Evanston: what I learned this weekend
Evanston: what I learned this weekend
Chicago was summer-like Saturday and we went sailing.
The forecast wind of 10 to 15 knots didn’t quite happen. We might have seen 10 or even 11 when GANNET’s SOG briefly touched 7.1, but most of the afternoon the wind was weaker and the little boat moved at around 6 knots.
When we headed back in the wind went soft and about ⅔ of a mile off the breakwater disappeared completely, so we Torqeedoed the rest of the way. With the security of a recently purchased second Torqeedo battery in reserve, we blazed along at 3 electric knots, which eats up the battery charge decidedly faster than our past 2.5
The new fully battened main and furling jib looked good, but not as good as GANNET’s former racing sails. That is inevitable. I believe in the past I’ve made an analogy to the differences between zoom and prime camera lenses. Zooms can do more, but are not as sharp as primes. So it is with a single 110% furling jib replacing three racing headsails. Nevertheless, making 7 knots in 10 or 11 knots of wind is satisfactory, and the ease of setting and furling the new sails is worth compromise. What was a matter of minutes struggling to control squirrely canvas is now a matter of seconds with sails whose luffs remain attached to head foil and track slides.
GANNET has three separate lengths of jib fairlead track on her deck.
As I expected the proper lead for the 110% when unfurled is on the middle track. I forgot to experiment and see if the lead should be moved to the forward track as the sail is partially furled.
I won’t be using my old sailmaker again. He’s made sails for me for twenty years, but has screwed up my last three orders; and, as I trust that even those of you in non-baseball playing countries know, three strikes is out.
Readers of the passage log of my fifth circumnavigation may recall that he glued rather than stitched the seams of THE HAWKE OF TUONELA’s asymmetrical which twice split wide open.
And some of you may remember that I like to have only two reefs in my mainsails at what normally would be at a reef and a half and at the third reef point.
Despite clear instructions, he put only standard first and second reef points in THE HAWKE OF TUONELA’s last mainsail, which are not deep enough. I had to have a third put in by a sailmaker in New Zealand.
And I noticed yesterday that despite clear instructions again, GANNET’s mainsail has three sets of reef points.
Also without advising me he changed the panel colors on the asymmetrical.
In the past, his sails have lasted and been less expensive than the name brands, but I got a quote from the Chicago Doyle loft, who modified a sail for me last year, that was slightly less than that from my old sailmaker.
Unfortunately Doyle took six weeks to give me the quote, by which time I’d already placed the order.
It is possible that all this is moot because I might never buy sails again.
I already knew that if I don’t use information, I lose it. Another unneeded proof was that once out on the lake, I forgot how to tilt the Torqeedo’s shaft up out of the water, and later how to lower it. Fortunately I did remember where I’d stowed the owner’s manual.
Leaning over the side while heeled, I could see GANNET’s newly white keel, but I couldn’t see the red diamonds of vestigial VC17. I’m sure that those on other boats could and wondered.
I took my iPad with me and learned that its screen is completely unviewable in bright sunlight, which doesn’t matter because it does obtain positions from below deck and showed our track across the state line into foreign Wisconsin waters.
The iPad works well inside a ziplock bag; but I’ve ordered a Griffin Survivor Extreme-Duty Military Case, which sounds positively scary.
GANNET is so small that even with a 24mm equivalent lens, I can’t vary photographs much. I’m afraid that there are going to be way too many shots that look alike.
On the mast-mounted ProStart, you may be able to read our COG as 33º and our SOG of 6.2 under obviously light conditions.
The knees are Carol’s.
I’m going up tomorrow to try to impose some order on GANNET’s interior and give more thought and perhaps get started on the three projects I want to complete soon: solar panels; install new winches--I don’t recall if I have mentioned that a discussion at the Moore 24 owner’s online group about replacing the old Barient 10s with Harken 20.2s caused me to order some Harkens, too; and reinforce the aft lower shrouds.
Monday, May 21, 2012