most comfortable rides. You can still get sea sick, but not as bad as on a lighter boat.
One thing I've done many times is tack up through there. Tacking is the zig-zag process of sailing upwind since sailboats can sail at most 45 degrees to the wind. So this is a challenging tacking situation--worthy of your full attention.
It is also a good exercise in choosing a tacking depth. Usually my tacking depth--the depth of water where I feel it is necessary to tack is on the order of 10-15'. This particular spot I used 70 for many years and dropped it to 65 and occasionally saw depths around 35 in the course of the tack as the stern swung through the turn.. We were a softball throw away from cliff side and a small thin tiny beach.
Why cut it so close? Because this spot was narrow, the wind and current was particularly strong. Every time you tack you lose a boat length of distance upwind. The fewer of these tacks the better. Also while the water was deep near the shore, it was still shallower than the center of the channel, and much of my progress upwind was made close to shore is current less swift than the middle. Hugging the edges makes sense.
Frequent tacking in a narrow channel is called short tacking. So short tacking through this narrow passage is zig-zagging back and forth trying to make headway against the current and wind both in the most adverse direction.
I've sailed many boats down there, and I think I'd like to sail my own at some point. My boat was made for the trade winds. It would power up and sail upwind beautifully. One difficulty would be handling my Genoa. It is a huge sail to sheet or trim in on every tack. So what I decided I wanted was a self tending stay sail, or possibly a jib also on the same track. That makes it easy to tack, you throw the helm over. It makes for a smaller sail without overlap which develops much more power, so I thought a double or triple head sail configuration would work best.
The idea is the outer sail is a spinnaker or drifter, set flying. The next in is an overlapping Genoa, for longer tacks. Inside of this is a stay sail with a single sheet going to a track just in front of the mast. So if you are in a short tacking situation, you don't use the Genoa or the lighter sails of course, and instead. The self-tending stay sail flops back and tacking only involves one person at the helm or someone steering with the auto-pilot. What could be easier?
Then on longer tacks, when you need more power, you unfurl the Genoa or perhaps a high cut Yankee. My plan is to make a curved track and support it at the ends--through bolted thru the deck, or else a glassed in structure. For the former, I might be able to buy a whole track system from Hanse--and voila--done. Nothing to it but bolting it in, which means it could also be removed if desired.
I think that little stay sail is the perfect place to fly a storm jib. My third reef is pretty deep. At most I'd need a hollow cut trysail about half that size and the pair of sails would keep me going upwind in any conditions.
A bigger problem would be light air downwind sails. In my case, I'd just as soon motor. Light air sails can make it hard to steer unless the winds are very light. I feel they are only necessary close to the equator, and even then a motor and lots of fuel are better. I don't like bobbing around. I like to keep moving--which means that at my heart I'm a cruiser not a distance racer. I don't like hours of tedium going nowhere with flapping sails.
So my boat sails well in light air in flat water--Long Island Sound for example, or the Cheasapeake Bay. It is even better in places like San Francisco or my favorite, the Carribbean Trade Winds. In fact the trade winds are perfect for my boat. It would blast through the Drake Channel light chop like it's nothing. Even the north side waves are not a problem for my boat in those conditions. While in the open ocean, it would be fine, but stuff the bow from time to time.
And because ECHO is heavy, it is one of the most comfortable rides. You can still get sea sick, but not as bad as on a lighter boat.
Friday, September 9, 2011
ECHO Hauled for her new Yanmar Engine
Here is a picture of ECHO taken last year when she was getting her new engine installed. She'd also recently gotten a new rigid vang and main boom--both Forespar products and a custom toggle to mate it up to the mast. I guess I'll be posting some things out of order as I'm be playing catch up and trying to pull this all together as a sort of ships log. Most of the information will be on restoring the boat, some on trips taken on other boats, and soon there will be posts of trips taken on ECHO.
Note this is an old post that was in draft format. I realized it was never published so I did that today. This post is actually at least four years old.
Genoa Removed from ECHO for cleaning and folding.
Another major milestone. It may not seem like a milestone, but it was a very difficult job, pulling my Genoa out of the V-berth, rolling it up as best as possible, hauling it up on deck through the companionway, and binding up the middle with some rope, hoisting it up and over the lifelines with a spinnaker halyard, and then carrying it up the dock and up a narrow ramp into my pickup truck Bruiser. Actually, it involved stuffing the sail into the bed of the truck with the equivalent of a football tackle to shove it in there. All in 84 degree heat and 85% humidity. Not fun at all.
My niece helped me and was very unhappy it was so hard. I could not have done it alone. As it was I needed several rest breaks because each spurt of effort was a maximum effort. This sail is 600 sq feet and weighs about 80 lbs. It felt like much more because it was so awkward.
Next up. Pressure washing it and rolling it up, and then lifting it back into my pickup bed and carrying it to my tent garage for storage. I have a few tarps to protect these two sails and cover them.
This opens up a lot more possibilities for me. I can set up my V-Berth as a place to live while I refinish the floors in my bedroom. I can start to plan to remove my fore stay and start assembling my roller furling--which will require a couple of helpers. I want to buy some new wire and Norseman fittings--I can start to plan that as well. I'm thinking about hauling the boat out soon. So it makes sense to pull the mast out and make a few changes to the shroud attachments, and fabricate new shrouds as well. I need to replace my VHF antenna feed line and make some repairs to my wind vane--also to be done with the mast out. It would make sense to do all this at once. On the other hand, I'd like to have the fore-stay work done so I can measure the Genoa for luff groove and to shorten the head for a furling system.
After fixing the leak in the inner fore stay attachment well, my next priorities are to repair the topsides, and begin work on installing a new head and holding tank. It would be nice to have the stove installed also, even though I might be removing it again to work on the ice-box/refrigeration system. I might want to remove the boom and spinnaker pole--just to clear the deck and prep ECHO for haul out and mast removal.
Regarding the ice-box. I will have to remove the deck lid and build a new one with formica and new doors. I have a supply of stainless steel I can use to fabricate the interior, or it might be easier to use fiberglass cloth over foam insulation.
Finally, while I like big boats, they are really way too much work for one person--particularly in a renovation such as this. Everything is easier on a smaller boat. Once ECHO is back in service, though, I'll have a ready supply of students and crew to help me with this work. I could probably find a ready supply of helpers now, but the problem is it takes more work to organize them than to do the work myself--with the exception of the two and three man jobs.
My niece helped me and was very unhappy it was so hard. I could not have done it alone. As it was I needed several rest breaks because each spurt of effort was a maximum effort. This sail is 600 sq feet and weighs about 80 lbs. It felt like much more because it was so awkward.
Next up. Pressure washing it and rolling it up, and then lifting it back into my pickup bed and carrying it to my tent garage for storage. I have a few tarps to protect these two sails and cover them.
This opens up a lot more possibilities for me. I can set up my V-Berth as a place to live while I refinish the floors in my bedroom. I can start to plan to remove my fore stay and start assembling my roller furling--which will require a couple of helpers. I want to buy some new wire and Norseman fittings--I can start to plan that as well. I'm thinking about hauling the boat out soon. So it makes sense to pull the mast out and make a few changes to the shroud attachments, and fabricate new shrouds as well. I need to replace my VHF antenna feed line and make some repairs to my wind vane--also to be done with the mast out. It would make sense to do all this at once. On the other hand, I'd like to have the fore-stay work done so I can measure the Genoa for luff groove and to shorten the head for a furling system.
After fixing the leak in the inner fore stay attachment well, my next priorities are to repair the topsides, and begin work on installing a new head and holding tank. It would be nice to have the stove installed also, even though I might be removing it again to work on the ice-box/refrigeration system. I might want to remove the boom and spinnaker pole--just to clear the deck and prep ECHO for haul out and mast removal.
Regarding the ice-box. I will have to remove the deck lid and build a new one with formica and new doors. I have a supply of stainless steel I can use to fabricate the interior, or it might be easier to use fiberglass cloth over foam insulation.
Finally, while I like big boats, they are really way too much work for one person--particularly in a renovation such as this. Everything is easier on a smaller boat. Once ECHO is back in service, though, I'll have a ready supply of students and crew to help me with this work. I could probably find a ready supply of helpers now, but the problem is it takes more work to organize them than to do the work myself--with the exception of the two and three man jobs.
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Downsizing
The other thing I did today was to move more of my nautical hardware to
the tent. So my office is clean and with a few small exceptions, nearly
perfectly in order. My plan is to start selling all my surplus sailing
gear and free up more space in the tent for working on projects. I've
already sold some automotive parts and plan to put at least one item on
eBay every day. Today I listed two items. A fuel pump and and laptop
sleeve. I need to downsize and get rid of everything I can.
Books, CDs, and DVD's take up space. I've been converting everything to digital form. It came in handy we watched a movie on my laptop when power was out and later when power was restored but there was no cable or broadband, I had my home network up and watched three movies located on my desktop system but routed to my Apple TV hooked up to my TV upstairs.
I have been organizing my eBooks, but having some difficulty with that. I have a duplicate library I just discovered, so I need to eliminate duplicates. I have also had some issues with cover art, and author names. These are tedious and something I can work on bit by bit so that when I take off sailing I will have a decent library of books to read, along with a huge library of movies, many of which I've never seen.
I have always been one to hoard paper. I had a huge file system about 10 years ago with 9 file drawers. Realizing that I never looked at much of this stuff, I threw out a two drawer file cabinet and got myself down to 7 file drawers. That was still too much. I threw out another two drawer cabinet and got myself down to 5. Still to much. I did it again and got down to 3 file drawers and I managed to hold it to about that until the last few years when things ballooned again. Last month I purged my files again and today I have about 3.5 file drawers. I'd like to scan some of these documents and store them on-line and on a memory stick and get down to 2 file drawers--which is about as small as I can reduce to. In any event, I'm very happy tha.
I've been doing similar things with books. Many paperbacks I have tossed out. Some I save to re-read once and then toss. Others I have discovered are worth a lot. I have one series of books that I found is worth about $400--so these will get sold soon. Everything else I'm selling except for some books I can't part with like my Patrick O'Brien series, and some computer reference books. My goal is to have no more than one bookcase of books.
I tried setting up an account on Amazon.com and it was such a headache that I gave up. I will sell everything on eBay.
While getting rid of things is nice. I still need to store some things. For example: I want to store my mainsail. The best place for that is on ECHO. But I'd rather not at the moment. As much as I'd like to go sailing on ECHO, that involves putting the sail back on, which is an exhausting job, and then taking it off again for the winter. I also plan to haul out ECHO soon, so I have to have the sail off the boat in any case. Better to tie it up in a small bundle and store it.
My realization is I need a trailer just for dry storage of normal boat gear and also as a mobile work bench. My Silverado, named Bruiser, can haul a large trailer. My Volvo, Sea Dog, can haul at most 3000 lbs. I have the mainsail in the bed of Bruiser, but not for too long. I need to bring the Genoa home next. For the near term, I have plenty of tarps. I'll make a clean place to store these sails in the tent and keep them covered and clean. That means reorganizing the tent to store two rather big sails. See how it is two steps back and then three steps forward if I want to make forward progress? It can be painfully slow for a boat this big.
I really don't want to buy a trailer right now, but it is something to think about. I also lost my parking brake on the Volvo and in the process noticed my clutch is slipping. Another two steps backwards.
Books, CDs, and DVD's take up space. I've been converting everything to digital form. It came in handy we watched a movie on my laptop when power was out and later when power was restored but there was no cable or broadband, I had my home network up and watched three movies located on my desktop system but routed to my Apple TV hooked up to my TV upstairs.
I have been organizing my eBooks, but having some difficulty with that. I have a duplicate library I just discovered, so I need to eliminate duplicates. I have also had some issues with cover art, and author names. These are tedious and something I can work on bit by bit so that when I take off sailing I will have a decent library of books to read, along with a huge library of movies, many of which I've never seen.
I have always been one to hoard paper. I had a huge file system about 10 years ago with 9 file drawers. Realizing that I never looked at much of this stuff, I threw out a two drawer file cabinet and got myself down to 7 file drawers. That was still too much. I threw out another two drawer cabinet and got myself down to 5. Still to much. I did it again and got down to 3 file drawers and I managed to hold it to about that until the last few years when things ballooned again. Last month I purged my files again and today I have about 3.5 file drawers. I'd like to scan some of these documents and store them on-line and on a memory stick and get down to 2 file drawers--which is about as small as I can reduce to. In any event, I'm very happy tha.
I've been doing similar things with books. Many paperbacks I have tossed out. Some I save to re-read once and then toss. Others I have discovered are worth a lot. I have one series of books that I found is worth about $400--so these will get sold soon. Everything else I'm selling except for some books I can't part with like my Patrick O'Brien series, and some computer reference books. My goal is to have no more than one bookcase of books.
I tried setting up an account on Amazon.com and it was such a headache that I gave up. I will sell everything on eBay.
While getting rid of things is nice. I still need to store some things. For example: I want to store my mainsail. The best place for that is on ECHO. But I'd rather not at the moment. As much as I'd like to go sailing on ECHO, that involves putting the sail back on, which is an exhausting job, and then taking it off again for the winter. I also plan to haul out ECHO soon, so I have to have the sail off the boat in any case. Better to tie it up in a small bundle and store it.
My realization is I need a trailer just for dry storage of normal boat gear and also as a mobile work bench. My Silverado, named Bruiser, can haul a large trailer. My Volvo, Sea Dog, can haul at most 3000 lbs. I have the mainsail in the bed of Bruiser, but not for too long. I need to bring the Genoa home next. For the near term, I have plenty of tarps. I'll make a clean place to store these sails in the tent and keep them covered and clean. That means reorganizing the tent to store two rather big sails. See how it is two steps back and then three steps forward if I want to make forward progress? It can be painfully slow for a boat this big.
I really don't want to buy a trailer right now, but it is something to think about. I also lost my parking brake on the Volvo and in the process noticed my clutch is slipping. Another two steps backwards.
Fiberglass and Paint Prep Work
A few years back, when I faired and painted ECHO, I built an outdoor, weather proof work bench to store materials and to mix epoxy. I will have to post some of those pictures as the amount of work I did, with my brothers help was considerable. In any event, today I moved this extremely heavy work bench into "The Tent". "The Tent" is a 22' x 20 ' tent shelter I bought last year. I am splitting the space with my brother who built the foundation. I want to use it to do fiberglass repairs on my Sunfishes, and any custom molded pieces I might need for ECHO. So it made sense to move it into "The Tent" and get it organized and set up to make stuff.
When Hurricane Irene blasted through here, I took the tent down and recently put it back up. I'd like to reinforce it some to make it stronger. It would be nice to have a framed back wall. In the mean time, the workbench is pretty cool. It has inside and outside outlets and wire to connect two 20 Amp circuits. Right now that is not hooked up, but I will add that to my list of things to do I have a heavy gauge extension cord going to the tent at the moment. I will probably remove the other wire and wire in a connector for that input.
Part of the reason the workbench is so heavy, is I primed it, and painted it, and then as I worked on fairing ECHO's hull, I used up any surplus smoothing out the plywood. Later I painted it with epoxy primer, and then coat after coat of epoxy paint. So it really is pretty water proof.
So this all goes to show that for every step forward there are a few steps backwards. The amount of prep work involved with boats is amazing.
Next up, I have a new hose for the boat, and I plan to fill up one of the water tanks and start cleaning the other tanks. I need some stainless steel covers and bolts and tap and dies to attach the new covers. It will be very nice to have all three water tanks working.
I am planning on purchasing a Techma Silence Plus tall model for the forward head. It will be using fresh water for flushing. So it will have a solenoid to control the water pump circuit. So this will be a very clean smelling head, quite and easy to use. For local sailing this will be the head people will use.
The aft head will probably use sea water and perhaps be manual just to conserve power. I do not plan to install an aft head in the immediate future. I want to haul the boat out and move a couple of sea-cocks to make it easier to operation. Or in the case of the forward head, I'll be removing the raw water inlet thru-hull and sea-cock.
When Hurricane Irene blasted through here, I took the tent down and recently put it back up. I'd like to reinforce it some to make it stronger. It would be nice to have a framed back wall. In the mean time, the workbench is pretty cool. It has inside and outside outlets and wire to connect two 20 Amp circuits. Right now that is not hooked up, but I will add that to my list of things to do I have a heavy gauge extension cord going to the tent at the moment. I will probably remove the other wire and wire in a connector for that input.
Part of the reason the workbench is so heavy, is I primed it, and painted it, and then as I worked on fairing ECHO's hull, I used up any surplus smoothing out the plywood. Later I painted it with epoxy primer, and then coat after coat of epoxy paint. So it really is pretty water proof.
So this all goes to show that for every step forward there are a few steps backwards. The amount of prep work involved with boats is amazing.
Next up, I have a new hose for the boat, and I plan to fill up one of the water tanks and start cleaning the other tanks. I need some stainless steel covers and bolts and tap and dies to attach the new covers. It will be very nice to have all three water tanks working.
I am planning on purchasing a Techma Silence Plus tall model for the forward head. It will be using fresh water for flushing. So it will have a solenoid to control the water pump circuit. So this will be a very clean smelling head, quite and easy to use. For local sailing this will be the head people will use.
The aft head will probably use sea water and perhaps be manual just to conserve power. I do not plan to install an aft head in the immediate future. I want to haul the boat out and move a couple of sea-cocks to make it easier to operation. Or in the case of the forward head, I'll be removing the raw water inlet thru-hull and sea-cock.
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