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fatehunter1972

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About fatehunter1972

  • Birthday 01/01/1

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    Vancouver Island, BC Canada

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  1. PAR, You are absolutely correct, particularly in small boats where a little bit of error does not really matter. Here's a story. I was leaving Santander in northern Spain for Rotterdam in a 300' coaster. Lost the Gyro coming out of the harbour but there was a sensor on the Magnetic compass that allowed the autopilot to work of it. The ship yawed around a bit in the westerly swell off the Atlantic as the magnetic compass tends to be more sluggish but I was sure happy to have it! Michael
  2. Norm, Wiring will affect the compass if you are running large amounts of current through it and it is close to the compass. Pretty well all electronic equipment stipulates a compass safe distance of 1 meter, or 3 feet. Twist the wires and keep them away from the compass. In reality It does not really matter if you compass is affected, i.e. has an error, as long as it is constant and you know the error. It is the intermittent error, such as the lights on at night that induce an unknown error, that might give you a head ache, as you may not be aware of it. without the aid of a gyrocompass it will not be easy to determine the error of your compass. Use range lights and markers and known headings to determine the error. Michael
  3. Sandy, I am in love with the Belhaven. Right now there is a Potter 15 and a Potter 19 for sale in my immediate area but I just can't get around the long rigging time or the fact that there needs to be rigging at all! Here on the West Coast of Canada I think the Belhaven would be ideal. I have no problem taking my open 13 foot dinghy into 2 foot seas (max) under oars. It is slow but very seaworthy. With a scrap of sail it is a blast but I find it easier to row it upwind than to sail it. Looking at the Belhaven's freeboard and shape (hard chine) the belhaven would have no problems with seaworthiness. However the fact that it has a hard chine will tend to make it want to be parallel to the water's surface so in a beam sea you would definitely want some canvas up. That said, roaring downwind up Alberni Inlet with a brisk NW'ly after the Broken Islands off the West Coast is what I want to do. The Potter 15 is $C 7,000, the 19 a little less (older) but I think I want a Belhaven. I've been given a time of 800 hrs over 30 months as an actual build time. Now I am talking to builders to get some quotes. Michael
  4. Scott, What is the overall weight of your boat? Michael
  5. talking about fir. My dad is building an airplane out of fir milled off his property. It will be wood structured with plywood leading edges and modern fabric coating. Now the plywood he is using! 3/32 inch thick and 5 plys! http://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/wppages/finnishbirch.php FINNISH BIRCH AIRCRAFT PLYWOOD (METRIC) from Aircraft Spruce
  6. This is a very relevent topic for me. I have a 13 foot clinker fiberglass dinghy with a luff sleeved laser 1 main. That's 21 feet of mast above the gunwale with unbattened sail on a boom. Currently there is no way to reef effectively at sea. I am looking at alternative rigs as this is the perfect camp cruiser for me. Thanks everyone for your input. Rob, I use ballast for my boat. I have 8 x 25 pound (200 lbs) bags of drain rock. That's rock that is 1/2 to 3/4 inch. (not sandy or liable to leave a mess) I put it in plastic bags and then inside burlap sandbags available at the hardware store. The bags are only a third full so the rest forms a handle. I throw them around to distribute the load. Sometime I row and my wife wants to sit on the side and look over the side. I just throw a couple bags on the other side to balance the load. Works great for me. Gives the boat a heavier feel when rowing through a heavy slop. Ordered up some 8 foot oars but even the crappy 6 ft ones I've got let me row easily at 2.5 kts.
  7. Bill, Your Bowron lake circuit pictures are an inspiration. I live on Vancouver Island but have yet to get to that part of BC. Drove past it a few times on the way to PG. Thanks, Michael
  8. For three summers I had to row a 14 foot aluminum skiff with three people in it (myself included) back and forth to the beach through swell and slop up to rocky beaches. I found the skiff to be great to row by myself, if the weather was calm. However when in a two foot swell and chop it was always better to have a bunch more weight. This allowed the skiff to punch through the swell instead of getting thrown off course. I did this for three summers on the west coast of BC, Canada for a commercial beachcomber. This really formed my ideas of ballast. My current pleasure boat is a 13 clinker fiberglass wherry shape (170 lbs) with a laser 1 main. Since there is no way to reef this sail I put 200 lbs of gravel in 8 bags in the boat. This helps to steady the boat when going through a slop. Since there is no chance this boat will plane I really like the solid feeling that the extra weight would give. One day caught dead down-wind from my launch in a 25 knot blow I beached the boat, took down all the rigging and rowed a mile back to the launch. Even at 400 lbs with myself, gear and boat she got thrown around a bit. What does this mean to me. Well I want a very lightweight boat to trailer, row, and sail until the weather gets up. Then I want some weight in the boat! I wish I could have a little bottle of 'gravity enhancer' with me. Swallow boats from the UK appear to use water ballast to great effect. They are however a very different kind of boat as opposed to Graham's water skimmers (which I love!). http://www.swallowboats.co.uk/ Home - Boat Kits, Classic Kit Boats and Traditional Craft
  9. This is a great area for boating. WHile there is a perception that Canada is a cold place with 6 feet of snow starting at the border, that does not apply to the west coast. I can remember three snowfalls this year and non of the snow was on the ground for more than a few days. Unfortunately our summertime winds are non-existent. Being North of the trades we will get some persistent NW'lies but typically we can have weeks of very light and very variable winds with warmth and sunshine. Crappy sailing weather. However the plethora of islands and varied coastline that starts towards the norhtern part of Vancouver Island is spectacular. Huge tides and currents, wildlife, islands, channels and best of all unpopulated except a few small settlements. I wish I knew how to embed a google earth image but I'm still figuring that out. IN google earth look up Comox, (there' only one ) and then go NW and SE to see the excellent boating geography. Michael
  10. Tom, I live in Comox and work on Gabriola (week on/off) so I'm always passing through Nanaimo. DO you have pictures or can I come see your boat. Please. Michael
  11. for electrical motors check out the Torqeedo. It seems to be a step up in electrical motor technology. http://www.torqeedo.com/en/hn/home.html Torqeedo GmbH: Home
  12. been there over Christmas as some family has a mining outfit there. two feet of ice on the lake. Summertime though is great for sailing, but not warm and the bugs!
  13. check it out. If it is aircraft grade it will be good stuff but will probably have a different rating system. Aircraft Spruce is THE source for homebuilt airplanes, with an excellent reputation.
  14. tim, the weight to tow, if allowed by the manufacturer, is not a great issue. However, is her car an automatic? Many automatics have a transmission cooling problem if there are hills etc and they are not equipped with a transmission cooler. Not perhaps as much of a problem in cooler months but in the hear of the summer it can be. Michael
  15. PAR, Beautiful piece of advice, especially regarding novices and comfort with heel. I must profess my surprise at my own discomfort when I first encountered sailboat heel. This despite being a Master Mariner that has rolled his guts out for many years on the North Sea. When the boat did not come back but just stayed heeled over it just felt weird! Now I love to sail my 13' clinker style fiberglass dinghy with a Laser 1 main cat rig. That is a lot of sail and with anything nearing 10 kts of wind is a handful since it does not plane. It has taken a few sails but slowly my wife is getting more comfortable with the motion of boats in general. Michael
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