Dave R1

My bride took this shot on Saturday of Julie K wearing her new suit. Don't look too close. There's a wrinkle or two in the main I need to iron out. This was shot on Lake Pepin during the Minnesota Messabout. The sails are from Duckworks. Perfect in my estimation.

No need to apologize. I assembled the deck halves as per the plan with the 1/2" ply butt block underneath. (Actually I don't remember what the plans call for for that butt block but I used a piece of plywood.) After the deck was attached to the stringer on the transom and the lazerette BH was installed, I laid out the opening for the hatch. I sawed close to the layout lines then clamped a straight edged piece of wood along the line to guide a bearing guided flush trim bit in a router. The guide piece wasn't bent over the crown of the deck. I just wedged it up on the ends to keep it steady. I cut through the deck and the butt block. After the opening was cut I made a frame of some mahogany. I think the pieces were about 1" wide and 3/4" thick. Most of the back was rabbetted away so there is a lip to cover the inside edge of the plywood. The ends of the pieces were mitered. I put the two long sides of the frame in first and epoxied them to the deck, clamping them in place to make the bend. Then I added the end pieces after the epoxy for the first two pieces was cured and I could unclamp them. Here's a quickie drawing of the way the frame fits the opening. I hope it makes sense. BTW, I've stood or sat on the stern deck many times and never had an issue with strength.

Ken, the deck joiner is still there. It's just two pieces now. The opening was laid out and cut after the deck, transom and lazerette bulkhead were all together. I made a frame for the opening that is about an inch wide all the way around and epoxied that to the deck. Instead of following the plans exactly for the steering I came up with what I've drawn here. Well, most of it anyway. The white rectangular thing is a piece of 1x4 epoxied and screwed into place between the transom and laz BH. I put vertical pieces on the transom and BH to fasten the board that is shown. Anyway, with this mechanism, which is pretty close to bullet proof, there's no way I was going to work on it from below. The access hatch on top works well enough. The other thing is that it gives me easy access to the stub tiller in case something in the steering does fail so I don't lose control of the steering.

Ken, I don't think it is at all critical as long as you don't go so high there's no strength around the steering shaft. I didn't put in that hatch but instead made one in the center of the stern deck. I made a rectangular opening and use a piece of varnished 3/8" luan plywood for the cover. I planed the back face layer off the plywood which gave it the perfect curve to match the deck. I hold it on with two short bungee cords underneath so there's no exposed hardware and nothing for lines to catch on. Here's a picture.

Chad, here is a shot of the starboard side of Julie K. The red line is the jib sheet. This is the clew of the jib. This little strop or whatever you want to call it is simply an eye and a stopper knot that just fits through the eye. The jib sheets are made from a single piece of line with an Alpine Butterfly loop tied in the middle. The stop goes through the loop and then through the eye in the strop. Almost like buttoning a shirt. I've never had it come apart accidently but I can hook it and unhook it with one hand if need be. There's no hardware banging around beisdes the grommet in the sail. It's easier on my bride's noggin too when she rides on the foredeck. See here for how to tie the Alpine Butterfly. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpine_butterfly_knot

Everyone hold your cards. We have Bingo! I think you're right from looking at the interior shots. I think you're a glutton for punishment Chad. But it might just be your next cool boat.

I don't think it is terribly critical. I set the height so the shelves were usable. They extend aft from the forward bulkhead and are primarily in the design to help stiffen the hull side. I think they would be most effective in that role located about halfway between bottom and deck but I went a bit higher than that for looks. (Mostly so people wouldn't look at mine. )

Roger, I'm happy to hear it has worked. Not to get too picky but now that you're a gaffer a couple of terms have chnaged. the Head of the sail is now that edge that runs along the gaff. The Peak is the high end and the throat is at the intersection of the gaff and mast. So would it be correct to say that you have a long wrinkle between the peak and the tack? If so, ease the peak halyard slightly and see if that takes care of it. Pictures man, pictures.

Yesterday we got out for our first sail of the year. It was a bit windier than I would have liked for the first sail but we had a pretty good time. I was testing out new sails, a new gaff, new standing rigging, a new position for the jib and a change to the mainsail running rigging. All of that stuff wa fine except I need to mount the jib sheet blocks on the deck. The blocks were hooked on the forward shrouds just above the turnbuckles like last year. Last year they were hooked through the quick links. The quick links are gone this year and I didn't anticipate the blocks riding up the shrouds. Easy enough to fix. Also need to adjust the mains'l on the gaff for a bit better shape. Also an easy fix if the wind would quit for awhile. Might have to try doing it at midnight when the wind seems to be least. The biggest excitement was a failure in the steering system. I wasn't expecting a problem there. I've checked it several times over the past few years and there's never been anything to adjust or fix since I built my patented BPSM. I didn't check it this year because I was more concerned about the things I'd changed. Just shows to go ya. :roll: Fortunately I had the trolling motor so we were able to drop the canvas and fire up the motor to get back to the dock. If the steering hadn't caused us a problem we'd probably still be beating our way back up the lake. Thanks to Bill Paxton for joining us on our first sail. I was glad to have him along to help sail the boat. The steering is fixed now and it's only a matter of waiting for a high to settle in over us so we have some calm winds. Hopefully that happens before the messabout next weekend.

Ken, the gaff saddle wouldn't need anything around the front of the mast. Neither do jaws. Jaws commonly get a parrel but I think that is more for keeping halyards out of the jaws. Certainly when the sail is raised the forces on the gaff from the halyards work to keep the jaws/saddle on the mast. On my boat the jaws do move away from the mast when the sail is down but my sail is laced to the mast and the lacing loosens considerably when the sail is down. The sail in question would use lugs in a track so the luff would stay close to the mast in any position.

Here's a couple of pictures of gaff saddles from Classic Marine

I'm wondering if there's any way you could manage with a gaff saddle instead of the slug/car in the track or jaws. The saddle wouldn't reach around the mast as far as jaws and you wouldn't have to engineer a fitting to the gaff. Here's an example from the Port Townsend foundry but I'm sure others could be found as well and if you can do the fabrication or know some one, it wouldn't be that tough to make either.

Shouldn't you be loading up and getting on the road? The Minnesota Messabout is only a week away.

Roger, is the sail laced to the gaff or does the gaff have a track for sliding lugs? I'm assuming you're talking about the throat of the gaff and attaching the sail there? It seems to me that whatever you do to attach the throat cringle to to the gaff, you need to make sure it maintains alignment with the head of the sail. The same would apply at the peak. I've never seen a fitting for a gaff that slides in a track although the idea is interesting to me if it works. Any chance you could post some pictures to show what you're working with?

Frank, that looks like a handy radio. I wish it had been available when I bough the pair of little marine radios we got last year. I have a slightly larger VHF radio that is a 1W/5W unit that I use primarily but West Marine had a pair of small marine radios (about the size of the FRS radios) for about $90 They are, I think .5 or 2Watt units. They work fairly well. We typically use one as a shore-based radio when sailing. sometimes when sailing with others who haven't got a marine radio we loan them one. Lake Pepin is big enough that I worry about my Weekender sailing friends being out there without a way to make an emrgency call.

Doc, Any chance you've got enough extra shroud length to allow for a short spreader slighly above where the jaws ride? I imagine if you could put a piece of something, oak, angle iron, that would extend about 3" on either side of the mastand which the shrouds could pass over (or be attached to) you'd eliminate the problem with the jaws hanging up in the shrouds.

Enjoy the trip Charlie. We'll expect a story and photos when you return.

Bill, since the boom crutch sits on the seats which are only supported at the ends, I'm not sure I want to put a big load on there. Noel, thanks for the picture even if it wasn't a clickable thumbnail.

Thanks for the picture, Bill. That's the sort of thing I was thinking about. I probably won't have this ready for the messabout though.

Here I am, trying to over engineer something again. I'm curious as to how you all have gone about keeping the stern of your boat on the trailer when dragging it down the road. I have a ratchet strap that hooks on the trailer, goes across the boat and down toward the ratchet attached low on the other side of the trailer. It works but due to the shape of the boat, it's tough to get it tight. I end up having to stop after awhile and retighten the strap. It has also left marks on the upper rubrail which I don't like. The trailer isn't long enough to make straps running to eyes on the transom effective. I'm wondering about making a crossbar out of wood that would sit across the side decks and either take the ratchet strap in a groove on the top or use two shorter ratchets straps hooked into yeybolts in the ends of the croosbar. So, what have you done or what are you planning?

My condolences to his family and fair winds to Robb.

Chad, you could cut a 7

Jeff, I'm sorry if I wasn't clear enough. Ken translated what I said correctly, though. Thanks Ken. As he said, shoot at the highest resolution your camera can do. Readjust on the computer if needed for the application. For posting to the web, by all means reduce the resolution for. Screen resolution isn't that high. If you shoot at a low resolution you've limited your options for adjustment at the computer. Picasa is a photo editing application that is quite easy and quick to use. Ken makes a point about saving the original and then editing a copy. Picasa has an interesting feature in which the original image is left alone. If you just open the image and edit it, the editing parameters are saved as an INI file in the same folder and tell Picasa how to display the image. The edited image will only really be edited if you export the image and then the exported image is a copy of the original. There isn't the editing capability of Photoshop but the average user doesn't need all that for the average photos, either.

Jeff, you might start by setting the camera to the highest resolution you can get. Then use photo editing software to reduce the image size later if needed. For printing, you won't want to reduce resolution but for posting on the web you will. Starting at the highest resolution will give you the option to crop if needed without causing a dramatic loss in quality. The camera probably came with software for editing although I've been finding Picasa, a free downloadable program, to be capable of nearly everything the average user would need. Another thing to look at in the setup of the camera if it can be set is the ISO rating. This is sort of akin to adjusting film speed on your old 35mm camera. Frequently there is an auto setting and then a range of manually selectable ones. Leave it on auto most of the time. If it is set to some higher setting--400 or higher--you'll get grainy images. In a digital camera it is the gain that is being adjusted. You might need higher gain in a low light situation especially if the flash isn't used. For outdoors on a sunny day you don't need that high gain. Think of increasing gain as turning up the volume on that old AM radio so you can here the ball game on a radio station that's a long way away. See if that gets you on the road to better pictures. Let me know what happens. Dave

I have had some luck hanging one on the aft shroud with a rolling hitch but I haven't found a good solution for a second one aft of that one. The rolling hitch on the shroud makes it easy to adjust the height after it is tied, it'll stay put but is quick to remove.