Sorry guys, I'm having too much fun.....
On 2008-06-12 13:17:16 -0400, "Wilbur Hubbard"
said:
"Jere Lull" wrote in message
news:2008061203070616807-jerelull@maccom...
On 2008-06-10 20:09:11 -0400, "Wilbur Hubbard"
said:
If you were a dedicated lone-hander
Don't want to be a lone-hander! That's what started this all.
That tells me you'd rather sail by committee. That's the path to
failure - remember the fate of the erstwhile "Red Cloud" which was
abandoned and lost due to the whinings of a wimp crew.
Oh, we don't *sail* by committee. My primary "crew" are the autopilot
and tiller tamer. Pat's capable and sometimes stands watch, but her
primary duty is to stay happy. My job is to make the voyage enjoyable,
not some testosterone-poisoned survival exercise.
We do determine the range of possible destinations by committee though.
, a better galley,
Only used for coffee. In fact, since switched to a portable stove so I
could stay outside.
Coffee isn't going to get the job done. You need a real galley where
hot meals can be produced while underway. At least one good hot meal a
day is a necessary thing when voyaging for maintaining strength and
moral.
When our longest legs *might* be two days, it's far less a necessity.
Truth be told, the galley is somewhat under discussion, but it's not a
high priority at this time.
Oh, you didn't notice how much stowage I have for groceries? -- two
deep shelves along most of the perimeter and caverns under all berths.
Groceries stored on those so-called deep shelves will all end up on the
sole in a big, dangerous mess when the going gets rough.
The lower shelves (where we put the few cans we carry) are enclosed.
Top shelves are for light stuff and has a 6" 'fiddle'. Some of our
larger stowage areas don't have but a small access on the side, and
none have a full-length or width board on top. We're good to 90 degrees
as we sit, and I've yet to get past 45 despite some pretty nasty
squalls and stupid moves, once or twice at the same time.
Limiting ourselves to short legs will minimize the sort of insanity you
seem to be expecting. What you describe would telegraph it's existence
well in advance. And if we're a slogging upwind a day out and a storm
develops, we'll get back to where we started quite a bit faster.
I learned a long time ago that if conditions deteriorate, it's best to
turn tail and hide out. If it ain't fun for all, it ain't fun.
more water tankage and I sure hope those aren't opening ports in the v-berth.
Nope. Not needed.
Easy to say now but you'll regret saying it if you very find yourself
off shore and dying of thirst. . .
Sorry, bad snip. More water tankage would be added before we took an
extended trip, low and near the mast. We could add 100 gallons easily.
And that unbalanced rudder is sure to be way too much of a chore,
especially when close-hauled.
It's one-finger steering up through 20+ knots. (NACA 0012, with center
of lift 1" behind the pintles.)
Poppycock! No transom hung rudder is balanced unless they dogleg under
the transome on the lower part. Straight ones like yours all have
severe imbalance problems by their very design. Do you even know what a
balanced rudder is?
Yup! Designed and built that one. IdaSailor produces a near-identical
blade. Really, it's got one-finger balance at all points of sail.
That keel, I don't think I'd trust it in heavy weather. It looks to be
only about four inches thick where it connects to the hull. It's got to
be way overstressed in that area.
What you don't see is the flange above, MUCH wider. That thinness, btw,
improves the water flow right where it counts.
Sorry but thicker above the thin still results in the thin part being
the weakest. Not only that but the thicker part atop the thin
concentrates the forces onto the thin portion.
And the stress that a 4 inch by 3 foot cross section can take is ...? A
quick calc tells me that if anything submits us to that sort of force,
we have far worse things to worry about. The 1+ inches of fiberglass a
bit away from the keel reinforcement will certainly have turned to
powder, and anything once-living would be tomato paste.
Quality boats don't have "persistent leaks!"
All boats have leaks. They get worse over time, particularly when not fixed.
And, I couldn't help but notice the deck about which you swell with
pride looks like a layman's copy of a Morgan Out Island 33 deck. Butt
ugly!
No disagreement, there.
But one thing it gives us is *enormous* reserve buoyancy against a
knock-down. At 90 degrees, the center of mass of the keel is a good 7'
from the center of buoyancy.
But coastal's fine for me for the foreseeable future, island-hopping
with a couple of 1-2 day legs between anchorages. I've no interest in
going outside of the east coast and Caribbean for a while, and there
are a bunch of places along that path we want to visit. Why rush,
bypassing all of them?
Nothing wrong with short legs but short legs can often throw at you
conditions worse than you'll find further offshore by virtue of shoal
water, currents and seas with very short periods and wavelengths.
Excuse me, but that describes our usual cruising area to a "T", so we
are comfortable with that sort of triviality. (Every once in a while
around here, the knotmeter reads higher than the depth ;-)
In most areas I'm talking about, it's no big thing to get out a couple
of miles to deep water, but we could comfortably choose to take the
"shoal" hit to take advantage of the wind shift and lesser current.
Would feel just like home.
--
Jere Lull
Xan-à-Deux -- Tanzer 28 #4 out of Tolchester, MD
Xan's pages:
http://web.mac.com/jerelull/iWeb/Xan/
Our BVI trips & tips:
http://homepage.mac.com/jerelull/BVI/