i be sailing

14 August 2006

went on the water again yesterday, same place.

Checked the pag-asa weather report that morning, and there was a gale warning out on the visayas and southern luzon. so I said to myself, this should be interesting.

Sailing partner this time was Andrew. We got there a little after 12pm and the wind over the water was… nothing like it was last week, very windy, white caps everywhere and fairly choppy also, with a mild rain shower.

Out at the area of TLYC there was something like 8 hobies on the water, racing I think.

so we assembled the boat and brought it near the water and rigged it up. then we had lunch (curry again). then we were ready to go. Andrew was at the helm when we shoved off, but he immediately got tangled up in the lines (my fault, for leaving them all over the place) and forgot to mind the tiller while he was untangling himself and we were blown back to shore and ran aground. When I heard felt dagger board scraping the bottom, i immediately jumped off, with my weight off the boat, the balanced was screwed and sure enough with the tangled sheet and strong winds, we capsized or better yet, andrew capsized . our first! woohoo! atleast the we found out andrew’s pfd worked

Most people I knew would’ve given up with fear at this point, but since both of us were known for having more guts than sense, we immediately righted the boat and bailed out the water and made sure the lines were out of the way. and gave it another go.

this time I was at the helm and kalbo was sheet guy. since both of us were very novice sailors, we were pretty much just messing about the whole time and eager to try out different points of sail. with the wind conditions plus the chop, it was pretty hairy most of the time, and we tried to be conservative with the trim, trying to minimize heel as much as possible after our first capsize experience. in summary, being out there in those conditions for me was a mixture of excitement and fear. mostly fear.

at the start, every time we switched tacks was like venturing into the unknown, but we eventually got the hang of it. but we both still need to work on the weight shifting thing. We were out on the water for around 30 to 45 minutes, when we felt the urge to go back, it was a straight run back to club lake, we knew something was up when the traveller line popped out during the run, good thing andrew had a good handle on the sheet. I then told andrew to hand me the sheet and pull out the dagger board. while he was doing that I felt the line tension was increasing. The wind was picking up! andrew was able to pull out the board just in time, then next thing I knew we hit land and I forgot to uncleat the rudder downhaul argh! so that scraped the bottom . so we unrigged, while we were doing that, the wind kept picking up, enough to get the coconut trees swaying, and we were very lucky that we didn’t get caught out on the water in that. After a very tense sail it felt great to be back on land.

we rested for a little more than an hour and had some left over curry. the wind started to die down little after 4pm and the sun was starting peek out of the clouds as well. of course we had to have another go.

the second time out was the exact opposite from the first one, it was a fairly relaxed sail, we didn’t even have to shift around as much. and we were able to experiment on different points of sail, and on one jibe I was able to find out how hard my boom was (ouch), good thing I was wearing a cap. other than that, it was pretty uneventful.

andrew had a hard time pulling out the daggerboard this time and it ran around again, I had to stand in the boat to pull it out. I think I might have to sand down all of the paint off it, so it fits better, as it had a great fit before we painted it. that or make the hole or the trunk bigger.

all in all it was a great day. our first time out was pretty much a baptism of fire, comparable to that of your first time on a roller coaster. but the second time out did more than make up for it.

next time, I think I need to go out with someone with more sailing experience than i do, any volunteers?

5 August 2006

A boat building buddy, Bob was nice enough to convice his first mate Lea to make a polytarp sail for me. and we were able to get it fitted on the boat around the first week of august.

My usual boating partner (Andrew) was out of commision due a very late night of DJ work. so I managed to find another willing victim to come along, long time friend Mon-mon.

I picked up Mon at festival mall at 8:30. the sun was shining, slightly cloudy, with a little breeze. the trip on the expressway was uneventful and fairly fast moving. and the sun was still out, after turning into Calamba on the way to Batangas, traffic was practically at a standstill. this went on until about a kilometer before star tollway.

Star toll was it’s usuall traffic free self but the breeze was starting to die, but the sun was still shining. 5 minutes after entering the town of talisay and rounding off on of those road cuves, it suddenlly went dark. all I can say was oh F%@#! then it started to rain… really hard. aleast there was breeze… well, more lake gale force winds.

So we got to club lake and it was still raining. Gil was there with a few friends and was mildly surprised to see us. So we waited around for the rain to stop and we waited, then we decided to have lunch. lunch was curried garbanzo beans with pork and 4 bananas. After lunch the rain slowed to a trickle and we were able to bring the boat to the water and started to rig it up with the new sail. this is when i found out I forgot to bring the battens. What me worry? rig on.

by the time we were done with the rigging, the rain had stopped, but there was no wind. the water was glassy as f%&^. so we sculled out, hoping conditions would improve. In a way it did, a very very light breeze blew in was able to move us at a leach’s pace. so we lit a couple of cigarettes and streered with the smoke.

I noticed wind line starting in the middle of the lake and went for it, sure enough we picked up speed. nothing exciting, our weight was still distributed port and starboard and we were barely heeling, but fast enough to get mon excited. it was his first time out. Mon wanted to go to volcano island, who am i to say no, though I knew we can’t possibly make it in these conditions, so we went for it. then my phone rang. so I handed the sheet to mon got my phone from the glove compartment  It was Arvin, asking where I was, told him I was on the water and told him all we had was drifting conditions. He wasn’t surprised I could still use my phone. He said he might be able to pass by on his way to Batangas. I thought we had enough wind to keep on sailing and be able to get back in time for Arvin’s arrival. When we did decide to turn back, the wind died again.

So we broke out the paddle and I told mon to start paddling while I sculled with the rudder. Still no wind, and sure enough Arvin called. we were still way too far from the club lake. He would’ve taken our only picture for the day, but I doubt if he had a 1000 mm telephoto lens to be able to snap us that far out. so bye Arvin, til next time.

On the way back I was kinda hoping it would rain so the wind would start to pick up. and then it did. rain that is, but there was still no wind. What a f@*$%g freak of nature! one of the few times in my life actually that I think i’ve seen it rain during typhoon season and there was no wind at all. The water was dead calm. and we were wet.

so paddle on we went. sure enough when we were almost at club lake, the rain stopped. I was able to crack the daggerboard handle trying to pull it out of its trunk. easy fix 

so finally back on land, we had some merienda and a couple of cigarettes and recounted our encounters with dead fish out in the lake. it was around 4pm then it started to get dark again, so we packed up the gear and the boat. And sure enough it rained and the winds were back, something like signal number 1.5. good thing we didn’t get caught out in the water in that.

then we took a shower and went home.

Our first Messabout

We were able to finish painting two days before the messabout, which was going to be on a Saturday. And on Friday we were cramming to get all the fittings installed, we were able to finish most of the work and loaded the boat into David’s L300 at around 2 a.m. Just in time to get some sleep for the next day. Amazing how we were able to finish the boat just in time.

The week while Andrew was painting he was actually having doubts weather the boat will fit inside the L300 or not. His doubts were laid to rest after I measured the cab and found around two inches to spare from the backrest to backrest. Perfect fit!

We arrived at Club Lake in Talisay, Batangas at around 9:30, Mario was already there after having rented a topper sailing dinghy from the Taal lake yacht club. Arriving a little before us were Rolly and his 25 year old "red boat" and Louis with his unfinished but ready to float Corsair 13. Also there was Lester with his planing speedboat called "The Fugitive".

After everyone got their boats in the water, we decided to try out rowing first.  The oars I had made were a little on the heavy side, but it still rowed pretty well, even with three full grown men on board. Rowing solo, it was flying.

Since I didn’t have sails ready yet. Arvin was nice enough to bring the sail of 12′ Snark Sunchaser II and were eventually able to Jury rig my mast to take it. Arvin said I had a truly composite mast now,as we used a 3′ bamboo pole to extend my aluminum mast to take the snark sail. 

I christened the boat "Ceol Beag" which is Gaelic for "Light Music". It’s what i played on my pipes to pay for the boat anyways, so fitting enough to name the boat with a piping related term.

Taking the Ceol Beag out on it’s maiden sail were Mario, Arvin and Me. I was originally supposed to be just a passenger,but I was handed the helm around 5 minutes after we cast off. Even with three full grown men on board and one of them weighing almost like two people, we were moving fairly fast in light to moderate winds. I can only imagine how well she’ll fly with less live ballast on board. Rolly, Lester and Louis were aboard Rolly’s red boat. They set off a little earlier than we did and we were able to catch up to them in no time. Sailing close hauled into the wind, mast started to give at the joint and we had to turn back. Bitin na bitin!

The mast gave way the weak point indicated on the pic left. There wasn’t supposed to be joint there, but we had to put one in since we couldn’t find the right sized aluminum tubing to fit the mast collar and we couldn’t enlarge to the hole in the mast collar anymore. The two aluminum pipes were joined by a smaller diameter aluminum tube, but the outside wall of that tube was way to thin to handle the stress. I’ve since found a thicker walled aluminum pipe as a replacement. Hopefully it will hold up better.

Despite the short sail, Arvin and Mario were very impressed with the Spindrift’s sailing performance. According to Mario, the comfortable helmsman position was likened to that of a larger pleasure sailers, he also said that;

"Under the right wind conditions, it should be a serious contender to the other sport boats in its size class. Most impressive its hull design. Although it looks atypical of other dinghies, they seem to have got something right which is not evident to us non-naval architects."

and this is what Arvin said;

"The boat felt lively, but also gave the crew confidence with buoyancy and stability. It didn’t feel like we were going to have water in the rails when we went through gusts. It also had quite a bit of buoyancy at the bow, because even when Piper was sitting in front, the bow didn’t submarine like I imagined it would"

You can only imagine my elation in hearing these comments, especially from   seasoned sailors like Arvin and Mario, and I was beaming with pride for our little summer project. I can’t wait to get her out sailing once again.

We were also able to strap on a motor on to Ceol Beag, courtesy also of Arvin. The motor was a 4hp Evenrude. with 3 people on board it moved alright, Arvin said is wasn’t quite hull speed but it was fast enough.

Red Boat Capsize

The most unforgettable moment of the messabout was the capsize of Rolly’s boat. As we were forced to turn back because of the bent mast, Rolly, Louis and Lester sailed on alone in Rolly’s red boat. Story has it that they were really flying when a sudden gust hit while first time sailor Louis was at the helm and causing a capsize. They where able to right the boat, but couldn’t get the water out of it. Rolly’s wife Marte noticed that the red boat’s white sail couldn’t be seen anymore and promptly initiated a rescue, Rescue boat was Louis’s Corsair with Arvin’s motor. The red boat was towed to shore almost completely submerged and all of the crew and the rescue party on the Corsair, which took the load quite well.

Buoyancy Test

Soon after lunch, Arvin wanted to do a buoyancy test on the Spindrift, too bad we weren’t able to take pictures of the event as even I was elated on how well she passed the test with flying colors. First we completely swamped the boat with water, even while full there was still plenty of free-board, we then put four people in her, and she still had showed some sheer, then two more. It was then that she was completely underwater, but still she didn’t touch bottom. So the floatation compartments worked pretty well.

After the the buoyancy test, I checked the compartments and all of them had water in them but only around two cups per compartment so the seals held up pretty well. We then did a capsize test (without the mast) from turned turtle position. She turned over pretty quick and when she righted there was less than 2 inches of water inside, even senior boat builder Rolly was surprised.

Almost Trip to Volcano Island

The next day, I was able to take the family out on the boat with the motor, and we were able to get around a hundred meters from the shore when the motor conked out. I tried to restart it again to no avail, so we had to paddle back. But Cholo had a great time nonetheless

After our short motor trip, I put the oarlocks back on and went to try out some solo rowing. Then it started to rain.

After the short rain spell, Andrew and I put the motor back on to see if he might have better luck, and he did. We found out that I put the gas line in the wrong direction. Dumbass!

Having the motor up and running again, Andrew then said "Volcano?" and I said "Let’s go!" and off we went, the way there was pretty uneventful as we were following the direction of the current. However, the sun was starting to peak out from the clouds and Andrew’s pasty complexion is not really made to take prolonged UV. After motoring for about 30 minutes and about 3/4ths of the way to Volcano Island, we suddenly realized that we forgot to inform anybody where we were going and promptly turned back. motoring against the current, the boat was pounding. So we decided to take a perpendicular course from the current and go the scenic route.

As expected, we weren’t missed. so we packed up and went home. Wondering when our next time out on the water will be.

OK, now time for paint.

Since we’re  painting and the rainy season was hinting to start. We strung up some tarp above the carport. Andrew started with painting the small bits like the cb, center seat and, and cb plug. This is when he found out that the smell of epoxy paint can be unbearable. So he had to stop until he was able to get a proper respirator. That wasn’t a problem as he’s in the business of selling safety equipment anyways. So the next day we were able to resume with no problems.

We went with white primer on the inside and gray primer on the outside.  Painting is Andrew’s specialty so all I had to do was stand back and watch and mix paint and clean the brushes. We were expecting that one liter of each kind of paint will do. But we ended up using up 2 liters of primer, 3 liters of white top coat and 2 liters of blue topcoat.

Pretty no?

After seats were fitted we were able to install the centerboard trunk. Andrew  left this task for last, as he wasn’t really looking forward to it. I suppose for new boat builders like us, putting a hole in the middle of a perfectly good hull goes against human nature.

It wasn’t as hard as we thought, but it was a three night job to finish the cb trunk. after cutting the hole, we filed down the sides of the hole to get the cb to fit. Then the cb trunk was dry fitted and trimmed to fit, then filleted and glassed into place. I also reinforced the trunk sides with fg to give it extra strength.

While Andrew was messing around with the cb trunk, I took this time to clean up the messy epoxy work I did on the aft side. A lot of the clean up was done manually with a wooden block and 80 grit sand paper as the misus said I had to cut down on power tool use in the evenings as the neighbors were complaining. I also glassed the whole centerboard to give it strength and abrasion resistance. In event’s of capsize the centerboard is used for leverage get the boat back up on its feet, so it needs to be extra strong for this purpose.

Soon as a the trunk was done we were finally able to join the two hulls together after what seemed to be a really long time. While they were one, I trimmed the tops of the gunwales flush with the hull sides and we also tried out the cb fit. Andrew wanted to see how the it would be like inside the boat and test the strength of the seat tops. so despite my protests he went ahead and sat inside the boat. We must’ve done something right as the boat was pretty solid. It also gave us a better idea on how big the boat is with someone in it.

The next day we installed mast step and construction was finally complete. Next was paint. I got one litter of each of the following, white primer, gray primer, epoxy enamel white and epoxy enamel marine blue. I got the paint from Cord Chemicals.

All the seats are almost done, seat tops for the aft seats have been fixed and holes for the hatches cut. front seats and bow seat have also been glued on. seat tops for the front side seats have to wait until glass on nesting bulkhead is faired and hole for the nesting bolts re-drilled.

Finished glassing the aft side of the hull and two weeks ago I started filling in the weave of the glass on the hull with pioneer marine epoxy, it’s pretty hard work trying to apply the thick stuff and work it into the weave and leave a clean finish. and it was trial and error for a while. until (on advice from Rolly) I decided to just leave it a little rough and then sand it down later. 

Andrew made a great looking center board also, what we particularly liked was the foil shape. All the shaping was done with a chisel, the belt sander and the palm sander.  That dagger board piece has since been glassed and the weave filled in and ready to be fitted into it’s cb trunk.

We hope to get the cb trunk done within the week. as that’s pretty much the last major bit of construction for the hull, we can get on with the detailing bits next week. and the off-hull pieces like the rudder and mast and hopefully get some paint on the week after. In time for the messabout on June 24 in Loch Taal.

Also went to binondo to shop for aluminum mast tubing, the specific spec and size of tubing I was looking for wasn’t available there or anywhere in country apparently, so I’d have to settle for 2" aluminum pipe for the bottom section and 2" and 1 3/4" aluminum tubing for the middle and top sections. While in binondo I also obtained some poly-tarp to be made into a sail. I’m also looking to scrounge up enough funds to get the sail made. a sail maker quoted PhP3,000 to make one from Dacron or poly-tarp. I’d have to supply the material though.

Was playing around the other day for a color scheme for the boat. Photoshop works well for this job.

It’s going to look something like this. Yes, the white stripe is going to be part of it.

Cool eh?!

Also played around with maroon with a yellow stripe but it looked too gay

As you can see from the grin on my face, I was having a real good time.

Fast Exit is the name of Arvin’s boat, a 33 foot X99 racing yacht from Denmark. Arvin is the Moderator and Administrator on of the Philippine Sailing Forums where I met other boat heads like myself.

We had a great sunset cruise. Rolly was also there, fresh from an eye operation a few hours before, as well as Andrew and David.

Arvin’s mainsail was under repair and we couldn’t use it but winds were good and we were able to set sail on only the #3 jib.

A few minutes after hoisting the sail Arvin handed me the helm, My first time ever piloting a boat, it was really cool! With only the jib up, everything was very much simplified and easy to understand. I actually didn’t want to give up the helm, but I eventually passed it over to David and Andrew after about an hour or two :P. All us especially us three newbies had a good time.

Managed to fix the disaster that happened with the "big cut". It was repaired rather well really. I cleaned up the bad cut, and covered the aft side (the clean side) of the nesting bulkhead with cellophane tape, then slopped a generous amount of putty on the "affected" area and re-joined the halves of the nesting bulkhead. The excess putty that was squeezed out was used to fair the outside seam. After the epoxy cured the two halves separated easily. and we ended with a nice clean patch up job.

The edge of the repair wasn’t quite flush with the rest of the nesting bulkhead so a little more putty was added. Here’s what it looks like after I glassed over the edge of the nesting bulkhead.

Next to do was install mast collar and and bow reinforcement block that it leaned on, it was a pretty straight forward job. we haven’t installed the cover yet since we are still going to cut a hole there for a deck plate. 

While Andrew was working on installing the aft seats I was busy glassing the front half of the boat. I was supposed to use plastic sheeting to make a nice smooth finish on the hull. But it was more trouble that it was worth and I decided to fore-go it.

The plans called for using 1/4 inch ply for the seats and installing stringers to support it. But we decided to use 1/2 inch ply and reduce the number of stringers instead. In the end we would probably have sturdier seats, a few grams heavier but i think the trade off  was worth it.

While working on the seats, Andrew discovered a few innovative new uses for them:

18 April - installing the keel

With all of the outside seams fully taped up. it was time to install the keel. Since the boat has a v-bottom, the keel had to be shaped to fit. Andrew did this with a chisel. Installing the keel involved drilling holes along the center line, and driving screws into the keel from the inside of the boat. Andrew thought that driving the screws into the keel without prior drilling would be easy, it wasn’t, and he ended up with a stigmata on his palm. about half way through the installation we decided to drill holes into the keel to ease labor.

i also started fairing the edges of the glass tape on the outside seams. it’s very labor intensive work, used sanding block in some places but used the palm sander did most of the work. Not really finished with the fairing when the sander broke again, this time the head came loose. took it back to the dealer to get it fixed but I’ll probably get a belt sander while I’m there. Me thinks the sander won’t be able to take any more of the abuse I’ve been giving it.

20 April - THE BIG CUT

This is the day we’ve been anticipating and dreading at the same time. It’s not really normal to cut a boat in half but for this boat it had to be done.

First step was to drill all the holes in the nesting bulkhead for the bolts that will hold the boat together. five in all, two each on the sides and one in the center. After the holes were drilled the bolts were then inserted.

Then it was time for the CUT. starting at the port sheer, it was a fairly easy job until you hit the cardboard pieces between the nesting bulkheads. I used two pieces of illustration board stuck together for this purpose and it was very tough stuff to cut through.

upon passing the the first chine we decide to flip the boat and cut from the  outside. The original plan was to cut until the keel then start cutting again on the starboard sheer without flipping the boat. upon hind sight this was actually the best way to cut it. but decided to do it another way. Which was a Big Mistake, read on…

After passing the keel, we decided to continue cutting on to the other side, eight inches after passing keel Andrew was having a harder time cutting through. First we thought we hit a tough piece of cardboard, but this wasn’t the case, the saw was starting to veer off course and cutting through the nesting bulkhead! the bad thing was, we actually thought the cut was going okay, until at the point of the starboard chine i noticed epoxy dust flying from the saw. this should have had alarm bells sounding as no epoxy was between the nesting bulkheads, somehow it didn’t. after a few more minutes of tense cutting Andrew then decided to cut upwards (as the boat was upside down) from the starboard sheer. the two cuts eventually met and the cut was done.  

The Horror!

The cut actually took 3 hours, a lot longer than we expected. and after laying the boat on the ground and removing the bolts that were holding the two halves together. We finally saw how far our cut went off course. everything from the port sheer to the keel was fine, and most of everything after that was a disaster. At the worst point, at the starboard chine, the saw was off by almost 3/4 of an inch. This meant that the cut went through the nesting bulkhead and the doubler and into fillets on the other side. So we have a big chunk the forward nesting bulkhead sawed off.

We had no one but our selves to blame for this, but a solution was eventually reached to rectify the problem. and Yes it mostly involves filler.

Here is Andrew’s take on the Matter.

The next few days (hours really) was spent on sulking and fixing the problem. Number of man-hours to get to this point: 99. 100 if you count the extra hour of blame storming after the cut.