broken-mount

broken-mount,
originally uploaded by rjlongfield.

Well it's official, I think I know why this boat was left behind the Yacht club and forgotten. I think it's cursed. Either that or I was just not meant to sail this summer.

The latest in the string of set backs is the broken Gooseneck mount. While trying to put the new gooseneck pin in place this mount bent and then broke. Firstly why on earth is a mount made of soft metal and secondly what did I do to deserve this?

Well the hunt in on for a new mount, a rivet gun and the appropriate sized rivets to attach the new gooseneck mount when I find it.

Gah! the frustration of it all!
-Rob

Centreboard Update

It's done, the centreboard gasket is in place with one small hitch.

The first step was to cut the gasket material to length, which was easy to do. The next step was to cut the aluminum bars to length. I cut two small pieces, one for the front and one for the back of the centreboard hole and then two longer strips for either side.

The cutting was a slow tedious process but one that went fairly well, some small problems but nothing to bad. Next up was drilling the holes in the aluminum
for the srews and the counter sinking for the screw heads. This took a while and many, many attempts to get the right drill bits and the correct depth for
the counter sinking.

The next step was to layout and drill the pilot holes in the boat for the screws. This was easy yet unnerving to drill holes in the hull of the boat.

Before placing the gasket in place I put down some marine adhesive/sealent to seal the holes. It made a mess which took a little while to clean up but I think
it was a necessary step to take.

So now everything is in place, the stainless steel screws bit well into the Albacore hull and everything seems to be gowing well until I turned to boat over.
It turns out that my hull isn't as thick as I thought. My calculation put the hull, gasket and aluminum at just over 3/4 inches. Well 3/4 inches ended up putting screws
sticking out into the cockpit of the Albacore.

Now I have to figure out what I am going to do. I am thinking of glassing some wood over the holes to provide some backing and extra surface area for the screws the connect with.

I think for now though I'll leave them so that I can get the boat in the water.

The Kingston Area needs a Dinghy club

My boat is mere days away from being put on the water in who knows how may years. I've had the boat for 7 years and before that there is no telling how long it was sitting in the alley under that tree. I'm thinking at least 5 years.

I think I've blogged before about how impressed I was with the dinghy clubs in Toronto. Now they didn't have fancy bars or facilities but I think that is the point. As a soon to be first time dad I don't have a lot of extra money lieing around to spend on club fees. Currently most of the dinghy sailors I found are either members at an established yacht club or they trailer their boats. A yacht club certainly has it's advantages, nice clubhouse, bar with tender, kitchen with cook and staff to organize races and club events. Unfortunately all those extras cost money and while it might not seem like a lot $700 - $1000 a year for two people plus extra fees to dry dock my boat on a dolly is a little too expensive for my tastes. After spending that much on membership fees, who can afford drinks and food?
The other extreme is trailering the boat. Other than wear and tear on your car, trailer, boat and the loss of time rigging and de rigging the boat this is essentially free. The drawback are obvious, no or harder to organize races, lack of consistency and general frustration having to rig a boat before sailing and de rigging the boat after a long day on the water.

There is a third option is what I am doing this year. I am paying money to a marina (Collins Bay) that harbours keel boats for dry docking. Now this is a lot cheaper than a yacht club but lacks other dinghys. Seriously I have been told that I will be the only dinghy at the marina other than the sailing schools boats.
I think the downside of this doesn't even need to be explained.

So what am I thinking when I say the Kingston Area needs a dinghy club? Well not a lot really. A protected place to store you dinghy on it's dolly, a small area with a launch ramp specially deigned for easy launching, a dock to holding multiple boats while their dolly are being returned or fetched, A trailer with change rooms and a portapotties.
The club would be as inexpensive as possible, memberships would be enough to cover costs which would be kept to a minimum. The goal would be to create a friendly atmosphere for dinghy owners to hangout, and sail together.

I had no idea what a dinghy club was before I went to Toronto and now I think the Kingston Area needs one. So if your a dinghy sailor in the Kingston area
that is interested in this idea or know some who might be interested drop me an email at Myfirstname.Lastname@gmail.com

Expensive bit

Well I finally tracked down the part of the gooseneck I needed to get to be able to attach my boom to my mast. The pin I had on the mast was round and the boom had a square hole. $60, 10 emails and phone calls later I had a square pin. With a little teflon tape (see picture) the pin fit perfectly.

The final steps required to get the boat on the water is to secure the centreboard gasket, apply some wax, clean the inside of the boat and get some line for the mainsheet. I hope to have everything finished off this weekend and sailing on Tuesday.

Centreboard Gasket Fiasco

I don't know what else to call it. I originally got my centreboard gasket from the sailloft in Kingston years ago and glued it in place. It was a piece of thick Mylar that was recommended to me by someone. Well in the intervening years that Mylar bit vanished. I went back to the Sail Loft and they don't use it anymore, so I was at a loss. I could buy some centreboard gasket but the smallest size was 3" which meant I was going to be tossing out about half of it and at almost $2 a foot I wasn't impressed. The whole problem stems from me not wanting to put screws into the hull to hold a fabric gasket in place.

Well I finally gave up and accepted that I was going to have to do this because I was not able to find the Mylar. Looking for it put me about 2 weeks behind schedule. So I went back to the Sail Loft and got some pre folded sail tape for a wicked price. Andrew and John are great guys and I strongly recommend them to anyone. So after a trip to the Sail Loft, The metal store for some aluminum strips and the hardware store for 1/2 and 3/4 inch stainless wood screws everything is ready to go. I will be attaching the Gasket this upcoming weekend.

I'll let you know what happens