Refitting in the year of the plague

The windlass battery bank is in place, and so are the new Honda 2200 gensets, which are making us look prescient in some respects, despite the fact that I've wanted a new pair for several years so we can fully charge at anchor...or weld things.

A realistic review of our situation has to allow that we may not be able to leave Lake Ontario this summer. This is because the situation at the American locks (and indeed, the Canadian locks on the St. Lawrence in regard to "non-essential travel") is at present unknown, and if I even bothered to ask some official, events unrelated to the toxicity of our boat's crew could overtake and alter policy quicker than we can whip out valid passports. I know we have to identify ourselves to the operators of American locks as Canadian boaters, but is chucking a line to a lock staffer crossing a border? If we never leave the boat? Can't say right now, but it's waking me up at night.

Mrs. Alchemy, who stopped being a wildlife rehabber last week, thinks she recognized the trumpeter swan in the foreground. We were measuring the templates for the chain plates for the drogue bridle when these two rolled up.

We are in our apartment until April 15, at which point we expect to be out of the marina and on the wall at National Yacht Club for a few days to finish up some jobs at the club workshop and generally prep for imminent passagemaking. There's a few personal matters to attend to, but we may be out of luck when it comes to any services or docks available on the trip down, which could make things...well, not impossible, but difficult in some respects, particularly given that it's still very early in the season to live aboard.

Found the prop puller! Now I want to stow it, greased up, in the Ghost Tank just because I hope not to need it for some time.

For instance,  our club, due to the "social distancing" aspect of the current pandemic, is considering delaying the club's boat launching, scheduled for April 25-26, until...who knows? The club is already largely closed for business, although the washrooms and the workshop is open and people are roaming about doing the usual commissioning jobs, but with no sure outcome that the crowds and the cranes will arrive at the end of April.

Another U-bolt firmly placed through the pilothouse roof...it will also serve as a tie-down for items such as the whisker pole.

Of course, we hope to be in Kingston or so by the end of April. We have to continue to work as if that's going to happen, if for no other reason than we will be living aboard, come viral hell or Lake Ontario high water, which, naturally in this year of the plague, is totally also a thing.

The keen-eyed will note that the current water levels  of March 18, 2020, are at the same height as those of April 21, 2019, meaning "high, indeed" and potentially record-breaking.

This adds several considerations to our departure plans: 1) High water levels may threaten yacht club and marina operations severely: fuel docks may be shut and electricity turned off to docks still clear enough of the water to use. Our early start may get us past (if we can clear the locks to more or less sea-level past Montreal), but we can't count on even marinas being open for business if the pandemic is cancelling boat launching plans; 2) The high water is increasing currents in much of the St. Lawrence river and estuary. While this is not necessarily dangerous, it is a consideration that may make getting in and out of marina and YC facilities tricky.

Took a trip by train out to our chandlery of record last week. Had no problem getting a seat as I am The Last Sailor on Earth.

Meanwhile, things are getting altered, improved or fixed. The "outside" throttle shifter was very balky and eventually seized in the shifter part for reasons that remained unknown even after a forensic review with the manufacturer's service tech via phone in Florida. So, not wanting to plate over and redrill fresh holes for something different, I invoked the warranty and got a replacement. So far, so good, but I won't actually hook up the Morse cables of the outside throttle shifter until we "dewinterize" circa the end of March and move the boat to a finger-end for coming and going, which will be after we remove the gradually failing boat cover this coming week. As will most boat things, creating an orderly action plan is part of the deal.

New shifter is identical to the old, save that this, you know, shifts.

Another job of some import is to fabricate and install chainplates for the series drogue. As discussed earlier, this involves cutting and shaping stainless steel bar stock and through-bolting the resultant plates to the hull at the stern.

Crosby G-209A 3/4" shackles with 7/8" pins and a seven-ton working load. I was told that a pair of 5-ton shackles would serve, but the size of these goes nicely with the closed thimble of the Dyneema bridle.

Because the five-inch wide, 1/2-inch thick SS plates are awkward to hold against the sternquarters on a windy day, I hit upon using some much lighter alu stock at 2 1/2" wide, which is what the SS will be cut down to, to measure out where the various holes should go. The idea is to actually make four 2 1/2" wide chainplates out of the two five-inch pieces and to drill all of them with matching bolt holes. Inside the boat, the "spares" will be rotated 180° and will serve as backing plates. The two will sandwich the hull and will be bolted together with six 1/2" SS bolts and locknuts per side.

Apparently, I was holding my phone upside down. The shackle end will be rounded off smoothly to lessen the slight chance of damaging the bridle. The dotted line represents the angle of the stern just below the pipe gunwales.

Meanwhile, back in the boat, I've started to saw this and reinforce that to swing the bed platform in the aft cabin athwartships, as described before, but I also did a small job to aid and abet the new shifter. That was to cut the compartment top for the hydraulic ram area so that the Morse cables for the outside throttle shifter, which also wend their way through there to get back to the engine, could have as few curves and therefore as little opportunity for friction or related hang-ups, as possible.

This involved some fun measurements and a hole saw to make a decent-looking slot. I've saved the cut-out and may tidy this job by restoring it so the cables just emerge from the hole and go straight to the shifter body.

The bed platform will feature a hinged portion that will "go up in the daytime" and will give us about four extra inches of width. More to come on that project as I do some more reinforcements.

The swans persisted. They were curious and unafraid, suggesting the dreaded bread supplement to their diets.

Every day is busy now, and last week saw the arrival, courtesy of a friend driving down from Barrie, of a replacement solar panel for our solar arch, which I will install once the plastic's off and I have easier access to the aft deck.

Now with five extra watts than its predecessor!

Staying with the boat

Yet another gale bent the boat cover in new and exciting ways recently. Before...

I've given my opinions on the somewhat dubious odds of self-rescue, in my opinion, at sea before, and while we've invested in items both expected and slightly exotic, including the EPIRB route, the best way to not drown, as better sailors than us contend, is to stick with the boat.

...and after. The red tape of shame is doing a fine job, despite the abuse.

The best way to do that is not to fall off. Sounds obvious, doesn't it? It takes, however, some planning and, more importantly, the habit of clipping on. Even then, one has to be careful in assuring that if you do "stay with the boat", it isn't in an attitude of potential drowning.

Irises in Toronto on St. David's Day (March 2) suggest both spring and our departure are coming on fast.

There's no secret here. All crew must, in all but the most benign, all hands on deck situations, wear fully functional tethers that hold them to the boat, either at a padeye or on a jackline. Now, there's plenty of ideas about jacklines; a typical setup can be found here. But best practices of running them port and starboard with sufficiently strong webbing suit us; the existence of the pilothouse means we want them to run from the aft end of the pilothouse to the forward bollards, The tethers come in three-foot and six-foot (1 and 2 m., respectively) lengths, which will allow us to go forward to the nearest padeye or other suitable anchor point to safely work on the foredeck for anchoring or sail adjustment purposes, even in heavy weather. Which will likely be neither comfortable nor dry, but if there's one thing I've learned at sea, uncomfortable and wet beat waving at a rapidly shrinking stern every time.

The super-beefy Wichard folding padeyes, through-bolted and backed to the aft part of the pilothouse. And yes, those shavings and drill dross have been removed.

I put in two pretty massive Wichard folding padeyes for where our webbing will start. These feature breaking loads of 9000 kgs, so I can't imagine a force that would break them without killing anyone attached to the jacklines they carry. These will be lashed as tight as I can make the to offer as little deflection (and therefore a chance to pick up speed or add to the tether's length) as we can manage.

The tethers we have include strong and simple webbing ones, and these double ones.

In the above photo is seen the elements of getting out on the aft "sailing" deck at, for instance, watch change. The tether's smaller silver hook goes on the D-ring of the PFDs we have. Ascending the companionway, we clip on the shorter tether to the

That propane tank will be better secured shortly, I know.

Once on deck, the longer tether will be clipped onto one of two stainless-steel U-bolts, backed with 1/2" SS plate, around the solar arch at its strongest point.

Obviously, that plastic shrinkwrap will soon go, too.

The U-bolt isn't pretty, but that's not that kind of boat. Being capable of rotation, it can follow the tether into the footwell in which the watchstander/helmsperson stands. Once clipped on, the short tether is released, the crew moves into position, clips onto one of the two U-bolts and releases the longer tether which can hang from the PFD. Reverse order to get back into the pilothouse.

The starboard U-bolt. Despite the inelegant look, they aren't going anywhere. They have Nylok nuts and threadlocking.

I'll put the jacklines on once the boat cover is off in a couple of weeks. There's a bit more to do in bolting on padeyes to either side of the mast tabernacle to allow safe working at the mast, and perhaps the addition of further carbiners and Spectra loops instead of hard points to make everything run smoothly, but this is, I hope, a prudent start to a complex topic.

I also rewired the foredeck battery pair, but that's for another post.

Drogue therapy

This is a Jordan Series Drogue as built by Angus Coleman of Ocean Brake in the UK.

There's a surprisingly long list of items, some quite expensive, one hopes never to use as a sailor. These include obvious ones, like a SOLAS-grade flare and the liferaft, to more cryptic items, such as drogues, warps and sea anchors.

Amusingly, the drogue, which weighs about 18 kgs., came wrapped in two very big IKEA bags.

The idea of a drogue is to slow the pace of a boat running off in heavy weather. Running off is the opposite tactic to that of heaving-to, in which the jib, main and rudder are all set so as to sail the boat slowly upwind. Heaving-to as a tactic is largely passive: one can tie off the wheel or tiller and essentially doze, if not entirely comfortably, as the storm passes over or even to delay a harbour approach until daylight reveals potential complications. Heaving-to is something some boats do more readily than others, and requires practice to fiddle with the sails in order to balance the desired slow forereaching that keeps the boat slowly "crabbing" forward.

The forces of the sails and the rudder nearly cancel each other out and the wave train is therefore met with "the pointy end" and at a low speed. Expect a twisty ride, but not a dangerous one. Diagram (C) Sail Magazine

To run off in a gale or a storm situation is a more active strategy requiring active steering, but it also allows more options in terms of reacting to worsening weather. Running off means to steer downwind at a slight angle to the wave train and (usually) the wind aft in order to make more speed either away from the storm or gale, or away from the dangerous quadrant of the storm or gale. The problem with running off is essentially the same as the problem with heaving-to: eventually, the winds and wave heights may exceed the usefulness of the given tactic and at that point, the transition has been made from "heavy weather sailing" to "survival conditions". Not good.

The IKEA bags reveal the drogue elements of bridle, leader, cones and tail. And the bag (black mesh) in which to store the lot.

If the skipper and crew have opted to run off in heavy weather, a problem that will soon be made apparent is that of too much speed. Even in conditions of reduced sail, or even bare poles, a boat can travel faster than its hull speed, at which point the rudder can lose its effectiveness and/or the hull can "surf" and be prone to broaching, capsizing or pitchpoling, all dangerous outcomes at sea.

The bridle "legs" are shackled to the chainplates bolted to the stern and meet at the drogue leader, after which the cones deploy.

The best option, once running off has been decided upon, is to ready a series drogue should the sea state intensify to the point where the boat may become uncontrollable. While this will vary from vessel to vessel and depends on hull type, design and less quantifiable aspects such as windage, the outcome desired is to slow the forward progress of the boat to allow the waves to roll beneath it. The boat is still sailing actively and is still moving, presumably away, from the worst parts of the storm conditions, but its speed has been reduced by the drag of a long, trailing line with fabric cones that act like a large rubber band to retard forward movement smoothly and which, thanks to a weighted end, will stay submerged in the advancing wave faces.

Now, this doesn't mean a carefree ride. Note all the complexities of retrieval of the drogue in a chat between sailors Randall Reeves and John Harries in the video above. And even the drogue won't necessarily keep you dry: The aft part of the boat can still be smacked by a pooping wave and the motion inside the boat can still be considerable. But if the boat is sailing actively, even in heavy conditions, the odds of not only surviving, but of preserving the rig and gear and avoiding injury or worse among the crew increase.

The black straps attach the cones to the drogue's single leg.

Series drogues exert great stresses on themselves, which are transferred to the hull. We therefore ordered ours with Dyneema cores, which made the drogue both lighter and more compact and stronger than the nylon-line alternative. Angus Coleman, the amiable contact at Ocean Brake in the UK, actually dissuaded us from buying the drogue last year as he was on the verge of introducing all Dyneema-core drogues and wanted us to have the opportunity to order that style. Of course, the Dyneema aspects makes the drogue less stretchy than nylon line, but I suspect this is not going to be a particular problem with our steel sailboat. Nonetheless, I am mindful that the attachment points must be engineered correctly so as to transfer all the shock loads that may arise non-destructively. So we are going to have chainplates fabricated to accept the estimated (by Coleman) nine-tonne working loads on the stern. We actually have beefy bollards that can likely handle these loads, but outboard chainplates throughbolted to the hull won't have anything to chafe on, nor will they have much of a chance to catch on the windvane or the transom-hung rudder.

So this is another piece of the puzzle of preparedness. While we will do a practice deployment or three, let's hope, as with the liferaft, we need never use the thing.

The winter of our content rent

 

He's got a fine head of hair, my nephew. And a very nice wife, too.

Time certainly flies when one is having boat. It's been a rather busy time aboard, abroad and ashore, with blogging updates deferred...but no longer! First up was nephew Ryan's wedding to Alex. Despite a bit of drizzle, a very good time was had. Logistics were tricky for us, however, what with retrieving dress shoes from Trenton and me needing a smaller suit thanks to The Boat Diet Plan: Eat less, move more, preferably on a 32C vessel.

A rare shot of Alchemy's two skippers, not giving conflicting orders.

After that pleasant duty came a scramble to secure a winter berth; to secure insurance for said berthing; to secure shoreside accommodation; and to feel more secure about some neglected sailing skills. So we buggered off to Niagara-on-the-Lake, as one does.

Foofy wind, however.

 ...and to Port Darlington for dinner with sailing pals Matt and D-L...

Sunset and rum, a good combination.

 On a rainy day, I even fit in another trip to see HMCS Haida, of loving memory...

In case one wishes to construct a WWII destroyer.

But other needful things beckoned. Our friend and agent for our now-sold house Suzanne Manvell found us a boat-club-proximate flat in late 2018 in which we stayed for 11 months until we moved aboard in June, 2019. Faced with an unexpected winter stay-over here in Toronto, and not Halifax, we asked her again if she knew of a downtown apartment in which we could stay short-term (we expect to move back aboard Alchemy at the end of March, 2020 with the goal of [finally] leaving Toronto circa April 15).

Unexpectedly, she said "how about my house?" Suzanne had a tenant leaving a first-floor flat and we could start renting October 1, which suited us perfectly. Her house is only slightly farther away from our winter berth than was the last place, and there's a corner of the garage suitable for sailbags, bicycles and dinghy sail rigs.

From stair to door is sufficient for clearing out most of the forepeak, plus bikes.

 The place is spacious and bright. We'd best enjoy it as it's likely to be our last "house" for some time.

Available spring 2020!

 Even the Cabin Boy got his dungeon, suiting his slightly Gothic bent.

He eventually got a bed, firm not cruel.

Meanwhile, we had to wangle insurance. Our carrier insisted that "floating, non-liveaboards" needed a canopy, tent or other covering to cast off snow and ice and discourage top-heavy turtling. Now, we have never done this for Alchemy: we've just shovelled off the decks when needed. But I knew where to go: the good crew of the steel ketch Goshawk, Jay and Rob, who live on Frenchman's Bay and who know their business as they are winter liveaboards.

This is from where I took my design cues, but, as will be seen, I didn't go to quite these sturdy lengths.

Jay and Rob do an impressive, generally bulletproof job because they would know right away were it to fail and because a proper covering makes for a warmer boat.

They run PVC tubing to the decks and packing tape as transverse supports. Then they shrink the cover on with a propane torch both impressive and, if not wielded carefully, destructive. See next post...

The bow of the boat need not be covered.

Everyone has the approach that works for themselves.

This "boom attachment point" I pretty well copied directly.

Having received the collective boat-cover wisdom while we were still at National YC (we moved gradually into the apartment during October as we wanted to sail as long as we could)...

Cobourg looking like a mill pond after a fairly gusty passage and a decision to bail out of a straight shot to Waupoos.

...we learned we weren't going to get approval to stay in the water at our club (it was a longshot) and so confirmed our berth at a nearby marina. 

The weather held until late October, save for some weirdness.

 Our slip was wide, but short. Good thing we had plenty of lines.

This was actually helpful when constructing the boat cover. I put together the Portabote and worked around the perimeter.

We also had an unusual 50-foot powerboat in steel from the 1960s opposite, cutting the breeze somewhat.

I don't see many steel boats on Lake Ontario larger than ours that aren't on the job.

 After some exotic maneuvering, we were ensconced.

Note the sails, bagged, tagged and garaged for the winter.

 This was Hallowe'en. The next post reveals what came next.

Have you never seen a horny teenager?

.And it was scary!

A slight change of plans...

Apparently it's a popular place these days.

This is Halifax. At this point, the last day of August, we had expected to be near or nearish to it and booking interesting activities like apartments and hull treatments. But we've had a very busy last six weeks or so, and while frustrating and sweary in parts, it's also been productive. Two weeks ago, circa August 15th, we decided to overwinter here in Toronto, leave the boat in "layup afloat" (mast in, at a slip, covered over with a frame and plastic and with agitators breaking up the ice) so we can go down the St. Lawrence in spring 2020 without rushing and having honed some rather rusty sailing skills.

Also, there was this factor:

We didn't want to rush to the Maritimes chased by fall gales and not lingering in nice places because we were racing bad weather.

Nonetheless, we've now sailed some and repaired or installed a great deal more. The boat's in good, serviceable shape and we have a good game plan for doing here in Toronto what we would have done in Halifax in less familiar surroundings. We've even got a land-based apartment as I do not propose to sleep aboard the "job site".

Some refitting highlights follow. Amazing what living aboard does for one's productivity!

 It's been a hot summer and we tend to skip lunch. Dinner, however, makes up for it. My belt's needed five new holes since May. Hmm.

So many parameters!

 After a rather steep learning curve with the hydraulic steering, we got the autopilot sorted and properly installed. And attractively mounted, if you ignore the previous generation of gear's mounting and conduit holes.

The rudder feedback sensor took a day to mount correctly.

We are at the point now where the AP steers better than we can, so we let it. Basically, we input a true compass heading and correct to conditions. We derive that bearing by putting a cursor with generous offing near our desired destination and just keeping a watch on events. It's clear that a lot of local sailors are going to some waypoint very close to, say, a buoy or other nav aid. That's not so prudent when two or three of 'em do it at once, we feel.

Lazyjacks took effort: the irony did not escape me.

 Lazyjacks and two separate Dyneema-core reefing lines are now on the main. That's a safety improvement, as are the preventers we can now rig for downwind sailing in blows.

 Fact is, prior to actually leaving, we haven't needed reefing lines. Alchemy can carry a full main well past 20 knots apparent wind, and if we encounter more, we've just gone to the staysail. But all is different now.

The secondary fuel filter: Not, evidently, guilty.

 We had a big delay around August 1, when, while on a test sail in light air, our engine basically sputtered and died and only started again reluctantly and at very low RPMs. We made it back to our dock with difficulty and an odyssey of troubleshooting commenced.

And goat sacrifice to the Dark Diesel Lords.

 Basically, we were:

• 1) starved of fuel, and
• 2) the fuel was old and grotty, and
• 3) we needed to change it all, which involved moving all the batteries to access the tank tops to vacuum out crud, and
• 4) we changed all the supply side fuel lines in case of said crud, and
• 5) we installed an inline fuel pump (a Walbro FRA-1, for the intrigued), and
• 6) we changed out all the filter elements, primary and secondary.

And don't forget the goat.

 Very long, laborious story short, the problems seem solved. We've done about 50 hours of rocky and calm motoring without issue, but it took a very long process and a lot of questions strewn about to the helpful people at the club (and elsewhere, thank you!) to solve Why Won't Beta Purr? I feel we were fortunate not to bugger the injectors and we will be cycling thrugh the fuel...and the biocide for the fuel...moe quickly in the future.

Ahctual crap sailing!

 Meanwhile, there's life aboard. Frankly, it's pretty nice.

My sleep schedule's changed.

 There's a lot of sky watching...

Nothing's ripped!

 ...and practising sailing in various modes...

Scored an end dock. Sweet.

 ...and travel to exotic places. OK, this is Trenton, jewel of the Bay of Quinte and where we keep stuff.

An actual exotic beverage, this was. The brewery was micro, indeed.

 We plan to sail as deep into the fall as weather and insurance allow, to see what breaks or falls off. Best to know here than 1000 NM eastbound, I think.

Cobourg, a harbinger of Trenton.

 A happy side effect of deferring our departure is that we get to attend my nephew Ryan's wedding. That required some collective sprucing up ashore and the acquisition of more formal duds.

Cabin Boy, soon to be Cabin Man.

 Lastly, I put the AP controller on a "helm extender", because just having the thing sticking out of a hole on a NMEA 2000 cable wasn't a long-term game plan. It looks about as nice as I can do with a piece of scrap teak.

The answer was "more helm".

More to come and sooner next time!