Finishing the Motor Access details and a new Mast step

I've finally finished detailing everything after cutting in the additional hatch for the motor access, which has been working out great.  It also really helps working the aft end of the boom when rigging the boat or reefing/furling the sail.  Tall people might not need it, but if you're 5'8" or less I highly suggest you make this mod if you build a Robbsboat.  It makes things much safer and more convenient.

The bungee on the bottom holds the rudder down in lieu of Jim's chunk of lead.  Slightly fidgety getting the tension right, but works well once you do.  Uphaul run on top of the tiller.  The bolt through the end is to prevent splitting after I installed the fitting for the Ronstan tiller extension on the end, I should have pre drilled for the screws even though they're only #6.  Live and learn.

The second thing that was wearing on me was stepping the mast through the deck.  I've only got 16ft instead of the originally designed 18ft, but it can still get a little interesting balancing things as you lift it high enough to get over the deck and then reach forward to insert it.  Definitely not something I've ever wanted to do while actually on the water.  I suppose if one were to find some nice light spruce or take the trouble to build a hollow mast it wouldn't be so bad, but like the aft hatch mod I wanted to make it super safe and easy.  As a result I brought the step to just the other side of the front bulkhead and into the cabin, so now I only have to lift it a few inches over the cabin sole to step it.  The only drawback is it's going to be more difficult to keep things in the cabin water tight in a good rain.

Had to cut 4 of my ballast bars to allow for the heel of the mast to reach all the way to the floor of the boat.  I wanted the step firmly affixed down by the dimensional lumber of the bulkhead.

Notching the front of the cabin was simple and it's plenty strong enough to act as a mast partner as the mast is right up against the bulk head.  The retainer plate was simple as well, and is held in place with a couple of 5/16" bolts with wing nuts on the bottom.

The pad eye on the mast is to anchor the downhaul.  the hole you see near it is where the running end of the downhaul runs into the cabin where i belay it against the mast.  While the partner shear loads are easily handled, I didn't want the heavy downhaul tension pulling straight up on the cabin after taking the center out.  All of that load is taken by the mast, and I can adjust downhaul tension without removing the front hatch if necessary this way.

 The old step is still there to use if I want, but it makes a handy place to run an anchor rode into a bucket below.  While cleaning up the garage, I found a dorade that fit pretty much perfectly into the hole with just some minor clearancing with my dremel.  The "unfinished" mast is just a short section I glued up for test fitting everything inside the garage.

Lastly I need to build a new front hatch.  The lexan in the existing one come down too far too notch, but luckily I have some pretty thick acrylic laying around that I had originally thought I could do all of the cabin windows with.  Turned out to be a poor choice for that, but it's working out great as a hatch material.

I still need to trim out the top of the notch to make spray and rain running down the hatch go around the opening.  I also need to get some shock cord attached to the bottom of the wood rails to secure the hatch to the thumb cleats in the cabin, but it's pretty much done.

I'll need to find the right position of the sail for helm balance now that I've moved the mast back @ 5".   Jim designed the mast with about a 5 degree rake aft in the original position, which actually puts the mast tip a bit behind where it's sitting now.  I rigged the step and partner for the mast to be straight up and down, so it shouldn't be an issue.

Time to Vacuum all of the sawdust and put the interior back in order.  Again.....

Hopefully the weather cooperates this coming weekend so I can get her out on the water and do that.  Only 39 more days to the Salish 100....

Cabin modification for better motor access

I've used the boat for a couple of seasons now, and one of the things I've enjoyed the least is the big stretch over the aft deck to operate the kicker.  I even end up crawling up onto the deck on my knees a lot of the time.  Tall people would probably be able to reach fine, but I'm only 5'8" and wanted better access.  Here's how I solved it.

I've since made a hatch and rounded off the stub of the tiller.  I've also extended the rope steering back to where it doesn't interfere with standing in the new space.  The tiller still works well with an extension if one doesn't want to use the rope steering.

I had the boat out on the Columbia last week for a motoring only trip, and this has worked out exactly as I'd hoped.  Motor is easily reached and operated standing in this space.  I REALLY appreciated it when i ran out of gas sooner than expected upstream of the Glen Jackson bridge and started floating down towards the pilings.  Grabbed the gas can and filled the tank without spilling a drop in perfect safety in about a minute flat.  Also made it much easier to operate both the motor and the tiller near the dock.

A definite success.

New professionally built sail from Really Simple Sails

As everyone following this knows I've been wondering how much sail area the Robbsboat really needs.  The originally designed 138ft2 on an 18 ft mast is definitely too much around here.  I built the original tarp sail @ 120ft2, and only needed the full area on the very lightest of days.  I spent most of the time on the first reef, which was @ 95ft2.

I finally had Mik Storer build me this one over at Really simple sails.  100ft2 with 3 reef points.  Came out nice.

Got it out for the first on the water test back on September 28th.  Headed downwind against a 1 knot current on the Columbia river between I5 and I205.  My velometer in the parking lot said the wind was hanging out between 3 and 6 knots.  I was going between 1.5 and 3 knots that way.  I got up to 4 plus knots when I fell off to any kind of reach, the current helping with the apparent wind and the SOG. Camera battery died before I got turned around and headed back upwind/down current, but here's some good shots of the sail shape with the wind behind me and going against the current.

I'll get some video with better wind and some tacking soon.  Hopefully before the season ends this year.  

Good day sailing. Decent wind, right amount of sail up

So this  boat has been on the water for like 2 years now.  Due to a ridiculous amount of truck trouble, I haven't been out that much.  That's all fixed, and I'm getting some sailing in on a regular basis.   I went from high wind with no reefs to a bunch of light wind days with reefs available and a cautious attitude after 2 days in the Gorge with no reefs.  This was a day where I had light to moderate wind with the right amount of sail up to play without pushing the envelope.  Great day sailing, boat was a delight.  I had the first reef in, which puts me @ 92ft2 of area for the day.

Lazy jack and leeboard modifications.

I've had fixed ladyjacks on the boat for a while now, and they've really helped keeping the sail and yard controlled and contained on the water, especially when dropping the yard and sail.  The 2 areas where they've been a little deficient is when initially rigging the boat, and getting everything out of my way when motoring/sculling/coming up on the dock.  The height hasn't been adjustable.  I decided to make them adjustable with another dumb sheave at the mast head over the one for the halyard.  I reinforced the sides with some Ply before drilling the new hole as I'm pretty close to the tip with it.

I'll have a running line down the front of the mast that will let me slack them far enough to easily attach to the boom without the yard hoisted.  before I had to lift the rig somewhat to attach the lazyjacks, and that was best done by hoisting the yard on the trailer before launching.  If there was any siginifcant wind and it wasn't from dead ahead,  that was a bit of a struggle.  Once rigged, I'll now be able to hoist the boom to whatever level I currently desire, including well above the slot for sculling, motoring and coming into the dock.  I can also fine tune the tension for whatever reef I'm currently on.

The second thing I've done is rectify a problem I've had since i built the boat.  When i made the leeboard, there wasn't enough width on the stock to leave the "ear" at the top for the downhaul and potential uphill. so I just drilled a hole in the corner.  This made for some leverage issues on the up haul, and left the board a bit wiggly when up hauled in the water.  So I laminated the ear on.  Hopefully this will be strong enough for the lateral loads when raised.  Plenty strong for the uphaul/downhaul function.

As soon as the last coat of paint dries, I'll get it all rigged up and show the functionality of the new lazy jack system.

Memorial day sail for 2018 at Hagg Lake

The forecast was for reasonably cool and a little bit of wind.  I slept on Saturday, took care of chores on Sunday, loaded up the dog and headed to Hagg Lake.  The wind was noticeable but not in the least bit heavy when I got to the parking lot.  The last time I had the rig up was at the Depot Bay boat show, and I'd left the second reef tied in for hoisting to show people.  I went ahead and left it that way and got the boat in the water.  It's easier to shake one out than tie one in, and I had the dog with me with not life vest for him.

I was amazed.  I'm guessing the wind was blowing in the 5-10 range, and with two deep reefs tied in I was hitting 4.5 knots often.  I can definitely get by with a smaller sail than the @ 120+ ft2 one I have now.  I built two more limber spars already, and I have another one of Polytarp Dave's tarps that was just a little too small to do the current sail.  This is an easily driven hull in light winds.

I went ahead and bought a Gopro with the head harness this fall.  I have a contour on a head strap, and it's been a good camera, but the Gopro head harness setup is much more comfortable and solid.  This ended up being a really good showing of the experience of sailing the boat and how I have everything set up now.  Got a little work to do on the leeboard control lines, but everything else is now working pretty well.

I do have a tiller extension set-up, but I find the rope system I was using to be really flexible for steering positions and easier to get out of the way when needed.  The extension is awkward behind me, and the ropes were great that way, and immune to position or elevation.  Mainsheet is in it's final configuration for sure.

I have 5 more parts to this.  they're each 4 gigs, so they'll come in installments.  Just sailing, very little talking.  Just the occasional outburst by some old bastard in the boat he built.