New toilet coming soon

I broke the flush handle off the old toilet. Frankly it was rather leaky and gross anyway so we ordered the sanipottie 965 msd from defender. It is supposed to come today and we will plumb it in this weekend. It is a self contained unit but you can plumb to a deck fill for pump out and a vent hose. Seems pretty ideal. Next thing you know we will be putting in a shower. Just kidding. We are never putting in a shower. 

Great weekends these past two trips out. Beautiful weather, but the wind has been up and down.  We went on a club sail and I have to say I was retry happy with our performance. Even with the giant new dinghy and everybody else being bigger than us we pretty much kept up with everyone! 

Dramatic revelations

First and foremost I read my outboard motor's manual today. I had been considering ordering a flush kit so we could change the oil ourselves.  You can put the lower unit in a bucket of water and run it to warm it up, but I have always been skittish of doing it because it is scary to have the prop in the bucket.  We have done it this way in the past in a rain barrel, and when we bought it they demonstrated it in a large trash can full of water.  When reading the manual I learned that it is suggested that you REMOVE THE PROPELLER if you are going to run it in a bucket of water.  Phew. Dang.  Sometimes you really do benefit from reading the directions.

Now, onto the Dalloway.  This weekend we sanded the high filling primer some more.  A lot more.  A lot lot more.  I installed the boom hardware for the lazy jacks, and the jiffy reef system.  I found so many cheek blocks in the tool box that I think we must have bought them before Derecho and it just took this long to get around to installing the system.  I hauled the monster sewing machine to the club, took the final measurements, and finished the last little bit of sewing on the sail cover.

Then we took a little break to join the opening day parade.  Clothing was optional.  JK. Thank god. 

There was even a gentleman playing the bagpipes. He was quite impressive.  

The boats were blessed, the cannon fired, and the flag was raised. 

Afterwards I finally installed the stack pack.  This thing is really phenomenal. I can't say I necessarily recommend buying the sail rite kit but I absolutely recommend making one of these things.  Just watch the video on youtube, it really wasn't that hard. Having three sets of instructions made it so much more confusing than it had to be.

Then I assisted with the taping and the painting.  Here's a nice before and after photo. 

Coat one is complete, but we have to wait 16 hrs between coats and sand every time so our schedule just expanded quite a bit.  We will have to sand and paint saturday then sand and paint sunday. I don't think it very likely that we will be able to tape on the new paint until the following weekend so the boot stripe and the speed stripe will both have to wait. I am not entirely sure we won't lose patience with the whole thing and just launch.  (That's what happened with the filling primer.  We only did one coat. Hand sanding the whole boat to that extent was torture.)

Fairing

We are using a high filling primer. One coat on and the hand sanding is pretty agonizing. 

I also installed the boom hardware for the lazyjacks and mostly the hardware for jiffy reefing. 

I am more or less finished with the stack pack. I took my sewing machine to the club and added the final major parts. Just have to hand stitch the forward ends of the batten pockets. 

Sewing sewing sewing

Matt brought home the mainsail for me so I could lay it out with the sail cover and mark all of the hardware placement against it. So now that's done I have been adding the closures on the bottom. All that we have left to do is take it back to the boat, put the sail back on, install the jiffy reef and the boom hardware for the lazy jacks, measure the gap we need to close on the front of the sail cover, take it off again, and sew a custom panel to go over the front of the mast, attach the connection points where the sail pack ties to the lazyjacks and then we will be done. Phew. 

Here's another tip: the DVD that comes with the sailrite kit contains a different video from the one on youtube. The methods are a bit different. I thought the one on youtube was more geared to beginners. 

Also I burned out a bearing in my sewing machine. I keep oiling it but I think I need a replacement part. Not sure how to proceed with that since there aren't exactly numbers on it. 

Haha. Sailcover=couch potato. 

Meanwhile at the yacht club Matt has faired the hull. 

And gotten one coat of primer on.  

Sewing again.

The sail rite sail pack kit is definitely taking over my living room.  Here's a free tip. Just because it came with a DVD containing an instruction video doesn't mean it will be like watching a cooking show. Watch the video. Read the written instructions. Do it. Do both. Seriously. 

Paint Prep

Poli Glow Poli Glow Poli Glow.  Let me add thee to my list of life regrets.  By the end of the second year it was chalky and messy looking.  Ammonia wouldn't take it off.  Sanding didn't take it off.  Acetone and a lot of elbow grease does.  We got two thirds of it off with a gallon, yes a gallon, of straight acetone.  The plan is to paint the bottom, paint the bootstripe tan, and paint the hull green. There are a lot of bad spots on the hull with fiberglass showing through that need some protection.

Meanwhile let me say that an extension ladder leaned on the spars is really not the best way to approach working on the mast.  It is too wobbly and probably about the most unsafe thing we have tried yet.  Since that didn't work out I made some inquiries and found someone with a mast mate who was willing to lend it to us.  The sail cars were a little small and kept popping out of the track but it worked out in the end.

 The tangs for the Harken Lazyjack kit are now installed.   The kit came with two options for attaching the tangs to the mast.  First you could use stainless steel rivets.  We tried that first, but they wouldn't pop correctly no matter what so we had to switch to screws.  It took some scrounging and we had to borrow a tap to thread the holes, but in the end it was a smashing success.  Now I just have to finish my part(I have cut out the parts but that's about it.  Long way left to go, lots of sewing).  It was also a beautiful day at the club with all the flowers starting to bloom.

 I foolishly did not take any before pictures of the terrible poll glow situation.  With it off the hull actually looks so nice it is tempting to skip painting.

2013

So for 2013 we mostly just launched. We didn't even spruce up the poli glow. It was a great year. No derechos got us, and we got our brand new mainsail at long last. 

We also splurged and bought a zodiac zoom dinghy from defender. It has been a real game changer. It has a hard bottom that really makes all the difference in the world. 

For Christmas I bought my husband a set of harken lazy jacks and a sailrite stack pack kit! 

They sat patiently in the basement until this week when I finally got the measurements I needed to manage it. The only trick is that we need to get up above the spreaders to install the lazyjacks and the yacht club isn't hiring a high lift this year. We have to scrape together enough members to make it worth renting or find some skinny daredevil person to go up the mast for us. 

Bellamy the salty sea dog in her little pink life vest. 

The new dinghy