Sailing

First sail of the year and a swim

May 8, 2011 By steve Leave a Comment

On Saturday, it looked really nice out on the water near our place on the island, so I decided to go out in my dinghy for the first time this year. It just so happened that it was opening day of boating season. There was a small craft advisory up, but nearly ready to expire, and the water was very calm as far as I could see in my sailing area. Further up the channel there were whitecaps.

My dinghy is an 8' Walker Bay with the performance sail kit, which includes inflatable RIB pontoons on the sides of the dinghy. I sailed it a bunch of times last season, and was always able to get out of any problems I got into, and ended up sailing pretty fast a number of times.

This time around, it wasn't so fun. After departing the beach, a friend was watching me, and I got out a couple of hundred feet when the wind kicked up a bit. I adjusted the sail, and dropped the centerboard in, got down in the bottom of the boat to drop my center of gravity, and got ready to work the boat upwind – the wind was coming from the north.

Before I could even get settled, a huge gust caught me – I remember seeing the water and really tiny ripples everywhere with water flying off of the top. I let the main sheet go and started leaning to get the nose pointed into the wind, but it was too late – the wind kept getting stronger very fast.

I don't remember which way the boat tipped over, or which way the sail was pointing – I just remember doing everything I could to keep things from getting worse, and when I knew there was nothing left to do, I got myself free of any lines or part of the boat and got ready to get wet.

The water was about 46 degrees, and it was about 50 outside, so it didn't really feel that much colder when I hit the water. I was wearing jeans, three shirts, rubber boots, and a life vest. I did get hung up a bit in the mainsail as the boat went over. It ended up going completely over and the mast hung up on the bottom – even though I was about a 1/4 mile out from the beach, it was still shallow. I could see the bottom and the sail stuck in the mud, and the boat was relatively stable, albeit upside-down.

My friend on the beach was asking if I needed help, and I said "yes" after trying to move the boat around a bit. I knew the tide was still going out at least for another 30 minutes, so I was worried things would be stuck for a while. He immediately ran up the beach and started to get his kayak ready to come out to me. Meanwhile, the rudder popped loose and started floating away, so I rescued that, and then climbed up on the hull of the boat and hung onto the centerboard, resting a bit and waiting for my friend to arrive.

Once he arrived, I transferred the rudder to him, and then after moving the hull to point into the wind, was able to get the mast un-stuck from the bottom. It was fairly easy to get it back upright, but the boat was filled almost to the top with water. Really the only thing keeping it floating was the RIB pontoons. I jumped in, secured a bunch of stuff floating around, and started to bail using my boot.

At this point, I figure I had been in the water for about 10 minutes. It wasn't too cold yet. The wind was still gusting, and I was able to get the sail loose so I didn't go over again, but the bigger problem was the waves and the fact that the boat was filled with water. I transferred a 10lb anchor to my friends kayak, and continued baling. After doing this for a while, with him yanking me in a bit, and eventually just rowing for a while, I was able to get to shore. Dumping out the water was pretty quick, and then securing the sail completely only took a few minutes. I would estimate I'd been in the water and in the water in my boat for about 20 minutes by now.

We were a few hundred feet down the beach from our house, so I walked the boat back through the water (I was already wet anyhow) and helped secure it along with help from my friend. I got up to the house and immediately jumped in the shower – probably at about 30 minutes now, and definitely shaking a little bit from the cold water. I warmed up over the next hour, but was very worn out after the adrenaline and working to get things secured.

Here are a few things I'll be doing differently the next time I go out:

Better floating radio – the radio I was carrying wasn't attached to me, and although it floats a bit, it isn't designed to be underwater as long as it was while the boat was overturned. I have also never been able to get it to stay attached to me no matter what I do. I have a different radio on my big sailboat that floats much better, and can be attached better as well. I'll be using this from now on so I can make sure I can get in contact with someone in the even this happens in the future, and a friend isn't standing on shore!

Less layers and better boots – the layers of clothing I had on were quite heavy while I was in the water, and didn't really help when they were dry. I've tried to find a better lightweight sailing coat of some sort, and now I'll definitely investigate a better solution. The boots I was wearing were 12" high or so, and useful for getting off of the beach without getting wet, but were nearly useless while in the water. They kept coming off.

Whale pump in the boat – I used to carry one of these, and couldn't find it for the last few outings. I'll always make sure I have one from now on in case I need to empty the boat.

One thing I'm still considering is the life jacket – I had a kayak-style lifejacket on which doesn't require any inflation or the like. However, it was a bit restrictive when trying to move around and get the boat righted. I think I'll look at some newer designs that might be easier to move in, but still be as bouyant as the existing one.

The only "damage" was the socket that the main mast was in popped out of it's mountings, and bent some plastic, which I was able to push back together – everything looks solid and stable. I of course, lost a little of my pride, and got a little cold, but I'm glad I'm safe! I'll try again next weekend!

Filed Under: Sailing

Not a lot of sailing this year…

September 27, 2010 By steve Leave a Comment

So far this year I've only really sailed once, which was about 2 weeks ago. Before then, I took the boat up to Seaview to have it hauled, painted, etc. but I don't count that since it was a "business trip".

And I'm sort of worried about going out right now because of my trip 2 weeks ago. The short story is that I think I ate something really bad. Combine that with 3ft waves and 20-25kt winds, and me getting seasick easy, and things went south quickly.

I ended up getting to Blake Island (north side moorings) and stopping to check some gear, when I started getting very, very sick. That was at 2pm on a Sunday. By 8pm I was really, really bad off. I remember talking to some friends and feeling like I was drunk. I was so weak and horribly sick that I couldn't even stand.

So I stayed the night on the mooring, drank lots of water, ate nothing at all, slept very little, and left at around 7am on Monday morning. I motored home, slept at the slip for an hour, and then went home and slept for the rest of the day.

It still took almost a full week before I felt right. I had to eat carefully…. I think it was food poisoning. If you think you might want to eat something from Moveable Feast, especially their Mushroom Burrito (yes I should have known!) you might not want to…

Anyhow, the memory of that whole evening/night still haunt me every time I think about going back out. I hope it will fade…

Filed Under: Sailing Tagged With: blake island, food poisoning, sailing

Parker fuel polishing system installed

August 28, 2010 By steve Leave a Comment

A while ago I wrote about the Parker Fuel Polishing module that I found and purchased. I finally had the time a week ago to finish my design and install it. So far, I'm very pleased with it, although I appear to have a potential leak in one of my splices…

The whole installation took me about 3 hours, most of which was laying in odd positions and searching for tools that I had dropped or misplaced – the usual delays and challenges on any boat project. In the picture above, you can see the pump, Racor fuel filter, and all of the fuel hose coming and going. The fuel filter was already mounted in the current location, so it was relatively easy to install.

You can see the fuel line from the tank going into the Racor filter. Behind the filter, a new fuel pipe connects the outflow to the inlet of the fuel polisher pump. On the top of the pump is the new line I installed that goes back to the fuel return line (not in the picture) and into a tee that I installed into it. The polished fuel returns to the tank via that line. The final pipe leaving the pump heads out to the engine fuel pump.

In addition to the pump installation, I also purchased the Programmable Controller that allows for very detailed scheduling of fuel polishing – far more granularity than I needed. I ended up running four cycles of 2 hours every day, giving me 8 hours of polishing. This might be overkill on a 10 gallon tank of diesel, but I suppose it's not really doing any harm – it's not like it would wear the fuel out!

The controller is mounted quite a ways away from the pump, and it has a really watertight glass and machined aluminum cover (not on in the picture) that will keep it very safe and dry.

So far, the polisher has been running for a few days – I've checked on it several times to make sure there aren't any major leaks. I can hear the fuel being returned into the main tank so I know it's working. We'll see if this will end up solving some of the fuel problems I had in the past – I believe it will. I also think it will require that I change the Racor filter more often, but that's OK too – I'd rather have good quality fuel.

The one concern is that the tee I used to connect into the existing fuel return line might be leaking. Per my research, I used teflon pipe tape on all of my brass/bronze fittings. For the tee, I used a bronze fitting, and then three 3/8" brass pipe connectors and clamps. All three of the connectors have teflon tape around their threads – only one layer – I read that more than that can cause leaks/problems. Nevertheless, I can see the edge of some of the pipe tape on one of the connections, and it appears to be soaking up diesel fuel. I have not seen any leaks or anything else, but if the diesel has miscolored the teflon, I would imagine over time it is going to leak.

Should I have used something other than this quite large hunk of metal parts as a tee? I looked high and low for a one part tee for a fuel line, and couldn't find anything. I did a bunch of research, and came up with my current solution. I'll keep an eye on it, but if anyone has suggestions, they would be appreciated.

I'll follow up in a while on how the polishing is going.

Filed Under: Engine, fuel problems, sail, Sailing Tagged With: fuel polishing, parker fuel polishing, sailboat

Fuel polishing

May 14, 2010 By steve 4 Comments

For a while I have been searching for a solution to polish my fuel on the sailboat. My motivation stemmed from one harrowing sail which I wrote about where dirt caused the engine to fail, and two other times where I've had to deal with the fuel filter at inopportune times – just when you need the engine the most as it always seems!
Most of the systems I've looked at before are far too complicated, or require a huge amount of space. One I've always admired is the Filter Boss from KTI Systems – it allows you to switch fuel filters on the fly with the engine still running. While it's primary purpose is to have filter redundancy, there are also ways of configuring it to provide fuel polishing.
Besides the space required, many of the other systems require a separate fuel polishing loop, which I also wanted to avoid. Due to space constraints when my engine was redone, the filter was placed on the opposite side of the boat from the fuel tank. Adding another fuel filter and loop just for polishing has never really been an option due to space and connections into my existing tank.
Recently I was reading online and found Parker Fuel Polishing. After reviewing various sources online and reading a lot of material about their systems, I ordered their FPM-050 Fuel Polishing Module, and Programmable Timer. Their system is much smaller (one small pump) and it can be used in-line. I liked this approach since by default it's left in an open state, allowing fuel to flow through, when it's not in use. Combine that with the Programmable Timer, and you have a really good system that will pull fuel through while you're not using the engine, and keep it in good shape for when you need it.
I think this system will be good to keep the fuel clean and usable while using the existing filter and system, and not requiring a huge amount of new equipment and space.
More after it's installed…

Filed Under: Engine, Sailing

Collinite – magic stuff for boats

May 13, 2010 By steve Leave a Comment

I've been through a lot of different waxes and treatments for boats that always seem to take forever to apply, or have some catch. I recently had my boat out of the water, and the cockpit and rest of the deck really needed some help after having been exposed to the elements for a year without much other than the usual wash down.
Enter Collinite – I saw this stuff at Fisheries Supply and read a bunch about it online. I started with Fiberglass Boat Cleaner No. 920 and then applied Paste Fleetwax No. 885.
The Boat Cleaner is designed to strip away any discoloration and restore the gelcoat – it was nearly instantaneous, and very easy to do. I started by using a paper towel to apply it, and then a clean one to wipe it off, which brought with it a lot of dirt and cleared out the "pores" of the fiberglass. I ended up using a stiff brush as the project progressed, and paper towels to clean it up once the brush loosened up things.
It took a fraction of the time for this part than any of the other systems I've used, and the fiberglass looked amazing, even at this stage.
The Paste Fleetwax is really thick stuff, and is really easy to apply as well. Wipe on, let it dry a bit, and then buff it to a shine. It really seems to work well with the Fiberglass Boat Cleaner to form a very tough shell.
All in all, it still took a good solid day to do all of the top of the boat, but I spent a long, long time in the cockpit doing every last inch of it – even in the corners and such, which I didn't do with previous solutions.
The only issue was that for the first day or so, any surface that had been waxed was AMAZINGLY slippery – very dangerous – far more slippery than anything I had ever seen. Since I waxed all of the non-slip tread as well, it made for a very difficult time moving around the boat.
Since the treatment, things have continued to look really good. I am waiting to see how it looks over the summer and with use. Definitely would recommend their products for ease of use and initial quality.

Filed Under: Cleaning, Sailing

Yearly haul out

April 26, 2010 By steve Leave a Comment

This last week I finished off a bunch of work on the sailboat and it was re-floated after the bottom was painted (them), topsides were waxed (me), and hull was waxed (them). There was a bunch of work on thru-hulls to make sure they were safe – we found one that was not even clamped on the far end!
The big job was removing the shaft and propeller and replacing the PSS shaft seal that had been there since who-knows-when. As far as we could tell, the old one was so old it was made of some sort of rubber and didn't have much spring left in it, which is important in it's operation. The most annoying thing was at low idle, when a loud banging noise was produced.
I originally wrote about this back in 2008 right after my new engine was put in. The noise never got any better than that visit, and it was still really loud and annoying. My bigger worry was what it was doing to the shaft, shaft log, and anything else.
The good news is that it appears to have been the PSS – replacing it with a modern one has resulted in virtually no noise at idle. And, the guy who did the repair talked with Coastal Marine Engine, the place I had the new motor put in from, and they think adjusting the idle might help get rid of it completely.
Sadly, while I was in the boat yard, the folks who did the waxing found a lot of problems with my paint job on the hull. The red stripes above and below the blue color are coming off rapidly, and look poorly painted. The blue center section has a lot of patch jobs where the previous owner tried to match colors of paint, and failed miserably. You can see it quite obviously in some of my close up pictures which I will post in a few days.
So, I'm faced with repainting things completely, which is pretty expensive, and requires removing the mast and all standing rigging so they can wheel the boat in and out of their paint sheds. Seaview West, where I go, uses Alexseal paint which seems to have a good following – it's claim is that it is much easier to repair than Awlgrip and it's similar types, but still looks close to those types of paints.
I'm going to do a bit of research, as I don't plan on having her painted until November of this year, and hopefully I'll find exactly what I want, color, type, etc. I also have engaged a friend in helping with the logo as that will have to be redone.
The good news is that the bottom looks in really good shape, and is ready for another couple of seasons in the water. I intend on taking advantage of that this year!

Filed Under: Cleaning, Engine, Sailing

ScanStrut Self Leveling Radar Pole

April 14, 2010 By steve 1 Comment

In my last post here, I talked about my new Simrad NSE and the BR24 radar. Some of you asked me how I mounted the BR24 and I said I'd write about it a bit. Here we go…
After reviewing a bunch of options, I found ScanStrut to have the best quality and most options from me to choose from. I visited a couple of marine stores and looked at their design, as well as wandered around my marina to see what others used. I knew I wanted it stern mounted because of the wiring headaches of trying to get it up the mast.
The three choices I had left were: pole mounted, backstay mounted, self leveling radar pole mounted. My preference initially was backstay mounted, which ScanStrut has a very nice kit for. Unfortunately, I have a swim ladder and split backstay, so making this work was either going to require major modifications to the kit, or losing my swim step's functionality, and drilling holes in the stern of the boat, which is angled a bit and would have been somewhat more difficult.
So I chose the self leveling radar pole mounted option. In addition, I added the GPS/VHF mount so I could mount my new Simrad GPS antenna here as well.
I mounted it on the port side of the boat right near the stern. It turned out really well.
The main attachment point at the bottom of the pole is a ball and socket joint with very tight connections once you tighten things down. It's also connected to the railing for additional lateral support, and you can see the forward facing support pole as well. It doesn't obscure any lifeline areas.
One side benefit is that I was able to mount a bracket on the lower portion of the pole for my VHF handheld extension for my Icom radio. Far better than having it in the pocket nearby where it's hard to hear.
The ScanStrut kit was extremely well designed – detailed plans for installation with very clear instructions and options. The quality of the pole and mount was excellent at every level. From the snap on caps to protect the screws, to the obvious quality in the head unit that provides the self leveling.
Cables run through the side of the pole and are covered well, and easy to access at the bottom of the pole. The self leveling part of the unit has worked very well so far, and the radar performance is great having it always level even while sailing. GPS accuracy is good as well since the antenna is away from all of the other junk and interference and is also always level.
I would highly recommend the ScanStrut product – it's a bit more pricey that some of the other options out there, but the quality is well worth the extra cost, especially for something this important.

Filed Under: BR24, Sailing, ScanStrut, Simrad

Climbing the mast

July 1, 2009 By steve Leave a Comment

Over the last few weeks, I've had to climb the mast of my sailboat to get at some things that were broken, and also to install a new system to control my mainsail. I'm afraid of heights, and so doing this was no small task.
A few years ago I bought a system that ran up the track in the mast and it had foot loops in it. It came with a belt to hold you around the mast as you went up, sort of line a lineman's toolbelt. It really didn't work all that well. The foot loops were amazingly uncomfortable – very little support in them. Your feet would get stuck in them since they flexed so much, and that wasn't a good thing since you would be fighting getting your foot in and out of the loop. Add to that the somewhat supportive belt, but still requires another rope connected to it for you to go up.
A friend of mine tried to go up, and he's not afraid of heights, and he didn't want to go all the way up on this thing. I made it up to the first set of spreaders on my boat, and gave up.
About 6 months ago, I saw an ad in some sailing magazine for a product called the ATN Topclimber. It is a different concept – rig a static line, attach this enhanced bosun's chair and foot loops to it, and up you go. Oh, and it can be run by a single person, instead of having someone hoist you up, etc. Obviously the more folks, the safer, but if I had something I needed to do and didn't want to coordinate a whole party of folks…
I ended up purchasing one, along with a good length of high quality line as recommended (1/2"). Many folks recommend just going out and purchasing climbing equipment, as it's likely cheaper, and very similar. I opted to purchase this since it was designed for this purpose to begin with, and didn't have lots of extra stuff to contend with or learn. It also packs up very small in an included bag, which happens to also turn into a bag to carry items up with you.
I'm happy to say I've been up the mast a number of times, and even all the way to the top, which I never thought I'd get to. It's so easy to just work your way up, and at least for folks who are afraid of heights like me, I found that looking out, and not down, while you're going up, makes it much easier. It also, in some weird way, is much more comforting to not be attached directly to the mast itself – having the static line very tight is key. I've also found that having the static line angled away from the mast is key so you don't bump into it on the way up. Plan your angle to come within 1 foot of where you want to stop to work.
The other big benefit of this system is being able to go up on your own, say in an emergency. I don't know if I would do that, especially in a dire emergency. I'm not one to be hanging around on the mast with a big storm going, unless it's that or death I guess… Regardless, it's compact enough that you could take it on a trip away from your normal marina, and if something happened, like a lost halyard or clipped VHF antenna, you could go up and take care of business without having to wait to go back to the dock.
It's still somewhat disconcerting to be at the top of the mast, but it's much safer feeling being strapped totally into the chair, and having the foot straps that you can push off of as well to gain more strength/force, as well as move around.
The only thing I think could be improved are the instructions. The only details are a single laminated card, and the pictures are very hard to see and understand. It's a pretty obvious setup, and I didn't have any problems, but it would be nice to see the pictures larger.
Overall, I'm extremely happy and I think it's well worth the money. I saved already having to pay some local marine folks to climb my mast and fix three things!

Filed Under: atn topclimber, mast, Sailing

Sailing … slightly cold but still nice

February 18, 2009 By steve Leave a Comment

In the last two weeks I've been out on the water twice, once only for a short sail (about 2 hours) and today for about 4. Last week it never got above 40 degrees, and there was ice on the deck when I left. Today it was a little warmer, but still only got up to 50 degrees. As I always do when I'm sailing, I used my SPOT Satellite Tracker to send notes to my crew on shore to let them know I was OK – and also so I could get a neato map like below.

My Tacktick wind instrument isn't working, and I'm working to get it repaired, so I ended up having to spend a lot more time paying attention to the wind and steering more manually, which is fine with me, at least every once in a while. At one point there were some sustained winds of at least 25kts for about 45 minutes – very fun!
The new Nauticast AIS transponder is working great – I removed my SR 162 AIS receiver and took it home (more on this later) and directly wired the Nauticast into my chartplotter and multiplexer a few days ago. I'm hoping others are seeing me too – the whole reason for broadcasting it in the first place.
Hopefully I'll get some more chances to sail even in these cold months!

Filed Under: Sailing, satellite messeng, SPOT, tacktick

Boarded by the Coast Guard

August 24, 2008 By steve 3 Comments

Yesterday I was out sailing with a friend in Elliott Bay, well I guess we weren't really sailing because there was no wind…. anyhow, we were trying to figure out what to do next, and hadn't planned on being out very long.
We'd seen one of the smaller Coast Guard boats running around near us for a while, and when it came straight towards us, I figured something was going on.
Sure enough, they politely asked if we had been boarded and inspected recently by the Coast Guard, to which I replied that we hadn't. They then asked, again very politely, if they could do so. It didn't really seem like a question that had an answer other than "sure", so that's what I said. They asked permission to come aboard, and two of them transferred, rather adeftly, to my boat to start the inspection.
They looked at life jackets, bilges, wastewater pumpouts, toilets, fire extinguishers, flares, and engine compartments. They found a couple of things wrong, but since it was an inspection, they just asked me to fix them. I suppose they could have fined me, but they were extremely nice and courteous.
We both asked some questions of them, about the process and regulations, and about their fast boat and strange weapons that they were more than happy to explain.
Overall, it was a very pleasant experience, and at no time did I feel uncomfortable or anything at all. They were so super polite and efficient, and very courteous, as well as even a bit joking at the end. I'm glad they try to make it as stress-free as possible.
I'll be changing my fire extinguishers and zip-tying my pumpout valves here in the next few days just in case they decide to check up on me, and because it's apparently the law.
The only bad thing was that as a result of being below during very barfy waves, I got really motion sick and we had to abandon sailing about an hour afterward, and I barely made it to the dock. I was shot the rest of the day…

Filed Under: boarding, coast guard, inspection, Sailing

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