No wind, so breaking in the Honda 2.3

Sorry there hasn't been much here lately, I've been working a lot and been having some truck issues so I couldn't tow the boat.  I've been playing with little details to fine tune the rig and sailing position.  I've moved ballast forward, re-rigged my lazyjacks to make them more useful, went to a smaller diameter mainsheet for less friction, etc.

The truck is finally all done and dependable, so I hitched up the boat and headed down to the multnomah channel of the willamette river.  No wind.  Not a problem, I'd purchased the new Honda 2.3 and it needed more breaking hours at low speed.  The video below is a quickie with the iPhone.  Throttle position is @ 1/4 to 1/3, and was getting me 4+ knots.  I ran for over 1.5 hours without having to add gas to the tank.  Not bad for a 15 foot displacement hull with @ 13' in the water.

Just as I got back to the ramp and was loading up, a front moved in with LOTS of wind, probably too much :-)  I sure like this little honda.  The boat makes a fine little mini trawler with it.

Fern Ridge photos actually sailing taken by John

Thanks John!

Another light wind day on the water

SO I hauled the boat down to fern Ridge reservoir in Eugene Oregon.  John Khonnen was nice enough to meet me there and hang out.  He keeps his Old Shoe in a slip there.

It was a light wind day again.  I let the whole 120ft2 fly unlike at Hagg lake.  I managed @ 3.5mph in what couldn't have been more than 5-6 mph of wind.  The boat heeled no more than 10 degrees with me sitting in the beach chair in my new helm arrangement.

I haven't show photos of it yet, but I rerouted the mainsheet under the boom to another block near the mast, then down through the foredeck to the cam cleat.  I did this because the cleat didn't work properly with the sheet led in from below as shown.  It also gets the mainsheet off the floor of the cabin where it can be stepped on and such at just the worn moment.

This worked pretty well, though when the sheet went slack there were all kinds of new things on the top of the boat to hang up on.  Primarily my sculling oar.  I threw this in the cabin, so it started to hang up on the aft oar rooftop bracket.  More fine tuning needed :-)

The wind was spotty, but I got enough to find that the boat now balances pretty well with how I'm locating my weight.

I was happy to find that I kept up with/stayed ahead of John in his Old shoe.  No racing boat, but John is an experienced sailor who knows what he's doing.

John Khonnen's Old Shoe

Quiet day on the lake.  Good for testing new rigging.

New forward Hem position

So one of the things i've noticed is that I need my weight forward in the cabin to make the boat trim level.  I rigged some quick and dirty rope steering ala Paradox with a few fairleads and a chunk of rope laying around.  I rigged the mainsheet to run along the floor and turn back through a cam cleat block, all so I can sit low and forward comfortably in my little sand chair.  One cushion in the chair puts me just high enough to see well.

Since rigging this I've found that the cleat doesn't hold rigged this way, i need to come in from the top.  I'll put another block forward on the boom and drill a hole for the sheet in the forward end of the cabin to rectify this.  It will have the added benefit of not having the sheet running on the floor the whole length of the cabin where it can get stepped or sat upon.

I'll upload the changes once i get the sheet re routed.  

Finally getting back on the water for the year

So it's been a long wet record breaking nasty winter here in Oregon.  It's been a long time since I've posted because nothing new has really happened for a while.  I got the boat down to a local Messabout with the Oregon Coots a week or so ago.  Dan Rogers was nice enough to send some dry sailing pictures from the gathering.

Hoping to get out on a lake this weekend.  Truck is in the shop getting some transmission work done, hopefully I have it back by Friday :-)