Things are looking up!
Things are looking up!I guess right now I'm going to reference the list I made in part 2 regarding issues with the boat:
The hull is gouged where it came off the trailer a bit
Repaired! I used the West Marine gelcoat repair kit with various dyes to try and color-match the hulls. Unfortunately the color darkens slightly when curing, so the patches are a deeper (think "red delicious apple") red than the rest of the hull. Fortunately they are located below the tramp and will not be much noticed. The mainsail won't raise all the way for some reason Not really sure what the problem was here but I haven't had this issue lately. Go figure. I'm not sure the forestay is attached correctly I'm still not certain of this. However, I've purchased an adjustable chaimplate and attached it to the existing one for the forestay, which has resulted in (a) more mast rake and (b) more holes for mounting the forestay and jib tack. Picture to follow soon, but meanwhile I'm relatively satisfied with this setup, although I'm open to suggestions. I don't think the rudders are aligned properly Fixed! At some point they must have been removed from the boat and put back on backwards (that is, right-on-left and vice versa. While the rudders are identical, the hardware is slightly different on each side and this resulted in mis-alignment. The boat sails much faster now. I didn't measure before/after speeds, but my friend's waterproof GPS showed a steady 15.5kts. with inexperienced me at the tiller which is faster than we have ever gone before. :) On the transom, where the rudders attach, the plastic has flaked and cracked Eeeh... I guess this is just cosmetic but I suppose at some point I'll attempt to clean it up because it doesn't look nice. The trampoline has pulled out of the rear cross bar Um. This remains the same, I think it's just due to the age of the tramp, which will probably have to be replaced in a year or two anyway as some of the grommets are starting to tear out. The trampoline is filthy The hulls are filthy The sails are filthy Cleaned! Bleach water and a scrub brush on the tramp works wonders. So does a power buffer and 3M Marine Fiberglass Cleaner and Wax on the hulls. The sails are much cleaner after soaking in my bathtub for a while, although there is still what appears to be a large dull oil spot in the middle of the main. At any rate, they look much better than they did before! The rudders are filthy One rudder has been completely replaced, the other painted. I tried the appliance epoxy enamel but it took far too long to dry and I ultimately sanded it off and applied Rustoleum Fusion paint which has not bonded as strongly as its advertisements lead me to believe; it wears off where the rudder rotates under the hardware. Still searching for the "perfect" solution here. I don't like the shackles with the little key-ring things and want to replace them This has yet to be fixed in all cases, however I have replaced some of them. Some new lines may be in order The main halyard is new 3/16" New England Ropes Sta-set polyester line. (White with green & red stripes.) The outhaul is new Excel Racing purple 3mm line. I may also replace the downhaul with this line soon. The old outhaul broke when I was using it as one of the three points by which I might hang the main after taking it out of the bathtub. 32-year-old rope didn't like that tension I guess. The tramp rope is new 5/16" nylon rope bought at Wal-Mart. ($4.99/50'). The 32-year-old tramp ropes were replaced with cheap but slightly-stretchy nylon rope which is apparently not ideal but I figure I can replace the tramp rope with "good stuff" when I replace the tramp. Meanwhile this rope is pretty darn tight using the "Vice-Grip" method. I could've pulled it tighter but I didn't want to pull the tramp out of the rails. Still, it's WAY tighter than it ever has been when I've been on the boat before. I have yet to sail the boat with this new tight tramp. I could probably replace the jib halyard but it's not looking frayed yet and I'm on a budget. The sheets are still in pretty great condition, although I was told my main blocks were old enough to be sold as antiques. I may replace these in the future. ;-) There is a piece broken off the bottom of the mast I have purchased a new mast base from Murray's, however I have yet to install it. Next weekend mebbe. I don't have any trapeze harnesses Still none. :hs:
We sailed back and forth in the bay for a while with my more experienced
friend at the helm while I was out on the wire wearing a ridiculous harness made
from some webbing and a snap shackle. (GOTTA get a real harness!! Mom? Dad?)
After 25 minutes or so, the old tramp rope snapped, probably from repeated
pounding over the 1½-3' waves. This resulted in some wet bottoms. Fortunately I
had bought the old main halyard with us "just in case" and we heaved-to and
parked so I could tie in a fix. (Sorry, no pics of this.)
While we were cruising back and forth in the bay, the rudders kept kicking up. It was really annoying,
so we took more of the old halyard and tied them down firmly so they only
kicked up a teeny bit. At this point we proceeded to sail the three miles up the
bay to the Ocean Springs Yacht Club where Slip to Ship was to have
originated.
This required passing under a freeway bridge (with several feet to
clear over the top of the mast.) Then through one of those railroad bridges that
swivels 90° to allow passage. We're fortunate that we arrived when it was open,
as it swivels very slowly. Then we had to pass under one more freeway bridge,
and this one was kind of hairy. I estimate the top of the mast is approximately
30-32' from the surface of the water, yet the only clearance marker we could see
on the bridge pylons said "25." The rest of the pylon was hidden by a
wooden pylon sunk just in front of the sign. Tense moments ensued as we
approached and the angle shifted until we could see there was about 34' of
clearance. Still, that's not much, when the waves are 2-3'. Of course the bridge
also deflected nearly all the wind and our progress slowed to a crawl. Meanwhile
a large shrimpin' boat approaching us from behind was probably very annoyed at being held up by a small
sailboat.
After passing under the last bridge, we made a hard left towards the beach and
OSYC. As we approached the shore, we remembered the rudders were tied down and
wouldn't kick up, so we had to heave-to again to untie the rudders, then sail in
to shore with them kicked partially up and awful weather helm.
When we got to the beach and pulled the boat up, a nice fella named Jerome whom I had met the
night before in person (and over the internet before that) ran up and said "BOY
you guys are either NUTS or you've got some BIG (cajones)!!. I said "Maybe a bit
of both." Another guy, Jim, drove us to get the trailer at the other boat
ramp and we brought it back to OSYC with Ahab's wife following behind in their
car. We chatted with Jerome and Jim for a while and then went down the beach so
that Ahab's boy could play on the sand for a bit. I took this picture of them
together. My boat sure stands out from all the newer (white) ones, eh?
After a few minutes I dropped off Jim (he was kinda sunburned and didn't want to stay out long) and Ahab climbed on. We cruised back and forth in that area for about 45 minutes and had great fun! I was really worried about the other rudder breaking but it seemed to do okay. I suppose it's only a matter of time though... Meanwhile we saw a steady 15.5 knots going back and forth on a beam reach. Missing two jib battens and with a crew weight of 340lbs or so. All in all I had a great time.
