RYA Day Skipper Theory

I have finally signed up for a week long day skipper theory course. Thought it was time to develop some basic navigation skills
Ho hum should be interesting

Dinghy cruising: re-boarding a dinghy 2 - installing re-boarding straps

I took a leaf out of Joel Bergen's approach on his navigator and installed boarding loops; I also installed righting lines as well.

The approach was simple enough. The green webbing is a 20 inch loop which is attached to two stainless steel eye bolts under the side deck behind the coaming. The eye bolts were attached to two neighbouring bulkhead ribs. I drilled through the rib and added extra 10mm ply blocks either side to strengthen the rib. The eye bolt went through rib and both blocks and was secured with nuts. The webbing was whipped at each end and then secured to the eyes with bowlines. Each loop is stored in the plastic wallet on the coaming. 

After righting from a capsize, the theory is that I can reach over and pull the loop out. It will go over the coaming and side deck and hang just below the hull bottom. I put a foot in the loop and there should be enough leverage to get me up and over the side, back into the boat. 

The rope is 12mm diameter braid. With big knots every 8 - 10 inches - for cold hands! It is about 14 feet long and each one (port and starboard sides) is attached by a bowline to another stainless steel eye through a bulkhead rib with strengthening blocks.  They store behind the coaming under the side deck. The idea is when Arwen lies on her side after a capsize, I can reach into the submerged cockpit, find the rope, throw it up over the higher side, swim around and use it to pull myself up onto the centreboard whilst at same time start to pull the boat back upright.

Well that's the theory. As always, theory and practice don't always match up. 

Hating IT

Microsoft edge has crashed again, this time causing my laptop to go into a permanent locked out reboot cycle, which thus far Microsoft help techies haven't been able to solve.
To those people who made comments on the blog, I will answer asap. Borrowing a friend's iPad at mo.
Normal service will resume sometime today or tomorrow. If you have been trying to Skype me, apologies. Bear with me.

IT sooooo frustrating at times 😢😱

spring launch time approaches

so...here are some winter reflections.....of a sort.............lots got done, if not done well!

from this CAD

to this..........

and the finished thing......a galley box for Arwen

The rudder got some TLC

as did the mast and the mast fixings

Frayed ropes and halyards got rewhipped

A new sleeping platform was made, Danish oiled and varnished

Life jackets and PFD's were checked and cleaned

Square spars were rounded

varnished, painted and had leather bindings put on 

and halyard rings were lashed in place

The outboard bracket was repaired and refurbished. Let's ignore the fact that I put it on back to front!!

All that remains is the attaching of eyes and setting up of re-boarding loops; and the installation of two knotted righting lines under each side deck

and some extra strengthening blocks in construction to reinforce where these eye bolts will go 

and of course, that ever nagging issue,

the painting of interior and exterior hull!!

Phew. Nearly there!

Dinghy cruising: re-boarding after a capsize and the need for re-boarding straps .

This year I intend doing another capsize test. I need to make sure that hatches are water tight.
The reason I have been thinking this is because I have just finished working on hatches. One of them has a lock, which over the years, due to salt corrosion, has now finally seized. Getting a replacement fit has been nigh on impossible and the hatch works perfectly well and so doesn't need replacing. It is the stern thwart locker and if I leave the boat I tend to store odd things in it when camp cruising - spare batteries, life jackets, etc. Cameras, radio, steering compass and binoculars go in my rucksack which I take with me. Anyway, cutting along story short, I epoxied and bolted on a small hasp set which I can padlock.

Having done that successfully I decided to add hasp locks to the wooden hatch to the under deck locker as well.

And whilst doing all this, I had my thoughts about a capsize test this year. The local weather forecaster said last night sea temps were 9C and lower than normal, so such a test may wait awhile!!

Having then thought about capsizing, my thoughts naturally turned to the 're-boarding' issue. I am no lightweight and previous experiences out snorkelling have shown me how difficult it can be re-boarding Arwen whilst she is at anchor!!

I have a brass step glued beneath the boomkin on the port transom and by stepping onto that and gripping boomkin and then mizzen mast I can haul myself in over the stern.  Last year I rigged a mooring warp from bow cleat to stern cleat so it fell about 50cm into the water beneath the boat and this worked very well. I could place both feet on it and ease myself up onto the side decks and over the gunnel and coaming.  It would be fiddly to tie whilst swimming alongside the boat during a capsize in open seas though.

So I have stolen another idea from Joel Bergen and I am about to install some 25mm wide webbing straps either side of Arwen. These will be tied off to very strong deck eyes which will be bolted through a pair of ribs either side. The resultant sling will be around 40cm below the water line and will be some 2m wide. It will fold up and be held snuggly by elastic bands under the side deck behind the coaming. All I will need to do is reach over the coaming and grab it. The bright green webbing arrived today and I will fit it sometime next week. I just need to make and stain some spacer blocks out of ply to reinforce behind the bulkhead where the bolts pass through the deck eye and bulkhead area.

I fitted a new red streamer made by my friend Dave to the aft end of the top yard and all that is left to do is lash on a stainless steel ring at the 35 - 40% mark on the yard. I've decided to go with the main halyard coming out of the sheave at the mast top, through the stainless steel ring on the yard and around the back of the mast before being tied onto the bow end of the yard. Hopefully this will secure the yard at the mast head during sailing and it will release quickly when allowing the sail to fall between the lazy jacks.  I also intend removing the bronze mast band I installed many years ago - it gets in the way!

And that will be it.

Apart from painting the interior cockpit area........and for that I need a spell of fine weather.......in the UK - ha! 

Dinghy cruising: using a standing lug sail with sprit boom part 2

is now published at https://duckworksmagazine.com/2018/04/04/setting-up-and-getting-the-best-out-of-a-sprit-boomed-standing-lug-sail-2/#comment-22

Article one can be found at https://arwensmeanderings.blogspot.co.uk/2018/03/setting-up-standing-lug-sail-part-1.html

\if you want to read it on duckworks go to https://duckworksmagazine.com/2018/03/30/setting-up-and-getting-the-best-out-of-a-sprit-boomed-standing-lug-sail/

the refit continues

Progress has been good over the last few weeks. I have never done any maintenance work on Arwen over the last six years or so, mainly because of work and family commitments. But, retirement brings with it time and so this winter I have endeavoured to try nd put things right.

So in the last few weeks, what's been achieved?

• spars have been stripped back, rounded, sanded, varnished, painted, leathered and fixings reattached
• rudder has been repainted
• loose fittings on tiller tightened
• the circular 8" hatches taken out of the front thwart bulkhead, old sealant stripped off and hatches cleaned and replaced
• the under deck locker hatch has had its lock fittings cleaned and tightened
• anchor trays have been cleaned and wooden runners attached so they sit better in the foot wells of the front cockpit area
• anchors and rodes and shackles checked
• life jackets cleaned and cylinders checked
• new sleeping platforms made
• new mast and spar transport supports made for when trailering Arwen
• outboard cleaned and lightly serviced
• new outboard bracket attached (with the back to front mis-hap - imagine eye rolling emoji inserted here!) 
• sail stitching checked and sails cleaned
• all running tackle checked and frayed rope ends rewhipped 
• outer hull dinks and dings cleaned and repainted
• mast refurbished and re-rigged
• new cord loops and deck eye fittings along hull interior sides (for clipping in camping gear)

What's left to do?

• leathering the oars
• painting the hull interior (big dilemma - do I keep it white hull interior with light grey Interdeck non slip floors OR do I just paint everything light grey inside? white shows the marks, when scratched, undercoat shows through etc - I really can't decide on this one)
• attaching the bronze star casting given to me as a birthday present from my wife - trying to decide where best location is for that - it looks lovely
• trailer maintenance
• sand blasting some old tyre interiors - the tyres are great, the metal work they attach to rusted away - if I can get someone to sand blast them for me and if i can insert inner tubes (because the metal rims are rusted way in places - i will have two spare wheels for trailer) 

In the meantime, I spent the long cold winter evenings doing a lot of thinking about my lack of sail understanding. Often accused of overthinking things, I went back to my default setting - and questioned everything I do. I then read a number of books and consulted with a good friend, who has the patience of a saint. The end result is several 'articles' which Chuck and Mike , at Duckworks Magazine graciously published on Chuck's site.

I have posted 'abridged' versions on the blog but if you havent seen them and are interested, if you use the menu on the right hand side and scan through 2017 and 2018, you will find the posts; alternatively, go to Duckworks Magazine.

The 'articles', some accompanied with videos on my YouTube channel have been on

• building a galley box for Arwen - part 1 and part 2
• Creating sailing videos - a trilogy of articles  covering equipment, videoing techniques and post editing, setting up your YouTube channel
• setting up the standing lug rig on a welsford navigator - part 1 - don't make my mistakes; part 2 - my understanding of how to get the best out of the rig based on my very limited experiences thus far. 

Seven 'articles'. I hope they are use to someone; if nothing else they have certainly clarified my own thinking. 

Not long to go - I need a spell of several days of settled, dry weather to paint the hull interior outside on the drive and then Arwen will be slipping back into the water.

I have some extensive sailing plans for this season, hopefully resulting in some more articles........and certainly better honing of my limited sailing skills. 

if you have a view on whether I should keep the interior white or go for light-ish grey, please let me know; I am so indecisive on this one. 

Dinghy cruising: using a standing lug rig (with sprit boom) Part 1

An article about Arwen can be found at http://duckworksmagazine.com/2018/03/30/setting-up-and-getting-the-best-out-of-a-sprit-boomed-standing-lug-sail/

http://duckworksmagazine.com/2018/03/30/setting-up-and-getting-the-best-out-of-a-sprit-boomed-standing-lug-sail/

I posted the blog content relating to the article earlier this month so you can scroll down the menu on the right to find it.

I expect part 2 will be published within the next fortnight.

As I said in the article, I'm no expert on anything to do with sailing , least of all sail rigs, sail setting and sail trimming. So the articles are based on my limited experiences thus far. As always constructive comment always welcomed below. 

on some days........

it is best to not get out of bed and not emerge from under the duvet.
Never do boat work when tired, hungry or feeling below par; never do it late at night either.

Having reversed the boat into the garage wall the rear part of the outboard bracket needed cutting off and replacing.

See if you can spot the mistake I made and only discovered after the epoxy had set!!

And you thought 'Homer Simpson' wasn't too bright!

perfect days

Ummh - should I post or not? will I be data mined; will they sell on my data to third parties? Do they know me better than I know myself? Will AI in the future hunt me down and enslave me based on my on-line profile?

Whilst I seriously ponder these weighty questions and try to decide whether I am going to give up Facebook or not in protest; or whether its my own silly fault for sharing on social media;  or whether or not getting a second piece of toast with marmite is a cardinal sin, here are some pics.....I've managed to finish the spars, paint and varnish them, put the fixings back on, re-bend the sails onto the yard, rebuild and epoxy the new transom outboard bracket and clear up the workshop. 

Weighty intellectual thought, toast and marmite, fingers glued together with epoxy.....a clean workshop......kids descending on us......and the sun is shining.......its a good day.............. and its only 10 am.

Of course, I've probably put the fixings in the wrong place and bent on the sails incorrectly - you know what I'm like.