markfitz

I think I have some really fine maple from RAKA left over from a boat we finished in 09. If I can locate it, I'll send it to you if you want to pick up the shipping. I'd guess it's a couple of pounds worth, at least. I just have to get to my dad's place next week.

I loved the lines of it, thanks!

Saw it on a trip to Ogunquit, Maine. It was beautiful.

Can't wait to see this one go together…congrats!

Thanks Ray. I am thinking maybe the boat upholstery place near me might be able to do it. I was also toying with figuring out a way to drop the mainsail and the jib from inside the cockpit. Some kind of fairlead and a cam cleat on the cabin roof or something….

Does anyone know where the reef points are installed on the new weekender sails? I think I read somewhere that they're included now. I tried emailing stevenson projects a while back, but got no response.

Excellent, thank you for taking the time to write that. I was contemplating bringing our sail somewhere to have reef points added, so that's good to know. The lake we sail on is notorious for changing wind conditions, both in direction and strength. The water on the way back was rougher than I've ever been out on it, even in a motor boat, and it makes sense that we were pointing a bit too directly at our destination because we wanted off the water. we were definitely getting knocked off course by the waves too. Every time I got splashed we'd be pointing in a different direction! Thanks again.

OK, I have a dumb newbie question that I *think* I I maybe know the answer to, but I'm going to ask anyway. First, the background: On our last sail, it was beautiful on the way out, with wind from the SSW at maybe 6 knots. We had a leisurely sail to the other side of lake -- tacked a few times without issue, and we moving along at between 4-5 knots. About 3/4 of the way there, the wind started picking up, and we turned around to head back. Judging by the many, many whitecaps, the wind was probably up to 12 or 13 knots about 10 minutes later, and the marina we needed to get back to was due south. I don't think the direction of the wind had changed much. If anything, maybe it changed to be slightly more SW. Now, here's where my terminology fails me, so please bear with me. When we tried to point SE, we beat the hell out of the boat and had the top rail a little closer to the water than I would generally like to see it, being a big chicken and all. When we pointed the boat a little more due South, it successfully slowed us down a bit, but the mainsail had a very weird shape to it. Like it was an "S" -- and it was flapping pretty good. We were able to keep it there and make pretty decent speed (about 4 knots) considering the pounding (and man did it pound. I think we need some sandbags in the forward hatch) but the sail flapped the whole way, no matter what we did to the jib. The only way we could get it to stop slapping against the standing rigging was to go way faster than we were comfortable going, heeled over way more than we were comfortable heeling. I did try to research it a bit using google, but most of what I read dealt with larger boats and it sounded like sailing windward in rough water isn't fun no matter what size boat you have. I guess my question is, is the Weekender particularly bad at sailing windward? I mean, it was fun and all, but since we're still learning what the boat "feels like," I figured I'd run it by you all. Thanks, as always for your collective experience!

Yesterday I tried dropping a 5" block down into the mast box, but I ended up removing it. It has been a while, and I hadn't remembered that we had adjusted the mast angle by doing the "Slice a wedge off the back and attach to the front" thing, and it looked really ugly sticking up out of the deck. Not to mention that it would probably have messed with the shroud lengths required. So I think it's going to stay the way it is and my dad will have to continue to duck. We're going out today, looks like a nice day for it! Thanks for the advice.

Yes, good point! "Keep the Admiral happy" is always good advice.

Ha, yeah that occurred to me, but I was thinking it would be heavy and harder to lift it completely out than to just raise it 4 inches and have my wife stuff a rod through a hole. But it's certainly a simpler solution.

OK, this may be a crazy thought, but I'm going to throw it out there anyway. I am envisioning a slot or a hole in the mast box that I can slide a plate or a steel rod into to hold the mast up about 4-6". Then when it needs to go back in the garage, I lift the mast up a bit and slide it out again. Will the mast box handle that? Any thoughts?

Thanks Frank. I also discovered something after dropping a 4" block into the mast box on the boat. It won't go back into the garage.

Excellent!

I'd love to get a look at how you added the ballast. I know that used to be on here somewhere too, but the search of the archives doesn't seem to be working right. Or I'm doing it wrong, which is probably more likely.