Last weekend sail.

Two weeks ago was our last weekend sail.  We spent the day taking Carol's Dad and brother out for a sail and then spent the night on the boat.  While it was a bit chilly, we had a ceramic space heater on board.  And we were rewarded w/ a spectacular sunset.

SANDY

A hurricane making landfall this far north the end of OCT?  What's up w/ THAT!?
Since the yard was fully scheduled to haul boats all weekend I trussed up Dianthus like a spiderweb and hoped for the best.  The marina is very well protected and is well back in the creek so I wasn't too worried.  Doubled up lines, added two more spring lines and adjusted them all until I was satisfied she'd be okay.
Monday night as the wind speed rose and the rain came down in sheets I was sorely tempted to drive over to the marina after work but figured I was just asking for trouble and there wasn't really much I could do.  Tuesday morning though I drove over and got there about an hour after high tide.  The docks were completely covered w/ water to a depth of about 10 inches but it was receding.  All the boats appeared to have come through completely unscathed.

Race #3    My first single handed race! 

The Harbor Cup starts down by the Baltimore Light at the mouth of the Magothy and finishes by Fells Point, just past Ft. McHenry.  I didn't have any crew and was planning on going sailing anyway, so I signed up for the Non Spinnaker division.  Trimming sails while steering does NOT make for a fast boat.  While it was a little bit like being a one-armed paper hanger, the worst part was once I turned up the Patapsco and was off the wind, I could have used a larger headsail.  Beating up the Bay I had the 110 up, but really could have used the #2 or even the #1 in the river.  I could have changed the sail but that would have necessitated using the autopilot and since this wasn't an official singlehanded  race I wasn't sure it would be legal.  So I slogged on using what I had.  While there were just two of us in the NS class and I finished second, (IE last!) I was encouraged by the fact that I corrected out just 2min, 21 sec behind the other boat.  They were fully crewed!  Had I had even one other person I think I could have taken them.  I coulda been a contenda.

RACE #2

The Constellation Cup is a fundraiser for the ships in Baltimore's Inner Harbor, namely the USS Constellation. I've done it the past 3 years on my buddy's boat and it has blown like stink each year.
This year was different.  Forecast was for 5 kts all week but Saturday morning dawned bright and sunny and a FX of 10-15!  We had a couple that Carol knew through work on board that were not sailors, Thad again, and a ringer in the person of Rob who I knew from racing on Widowmaker as well as him being a previous Wharf Rat crew.  We did fairly well finishing 6th out of 16 in the Fin Keel Class.  The best part was crossing tacks w/ my pals on Caribbean Magic (a C/C 44) and actually keeping up w/ them!  Of course we tied up on the dock next to the Constellation for the post race party.

Taking stuff apart on a boat PART II

Concurrent w/ the deck sheave project I wanted to remove the fuel tank for cleaning.  A few weeks earlier while on our way back from Baltimore the engine completely quit.  Would not start.  I had time for just a cursory inspection of the engine and since the Racor filter was clean I had my mechanic take a look and he found the fuel pickup was completely clogged.  Rather than tempt fate w/ losing the engine at a most inopportune time I decided to remove the tank now rather than over the winter and have it cleaned.  First up, draining the 8 or 9 gallons of diesel.  My friends Gary and Greg loaned me there hand pump and provided moral support.  Then came getting the screws out that held the brace on top of the tank in place.  Two came out w/ minimal cursing and sweating.  Two wouldn't budge.  After much grunting by Gary and myself, heating w/ a torch, and using an array of screwdrivers, vise grips and other assorted tools w/ got the last screw out.  I also wisely took a picture of the wiring on top of the tank to the sending unit and grounding tab.  Shine a light in the tank an there is gelled GUNK on the walls and pickups.  No wonder I had problems.

Of course the place that I wanted to take the tank was only open M-F so I had to drive to Glen Burnie on a Mon morning and back again that Thur after work to pick up the tank.  Get it home and shine a light in and the sides still have fine grit and stuff on them.  Oh, and they put a "cap" on the bottom of the tank as it was pitted.  Made the tank sit just a bit higher in the boat meaning it BARELY fit.  
Call the shop.  They'll clean it again while I wait, but this means another whole week to get the tank to them and then installed.  Okay, whatever.
They do a nice job this time, I race off to the boat, put the tank back in, go to wire it and.... I forgot my camera w/ the picture of the wiring.  While I'm SURE I know how it goes, I don't want to screw up, so on to other projects until I can call Carol to look at the pic and tell me what goes where.  (That is a whole other story telling her how to work the camera!)  Then on to hooking up the fuel fill hose, vent and supply/return lines.

The good thing in all this is after putting 15 gal. of diesel in the tank it only took a few minutes of priming the racor to get flow.  Fired up the Volvo and VOILA!   Ah, success!

Taking stuff apart on a boat. PART I

Nothing on a boat is easy.  You might think it is and it may even appear to be straightforward but that is just anti-karma setting the hook in you.  Take my deck organizers for instance.  A wire to rope halyard had worn one of the sheaves out and several others were worn and had the edges broken.  Okay, so I call up my new favorite marine supply company, Holland Marine Parts in Ontario, CAN  and order some sheaves. Or so I thought.  They were out of stock; didn't know when they would get some.  Okay, back to more important issues.   (see the post below about my transducer leak)  A few weeks went by and not having anything important to do while on a break at work, I called again.  This time they found there were some in Canada (eh!) and I ordered 12 of them.

Cool.  So last week I decided to go ahead and swap the sheaves on the forward organizers.  Easy, right?  WRONG. Oh, the bolts came out pretty easily enough. But then I realized that they were through bolted and the nuts/washers were up in the headliner, not bolted into a tapped plate set in the cabin top.  So let's take the headliner down.  Oh, but first we have to remove the teak trip around the small hatches in the main cabin.  The finish on them was pretty worn so at least I can either refinish them or replace completely.  Of course the center of the headliner is underneath the trim around the companionway hatch; no WAY am I taking that down.  So, after enlisting my buddy Ron to help w/ the job I carefully pulled down on the edge of the plywood liner and squeezed my arm in w/ a ratchet to fasten the washer and nut whilst Ron applied pressure to the screw from above.  Then came the fun of putting it all back together.  But at least I know how to do this and what is accessible from where.

DIANTHUS? Why?

So by now you're wondering, why in the hell is their boat named DIANTHUS?  And maybe you're wondering what the hell is a Dianthus?  Answers below!

Well, when Carol and I first started dating, or whatever it was we were doing, she bought a house in October 2006 and I stopped by and left a pumpkin and a Dianthus plant for her.  She planted it in her flower bed and in the spring, lo and behold she had more Dianthus.  We dated for over a year and then "took a break" to borrow a phrase from FRIENDS.   That lasted about 3 months or so and then we started going out again.  The plant came back again in the spring (2008).  And the next year (2009) it came back also. So we were outside walking around and she said "look, it came back again", I said, "yeah, I thought they were supposed to be an annual".  Carol replied with her usual quirky sense of humor, "yeah, I was supposed to be an annual too!"   I couldn't help but crack up over her sense of humor about me dumping her.  (although she says she broke up w/ me.)  We've since figured out the plant just re-seeded itself since it was the annual type although there are also perennial species.

Now, when naming a boat you have to really think about how the name sounds and looks.  It has to be easy to say, easily understood on the radio (think Maydays to the Coast Guard!) easy to pronounce and not be cutesy or some stupid play on words.  Think anything w/ the word "SEA" or "C" in the name.  Usually powerboaters do this.  I also didn't want something that might be a little too risque; maybe if it was purely a race boat, but not for a boat we'd be cruising on.

I had always liked the idea of using DIANTHUS but wasn't completely sold on the name.  It was on the short list though and one day I got to wondering if there was ever a Navy ship named Dianthus.  Well, our good friend "the GOOGLE" *  answered that right away.  Turns out there was a USS DIANTHUS, SP639, for Section Patrol boat.  During WWI,  also known as The Great War, the US Navy took over private yachts and used them to patrol the coastal waters to defend against German U-boats.  Dianthus was a private motor yacht used for 1 year and then returned to its owner after peace broke out.  What was interesting is she was designed and built by Nathaniel Herreshoff in Bristol, RI which is where we bought our boat.  I figured that was as good a sign as any that DIANTHUS should be the name.

Oh, and here is a picture of some Dianthus from my flowerbed.  They come in over 300 species of various colors; pink, red and variegated being the most common.  Also known as Sweet William.

* Gotta love "W"isms!

Photo courtesy of SPINSHEET mag.

Our first real race.   CRAB is the Chesapeake Region Accessible Boating organization.  They have a regatta every August as a fundraiser.  (the real money comes from the party afterwards!)  So last Friday night after my son's football game (they won 52-7) I came home, packed up the car and Carol and I drove to the boat.  We got up early Sat morning and sailed down to Annapolis where we met Doug who crewed for us on the delivery back in May, and Thad, Carol's brother in law.  Heading out to the race area at Red #2 at the mouth of the Severn River it was getting quite blustery so we took a reef in the main and sailed around waiting for our start time.  This race used a pursuit style start so your start time was based on your handicap.
We nailed the start and made good speed to the first mark, rounded, shook out the reef and picked off a few more boats.  Rounding the second mark for the beat back to the finish it would have been nice to have taken a reef but...  Anyway,  we just could not get past this one boat on the upwind leg and I really wanted to come down a bit but they were in the way.  Finally I decided to duck them and take a chance w/ getting their bad air.  Just then they got hit by a gust and had to head up as we were easing our sails and ducking beneath them.  Perfect timing!  We shot by and in the process ensured that a few boats to windward of us weren't going to catch us.   Finished 10th out of 29 boats in our class.  Not bad for tired, old cruising sails and needing another 2 or 3 guys on the rail.  Party was okay, but it was raining and blowing 20 + knots. 
We waited out the weather and since the forecast for Sunday was even worse, we left Naptown at 8:15pm and motored to the Bay Bridge, right into the wind, then hoisted a reefed main and motorsailed the rest of the way. 
Sorta.  At the mouth of the Patapsco the engine decided to take a snooze, so we sailed up the river and in to Rock Creek.  Fortunately the wind was ENE and we made it most of the way in.  I fired up the engine as we dropped the main and we were about 150 yds from the slip when the engine quit again.  We drifted and as we slowed down I started rocking the boat like it was a dinghy and that was enough to coast into the slip!  Tied up the boat and looked at my watch; 1159pm  just as predicted.  
At 5am I was wakened by TORRENTIAL rain on the boat.  Good thing we came home the night before.

Still haven't figured out what the issue is w/ the engine but it seems to be fuel starvation. 
In the meantime I decided to change the sheaves on the deck organizers.  Thinking they were bolted into tapped backing plates I took the bolts out.  Nope, they went to washers and nuts up under the head liner.  Now I had to take the head liner down.  Nothing is ever easy on a boat.

Early June, sailing up to Ft McHenry singlehanded.  9 knots apparent wind and 6.5 knots boat speed w/ just a 110% jib and a cruising main sail!

Water, water, everywhere...

Water, great for sailing but not so great when it's inside your boat.  Shortly after arriving at Oak Harbor I kept finding water in the bilge.  Unexplained.  I could not figure out where it was coming from and then it stopped.  My bilge was bone dry for weeks.  Then it came back.  And we're not talking a few cups or even a gallon or two.  We're talking LOTS of water.  Searching through the boat found every accessible part of the hull absolutely dry.  So that meant the water was coming in the boat somewhere under the liner.  Liners; Satan's contribution to boatbuilding.  Easier for the builder and cheaper too, but a total pain in the arse for running cable, plumbing and oh yeah, finding leaks.
After searching to no avail and realizing the leak seemed to be getting worse I arranged for a short haul to inspect the hull.  Unfortunately the yard put the strap a little too far forward and crushed my knotmeter paddlewheel and we couldn't find the leak.  Good news was the hull didn't have any damage.
Here's where it gets interesting.  When they dropped me back in the water I pulled the paddlewheel to put the dummy plug in and I couldn't get it to seal and now I had water seeping into the pan or inner liner.  Damn.  And the original leak was really gushing water in now as evidenced by the bilge pump running every 7-8 minutes.   JB, the yard manager came down w/ some grease to put on the O rings to see if that would seal the plug better.  I couldn't tighten the nut so I told JB to try.  He immediately realized the entire bloody through-hull was turning!  Needless to say we hauled the boat again the next day.
Seems the actual through-hull was not sealed to the hull and the strap that covered it when we hauled the boat the day before kept us from seeing that fact.  To further complicate things the hole for the through-hull was located right where the liner started to separate from the inside of the hull.  There was just the slightest gap on one side of the hole and this allowed water to spray inside the hull but under the liner.  There was no way to see this w/o removing the fitting.  Good news is everything is fine and fixed and best of all the bilge is DRY!

Oh, and I have been getting a little bit of sailing in.  In fact, for the FIRST TIME EVER, my father went sailing w/ me and some buddies early in July.  Hard to believe but in 38 years of sailing we've never been on a sailboat together together.

DIANTHUS is home in her slip on Rock Creek, just off the Patapsco River.  Months of planning, 2 trips to RI to work on the boat, uncounted phone calls and lots of finger crossing were involved.  While the boat was in really good condition, the fact was it had sat on the hard for a year and a half.  Things were untested, I had never actually sailed the boat and of course "issues" did rear their ugly little head.  Oh, and let's not forget that planning on doing a 3 day delivery when you pick the date 2 months in advance is like throwing the dice that the weather will cooperate!  Throw in the fact that the yard had a mechanical breakdown and lost 3 days of launching boats the week prior and you have the makings of a nightmare.

So, Wed, May 16th,  Carol (the Admiral) myself and a friend Doug flew up to Providence on SWA courtesy of my credit card points.  I got the card last fall because I knew I'd be going to Providence a lot; despite my dislike of annual fees I have made up the $69 fee 10 times by using the points to fund my travel.  But I digress.  It was gray and rainy but forecast to improve.  By the time we took a taxi to Bristol and got settled on the boat  it was already clearing out.  We set about organizing "stuff", had a crew briefing, and readied the boat for sailing.  The yard had put the cutless bearing in the day before (THAT is a whole other story) and about 4pm the trailer came to move the boat to the dock where the Travellift would splash her.
Exciting as it was to put her in the water, that was quickly tempered by the fact that water was just GUSHING in through the packing gland.  We pulled her back up in the slings, a yard worker came on w/ some big pipe wrenches to tweak the nuts and we were good to go. 

I won't bore you w/ all the details of getting ready to go but suffice it to say that the next morning was HECTIC, made more  so by the fact I couldn't get the instruments to come on, the electrician was coming by to tweak some stuff and we had to finish provisioning.  (Finally figured out that not only must I turn on the instrument breaker, but the log counter on the electrical panel also.  And that is where the rheostat for the lighting is too.)

Next up, Sailing!