Music in the Air!
The speakers are installed and life is wonderful! Sound is great! The only thing left to do is get the wires out of the way.
Paul ran the wire aft in the engine compartment, I assume, to avoid the heat of the engine.
Jodi came by with me and tied up the wires. She then saw that the wires on the other side, from the gauges, were just inside the engine compartment, so she put the speaker wires there as well. She then noticed that the other wires were running in a groove just inside the molding, so she removed the molding and did the same with the speaker wires
Now the wirs are out of the way and the sound is great!
Wednesday Night Races
Cock Island is coming up soon, and I want to be ready for it. I’d rather not be as nervous about getting the boat hurt as I was last year. So I’ve signed up for the Wednesday night races on the York River.
I don’t know how common those are elsewhere. But this area has at least 2 series of this type: one on the York River, and one near the mouth of the bay. They’re fairly short courses, and held each Wednesday night.
We started on the last race of the Spring series. My crew were Dew-Man, Betty, Paul and Grant. We left the dock about 5:30, in what looked like possible storms. We headed towards R-24, the starting point of the race. As we did, there was chatter on the radio, discussions about whether the race should be cancelled. It was decided ‘no’. But the start time was adjusted, and we missed when it was going to be. We were near the start line (which changed once because the wind had shifted), but got off about 3 minutes late, I’m guessing.
Smoothly on our way, but not knowing what the course would be, we followed the other boats. Not hard, since the group that started after us mostly passed us like we were standing still. 😉
We made our first tack. So far so good. Second tack, and the boat spun around. Not sure what I did. Oversteered? Well, took it all the way around and continued on our way, a bit more behind the pack than before. Next tack went smoothly. The one after that, a full 360 degrees. See a pattern here? Yeah, tacks to starboard were not going well. :'(
Made it around the mark after the rest of the fleet, and ran into the dead wind that everyone else had. The storm was looming at that point, so Dew put on his foul weather gear. I turned the helm over to him, donned my own, then started passing out jackets. Rather than heading towards our mark, Dew headed the boat towards the opposite shore, picking up a nice wind. When we tacked after that, we were flying! 7, 8 mph and the boat at bout 30 degrees tilt.
We crossed the finish line in just under 2 hours. Everyone else was gone, so no one got our time, and we were marked as ‘Did Not Finsh’. Too bad I didn’t record our finish time – could have mailed it in. But ah well! It was just a practice anyway!
[Top]Sewing the Sail
The UV cloth on my head sail had been coming loose for quite awhile now. And, after our recent storm event, it was looking pretty raggedy as well. I emailed a couple of places for bids on getting it repaired. Right around $500. Ouch! Well, that was including new fabric as well.
So, just before heading out of town, I pulled the sail down. As I did, it appeared that the fabric was not in as bad a shape as I thought. And it was just the one edge that was loose. So I figured I could sew it myself.
I have a wonderful Brothers sewing machine. That thing can sew through leather, according to the guy who sold it to me. I don’t know about that. I do know that he took a piece of denim, folded it in half, and sewed a seam on it. He then took that, doubled it again, and sewed it again. He repeated the process a couple more times and the machine never balked.
I’ve also sewn quilts with it. My quilts are made with denim and broadcloth, and the seams on those can get quite thick. Again, no problems.
So, rather than put out $500 on what looked to be a simple zigzag seam, I took it home and did it myself.
The machine didn’t like it. The zig wouldn’t. Just the zag held. So I sewed a straight seam in it. That did work pretty well.
But I am a bit worried about it. If you’ve ever felt the cloth on a sail, it feels like it’s permeated with plastic. So, did I just create a perforation that will make it easier to tear? Usually when one uses a zigzag stitch, it’s to allow the seam to ‘give’. Did I just create a seam that’s just going to tear more easily? Only time will tell.
Next problem: the foot was floppy. It would wave at me in the wind. After seeing the UV strip, I assumed that sewing the seams would fix that as well, since I thought I might just be witnessing that fabric flapping. That wasn’t the case. The foot is still loose. So I still may need to take this sail in for repairs.
[Top]Holes in the Boat, Parte Deux
Well, I finally did it. I decided the music was important enough to me that I went ahead and put holes between the cabin and the cockpit so I could have tunes when sailing.
So, I picked up a small saw, my drill, and some screws. I already had the wire I needed and a mounting frame(?). And I set to work.
The place I wanted to put it was lined with wood I was trying to miss on the inside, so I measured carefully to make sure they went in the proper place.
Somehow, over the months I’d had the speakers, I lost the pattern that was included. So I created my own.
I drew the holes and measured again:
I drilled a couple of sample holes, just to make sure I’d gotten it right. And I still seemed to have messed it up, since one of the holes ended up in the wood.
I used the drill to create a ring of holes around the ring, as I’d read in a book recently. Then I used the saw I’d purchased to connected them and finish the job. But the saw broke after getting only 1/4 way around one of the holes. So I finished it up by using the drill to connect the dots.
I finished it up, then put epoxy in to seal the wood and fiberglass against water damage.
Notice how thick it is? That really surprised me!
[Top]Maybe it was an Omen
… that I put the link in about the learn to sail in gusts link. That’s just what happened yesterday.
The weather was perfect for sailing! Breeze was nice. It was a little on the cool side, but not enough to be uncomfortable. We’d been out a couple of hours and were just about to turn back to the docks when BAM! A gust came and knocked us over about 35 degrees. Not much, if you’re a racer, I know – I’ve been at bigger tilts when racing. But this came out of nowhere! Everything inside the boat that wasn’t locked down went from port to starboard. The boat spun til it was facing a windward direction, then stayed pretty stationary. It was still rocking in the wind, but not quite that bad.
I first tried to pull down the mainsail. I got it partway down and it stuck. I couldn’t at the time figure out what was wrong. Debbie, my one passenger, I told to try to bring the jib in. It’s on a roller furler, so I showed her how to haul it in. But the wind was too strong and she couldn’t do it.
I finally got the mainsail reefed in (still couldn’t get it all the way down), and started the motor. I turned the boat slightly off the headwind, since directly in took us into a crabpot minefield. Debbie took over at the helm. I pulled in the jib, then took over the helm and headed back into port.
We were on a broad reach heading back in. With the main reefed, and the engine on minimal, we were still doing about 6.5 knots. The waves were coming in parallel to us, and growing.
Yeah, the waves. There were ripples on the water most of the time we were out. There were still ripples when this storm hit us. By the time we neared Wormley Creek (home), the waves were about 2 foot high.
Wormley Creek is sheltered. In fact, you really can’t tell what the weather will be like on the York River sitting there at the docks. In this case, it was a good thing. I knew, when I brought the boat in, I could take care of whatever I couldn’t in that weather.
When we got in, I saw that the main halyard had wrapped itself around the spreader. That’s why I couldn’t take it down. First lesson – follow the entire line when trying to figure out why it won’t move. That’s no saying that I could have gotten it unwrapped out there. That would have required holding the line tighter as I tried to bring down the sail. But at least I would have known why it wasn’t moving.
Second lesson? Well, I’m going to hope some more knowledgeable sailors can tell me how I could have predicted this, or was it a fluke?
Weather report – land: 5 – 10 mph winds; marine: 10 – 15 knots, with gusts of 20 late in the afternoon in the bay. Sky: partly cloudy when we headed out. Overcast most of the sail. But the sky was a light, even color, almost as if we were staring up at fog. No dark spots – no dark spots ever. That I would have known was a storm heading our way. And, as I mentioned, the waves didn’t pick up until after the winds had started getting strong.
The online buoy report doesn’t work for that part of the river. The only report I can get is from the buoy closer to the mouth of the bay. The weather report I get for that portion of the bay tends to be less favorable than I find conditions on the river, although I won’t venture out if the words small craft advisory appear.
And the whole time, I kept repeating my mantra: sailboats are stable, sailboats are stable. I have 4 tons under me and it will take alot to tip it over.
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