Saturday, June 28, 2014

A few upgrades and I hope, improvements....

Since the first time I took my boat out on the water there have been some things that needed attention and changing. So here I will describe most of the changes I have so far made.

I moved the boom up the mast about 7 inches in order to improve visibility from the cockpit and allow a person sitting on one side to see the person sitting on the opposite side. I like it much better this way and didn't notice any downside really and I was out in some pretty fair wind.


One of the problems I had been having was the jib sheets getting caught in the halyard cleats that were attached to the sides of the mast. I did away with them and instead I made some belaying pins down on the deck just behind the mast and some turning blocks at deck level to point the halyards towards the pins. These work really well and are out of the way of the jib sheets. When you need to release a halyard in a hurry, just knock the pin up and out or pull it. Make sure you have hold of the halyard when you do though!!!


The belaying pins make a nice place to hang the coiled halyards after the sail is raised too.


I decided to use this sort of high tech rope on my boat instead of steel cables for the standing rigging. This Dyeema rope is just as strong as the steel cable and easy on the hands. Also it's easy to adjust the tension and since I did not have to by expensive tensioning devises, I think it actually cost less this way.


I made a new jib furler as well. I owe this and many other rigging items and ideas on my boat to Joel Bergen, a Seattle boat builder and sailor. His blog, should you wish to take a look is linked from the right column of this blog. It is well worth checking out, as there is a wealth of ideas and entertaining sailing content.


My Jib sail furled up and ready to go.


The main sheet, the only thing I did here was to add the boom bail to attach the block to the boom instead of a piece of rope.


My mainsail outhaul runs from the clew of the sail around the boom and out to the ring at the end of the boom, then up the boom to the cam cleat.


Here is another Joel Bergen beauty, this nifty and easy as well as cheap, tiller lock. It is adjustable from completely locked to completely loose, all at the turn of the knob. It works great and is very handy to have.


Here are the rudder up and down hauls. The one on the left hauls the rudder down and has a pressure release in case the rudder hits something under water. The one on the right hauls the rudder up.


Well I took the easy way out this time. I was going to make a nice boarding ladder and even had my son make some hinge parts for me but I found this guy online fr a good price and after searching in vain for some nice teak to make one, I just bought one and here it is.


In my original plan, this would have been cabin but now it is just open space to move around. It may be the future home of a tent though.


I used these straps and snap connectors to attach the luff of the main sail to the mast. The jury is still out on them. Sometimes they don't want to slide down the mast when I'm bringing it down. I like the clean look but we will see.


Here is a view of the mast head showing the gaff jaws. Actually it may be the jaws that is holding up the mast when I lower it. You can see the jib swivel, the topping lift where it goes thru the ring on the side of the mast. Also the throat and peak halyards where they attach to the gaff.




This is the centerboard up haul at the front of the cockpit.


The centerboard uphaul tackle in the top of the centerboard case makes pulling up the weighted board a breeze.


Auxiliary power.


After the sail is stowed on top of the boom, it can be raised up using the topping lift and mainsheet to open up the headroom in the cockpit.


Lets go sailing!!!


2 comments:

  1. Picture links still missing... would love to see them as most seem pertinent to boat I am building.

    ReplyDelete