There was a very short dalliance with a Drascombe Coaster, a very short dalliance, in the end we decided on something that not only only sports triangular sails but twin rudders to boot!
It's a long story but the Beneteau First 210 which had piqued our interest just after we sold Greta was on the market, so we start the season with a go faster, space machine.
Friday saw father in law David, fellow blogger and boat builder Graham and myself down at Mercury Marina trying to fathom the intricacies of the mast raising legs, I'd like to say third time lucky, but it took four attempts to swing things into place, probably a good job there were no health and safely folks around!
With the mast up Matilda Emily was soon in the slings on the travel lift and on her way to the water.
I want to say a thank you to the staff from HYS, they were really helpful and very friendly and made the whole procedure relaxed, easy and safe.
In the water, we soon had the engine running sweetly and motoring down river to her mooring, there is quite a bit to do to get her sailing hopefully it will all be done for the upcoming Easter weekend. The eagle eyed may have noticed the fresh varnish, there are only 7 pieces of wood in the cockpit, seemed a shame not to get them looking their best - old habits die hard even on a modern hot rod!
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Sounds like you're going to have a lot of fun sailing her this year!
ReplyDeleteI agree with JP - fair winds....!
ReplyDeleteI'm fascinated by the mast raising legs.. do they just act as a derrick?? Pulley at the top, loop a halyard round the mast just under the spreaders up to the pulley and then haul away???
He makes it sound so simple!
ReplyDeleteIn reality everything that can go wrong will.
Good game though and I have some theories about how to improve the process. Its always better fun experimenting on someone else's boat.
Steve - more or less, if you want to borrow them to try on Papillon let me know.
ReplyDeleteGraham - you missed me climbing up a ladder on sunday (afloat) to retrieve the strop from around the spreaders.
Oh my, oh my, oh my!
ReplyDeleteThe alternative is to use the legs as an A frame and pivot the mast up using its pin as a hinge. They do it a lot on the Broads
DeleteThere's an example here. http://www.boicey.com/sailboats/mastraising.jsp.
Congratulations!
ReplyDeleteAt least you wont find rot in your coach roof like I did! It's all under control though and the boat is safely in Southampton. See you out there.
Graham - i think adapting the legs to an A frame might be a winter project, on my old Jaguar 21 I used to use the spinnaker pole in same way and could raise and lower on my own. We also have a friend in Belgium who uses an a frame to lower the mast on a 38 foot Colin archer!!
ReplyDeleteMarion - oh dear, but the beauty of wood is cut some out, scarf some new in and off you go - plus epoxy for those of us who's woodworking skills are not well developed!
She will give you minimum effort and 'Max'imum fun! Good choice.
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