waynemunro

ahh, I just found this 'spreader' link from elsewhere in the forum http://www.pragdata.com/philboat/PlanSpreader.html I see that they provide alternate attachment points for the shrouds, I had assumed that the spreader just had the shroud passing through and provided a kink in it. I guess there are always 10 ways to skin a cat. Don't want to have to re-wite my shrouds so will have to consider how to do this.. not an urgent short term fix anyway

I may give the wheel another try in its current direction , I have been thinking about the wheel and realise that I was thinking of it as a tiller.. maybe if I do think of it as a steering wheel, which for some reason I am standing in front of, then it may make sense... Yes frank, I was using the standard sprial lacing, I had seen your page about the alternate methods, but for some reason went with the standard one (I know not why, perhaps it was the easiest to picture when I was doing the lacing). I'll give the back and forth a try. phew 12" seems quite wide for the spreaders Pat.. I assume you through-bolt them to the mast...

I am considering putting reef points in my sail, it seems the conservative thing to do. I have seen discussion one way or the other.. however my question is how do I do it ? I have never actually seen a reef point so know them only academically as a row of somethings across a sail which allows me to lash it to the boom around mid height. I can see these being one of: - a row of grommets through which a line is feed, could be slow to reef, some air will be let through the sail. - some pre-stiched lines attached to the sail, so just a case of dropping it and tying them together, this would look a bit naff with the lines hanging when the sail was full up - some stiched loops on the sail, through which to feed a line. no through sail airflow like grommets, though perhaps not as strong ? I am sure there are other options, I have not been able to find a reference to how reef points are made.. anyone care to shed some light ? cheers Wayne

thanks Barry, no, as far as I know no-one has sworn off sailing with me (or tried to prevent me from ever taking it out again), the guys that came on the first few trips are all keen for another go. It was genuinly flating when it was on its side, it was only prevented from going over further due to the top of the mast hitting the bottom, the water was about chest high on me standing next to it (I am about 5' 11"). I suspect that had there been any significent waves they would have got inside the cabin and the whole lot would have swamped... one day I'll do I a more controlled swamping test. I'd also be interested to see if the floatation of the mast would be enough to stop it turning turtle (I am not too sure if the mast was only hitting the bottom when I put my weight on it or not, and there were two old people hanging onto the cabin which would have bought it over more. regarding the wheel.. the other guys that I had on the boat (who had done any sailing) felt that it was intuitively backwards as well. As they (like me) tried to use the top of the wheel like a tiller. I will give it some though though, and maybe another sail.. it may have just been the slack in the system making it hard to feel the right way to go.

here is the promised more detailed account : http://www.waynemunro.com/misc/launch.html though I am not too sure if it does shed much light on why we ended up wet, but it does explain why we didn't turn turtle (water was not deep enoough). A fun experience with hindsight though, and one that my friends will feast on for some time

Well, launch day was saturday - it went mostly well. the brief summary is that the first few trips went very well, in conditions that we were finding a little difficult (probably should have waited for another day), and the last one was less than perfect. I am going to write up a more detailed account within the next couple of days, but in the meantime, the pictures on my website start from this link (note that you can click on the main picture to move to the next one): http://www.waynemunro.com/grw/wayne/2003/2003_weekender/IMG_6827.jpg/view_med_70.html there are a couple of shots from the collection below. Robbo came over for a look, thanks for the support and sorry that I didn't get you out for a spin, but will another day (if you stil want to after seeing the picture below). [attachment over 4 years old deleted by admin]

things seem a bit quiet round here, and since I have just managed to get the motor mount attached to the transom, here is a picture. sort of guessed the height and position, so will be interesting to see if it works. [attachment over 4 years old deleted by admin]

I'll be sure to let you know how it goes, though i have every confidence. Mine is much chunkier than the commercial ones, that ali is 65mm wide with a 6mm wall thickness. I am confident that it will work fine. the proof however will be in the pudding, and launch day is sat week. so stay tuned

ok, below should be a picture of my first attempt at a mounting bracket. I have put the holes in the lifting piece int he wrong place, so i will have to make another one tommorow, luckily I have plenty of leftover metal. I was planning to mount it level, using a wooden wedge to build it out from the transom. However having made it and held it up againt the boat, I can see the merits in mounting it at right angles to the transom face. Thanks to those above who planted the idea about mounting it straight out I noticed that there is an adjustment on the motor so I can set it to be fully down when vertical, despite the mount being angled.. I guess all motors have these. [attachment over 4 years old deleted by admin]

Interesting that your motor is designed for an angled transom Brian. I took a good look at mine (3hp Yamaha) yesterday and I am pretty sure that it is designed to be mounted on a vertical bracket. bought some aluminium today, hope to whip up a bracket tonight. The plan is that by making it myself I can tailor it to exactly my requirements, and therefore have it a little smaller. Only time will tell however.

Ahh, Robert has reminded me that I have seen brackets like that in that past... actually I think those look like a nice light bracket, more in keeping with the boat style. I might look at making something like that, so I can have the geometry the way that I want it. Will have to use aluminium I guess... but there has to be comprimise somewhere but then I seem to be changing my mind every day - wonder what tommorow will bring. the sliding one would be nice too, as would the tilt, but I did some more measurements on my motor last night , and if the top of the bracket is to be 10cm below deck level, then it needs to be at least 22cm out from the transom just to allow space for the motor to turn (it can do 360 degrees for reverse).. so my dream of a tiny bracket is flawed from the start.

yeah, I have seen a number of those brackets around, I could go uptown and buy a wood and stainless one (NZ made), though they are a little expensive. here is a picture of them: from this site:http://www.tenob.co.nz/ though the one that they may is 350mm long, and if I was prepared to put a bracket that long on the back, then I wouldn't have problem with tilting the motor up (also the motor might be a bit too far away for easy control) . I thought about duplicating this in wood, but felt there were a few too many moving parts. thanks for your idea about having the pivot point at the top of the transom, it is a good one, the geometry works out much better that way I think.

Ahh, I see, thanks for the image, I see how it works now. I have to admit that I would be a little worried about the looks of the motor sitting quite that high above the transom. it has given me an idea however about making a short mount with a small tilt into it, which should be enough to get the motor pivot above transom height in order that its own tilt can be used for the rest... .. not 100% sure if this would work, but here is an image to clarify .. (I too apoligise for the quality of my images) [attachment over 4 years old deleted by admin]

Also thanks for your description Pat, it sounds promising, though I am not sure that I have understood correctly... .. here is a crude image that I have made.. am I on the right track ? I can see that this would allow it to slide up and down, and maybe some pins or something to hold it in various positions. [attachment over 4 years old deleted by admin]

Thanks for the picture of the transom mount SeaEagle, but I am not too sure if that sort of mount will solve my problem (I may be mis-interpreting the picture), with a mount like that it looks like it would give me the extra depth, but I still wouldn't be able to tip the motor back, as the mount would be int he way ??

yes, Mikes solution sounds ideal, though I have not been able to find any reference to someone selling something like that on the net. given that it is now less than two weeks till my planned launch date I may have to whip up something less that ideal (maybe even the long bracket). thinking on from what mike said i am trying to figure out how hard it'll be to make something like that, wooden bracket on the transom, holding some steel rods, which another wooden bracket can slide up and down. May just a rope and cleat arrangement for holding it in the up position... still on the drawing board..

I have a bit of a problem mounting my outboard.. (to my weekender) I was only able to get a short shaft motor, the ideal height between the top of the mouting bracket and the bottom of the transom is 16 inces (according to the motor manual). The transom is about 20 inches high, which leaves me with the motor bracket 4 inches below the top of the transom. If I never wated to tip the motor up out of the way, then a small bracket would suffice, but as I would like too, then as I can see it I have only two options: 1) make the bracket stick out a long way so that there is room to tip the motor fully back within the bracket length (about 13 inches), which I am pretty sure would look very ugly 2) construct (or buy) a bracket which is able to lift a little (the 4 inches), so that the motor can be tipped back over the transom. Can anyone think of a better solution ? this problem must have been encountered before.. anyone have any pictures ? thanks for any help. cheers Wayne.

Speaking of the LOTR scenery, here are a couple of pictures that I took today... not completely OT for the forum as these are a couple of the lakes which I intend to sail on later this year [attachment over 4 years old deleted by admin]

yep, it is late in the season for so much snow to be falling (even on the skifields), the fields were all due to shut this weekend. I am now in queenstown and drove through falling snow today to get here. looks like it is unlikely that we will get snowing this weekend as the weather is going to be too rough, a great shame as there is middle of winter quality fresh snow up there waiting to be carved up. on the bright side, I am not the proud owner of a shiny new 3hp yamaha outboard.. now just have to make a bracket for it. I think chch is about 42 degrees Mike, and queenstown about 5 hours drive south of that. though our weather patterns are often dominated by the fact that there is nothing except open water between us and antarctica.. and this weekend is one of those. Also picked up all the ropes and stuff that I am going to need for the rigging I think. on the coutdown to launch for sure now.

Excellent to hear that it has been done before.. I'll do that then. Launch will not be far away now Mike, I still have a list of things to do (essential things), such as get the trailer finished and registered, steering, rigging. I'm driving down south this weekend to pick up an outboard and all the ropes and wires that I need, I have the rest of the chandlery already (and going to do a days skiing while down there as they have just had 50cm new snow.. yippee). however, october 25th is the proposed launch day.. have to make the sails too... phew. And summer is nearly here, it has taken all winter to build the boat.. but it'll be ready for a whole summer of sailing. I'm getting quite excited

I am pretty sure that I used the 2x4 from the materials list, show below. [attachment over 4 years old deleted by admin]

here is a query for you expert finishers out there. I beleive that I may have done something in the wrong order. I varnished my splash coamings, then masked them off while I painted the top of the boat. Now that I have removed the masking from the coamings I have a very small ridge of paint, which in some places is lifted slightly from the surface. (picture of splash coamings below) I am worried about these little ridges collecting water and it being drawn underneath the paint layer. I was thinking about putting another layer of varnish over the coamings and just over the paint layer, to seal up those ridges... anyone have any opinions on that ? cheers Wayne [attachment over 4 years old deleted by admin]

woo hoo Buck.. well done having such a loving family I am sure that you will have fun with that tool. planning my launch date for labour weekend if you are keen on attending, probably the sat. Not too sure where yet, perhaps lake hood, though worried that there may be too many power boaties there, maybe lake clearwater, as i think it is sail only... other possibilities are Purau or brooklands... maybe even ellesmere I guess.

Hi Guest, the pictures make it look a bit better than it actually is in person, there are a number of small imperfections in the paint job. However I am very happy with it.. and tend to give it a look over for a few minutes before going to work the paint is just standard white gloss enamel house paint. I have sprayed it on as my brush skills are not all that good.

thanks for the offer on the love birds Barry... but sadly I will decline Perhaps what I need to find is another boat to build which has about 1/3 of the deck are of the weekender.. just to use up the last of these walnuts. Maybe a skipjack !