One of the manufacturer recommended upgraded is to put non-skid material at the base of the dagger board case if the old out-door carpeting that was there needs replacing. I noticed that my outdoor carpeting there was already completely gone. Just a glue residue remaining. After a quick internet search I found some non-skid material that I could cut the required area.

The first order of business is to clean up the surface so the new material will have something good to stick to. I used some Goo Gone, a bunch of paper towels, and a lot of rubbing until the surface was totally clear of any sticky residue.

Then it was a simple process of putting the non-skid material into place.

This does hold the dagger board more securely in place with less wobble.

Some video footage of sailing on the York River with a highly reefed main.

Another weekend in Beaufort NC. Did some reconnaissance for the NCC.
Drove down rt 101 to see a bridge over the Harlowe canal.
Checked out a possible camp site for after traversing the Harlow canal.
Checked out the tracking ability of the Spot unit while circumnavigating Carrot Island.

See it all here.

Here is the North Carolina Challenge course as seen from Google Earth.

I felt the friction of the bungee sliding over the fairly pointed edge of the rudder mount was contributing to the difficulty of the bungee keeping the rudder in its down position while sailing. I felt the combination of the buoyancy of the hollow rudder, the water pressure while under sail, and the friction at that one point was overpowering the effective elasticity of the hold-down bungee as applied to the rudder. I decided to try putting in a roller for the bungee to go over to remove the friction at that one point.

I simply used a 3/16″x1″ Clevis Pin, a 3/8″ Cotter Ring, and a 1 ” Nylon Spacer (.257 inner dia, 1/2 outer dia) which I had to cut with a hacksaw to get the length just right.

The nylon spacer will rotate around the clevis pin.  Metal parts all stainless steel of course.

I drilled two small holes in the rudder mount just big enough for the clevis pin and installed the parts as shown below.

The pull-down bungee and rudder lift line now go as follows:

With the bungee applying enough tension to hold the rudder down while under sail, the nylon spacer would rotate with the bungee whenever the pull-up line raised the rudder. When the pull-up line was released, the nylon spacer would again rotate with the bungee as the rudder went back to its down position. This seemed to work quite well while under sail and the rudder remained in its proper position.

[EDIT: I’ve found that I need to oil the roller before I go out each time to make sure it rotates freely. I now keep a can of WD40 in my boat.]

I tried the spinnaker out for the first time on Sunday.  It worked great.  Possible too good because before I knew it I was quite a few miles downwind and then needed to tack back up wind to get back to the launch place before sun-down.  They lock up the place where I launched from at sunset.  York River State Park Croaker landing.  Next time I will go upwind first, then downwind for the return trip.

The wind started out slight but built up all afternoon.  I was hitting about 9 miles per hour with the spinnaker up and around 6 taking back upwind partially reefed.  The main hull is so narrow that it is deceptively fast.  There is hardly any splash. 

I was wearing my new MSR mission dry suit (event) and it worked great.  Never over-heated and could easily launch the boat with stepping into the water up to my knees while staying dry.  Gave peace of mind if I happened to flip the boat away from shore.

It took me a while to get the hang of all the various lines and to keep them untangled in the cockpit.  I had loosened the rudder pin but the bungee still isn’t keeping the rudder all the way down.  The manufacturer has mentioned a possible rudder upgrade coming down the road.  I’ll definitely look into that.

I hope to get a go-pro camera to take some fun videos sailing. 

A few pictures from the York River in Virginia.

There was enough wind to try out the main sail today. I mastered the furling and unfurling. There is a little technique to make sure the lines don’t get caught up on the inappropriate spindle but after a while, I got the hang of it. I’ll probably try out the spinnaker the next time I’m out.

I saw and talked to one sea kayaker out on the Your river. Besides us, there was just one other power boater out there. Besides that, we had the whole river to ourselves.

My only boat issue was the rudder. The bungee that is suppose to hold the rudder down didn’t provide enough force to overcome the buoyancy of the hollow rudder. The rudder was in the water but only partially submerged. I’ll have to think about that some. I might need to engineer something that holds it down with more force.

[Edit.  I may have had the bolt too tight that attaches the rudder.  I’l ltry loosening it the next time I’m out and also add some WD40.]

Another manufacturer recommended upgrade is to add a nylon spacer to the masthead to raise the spinnaker attachment so it won’t drag on the top of the mast.

The TRIAK website has the following image.

I decided to use a thinner nylon spacer above the bracket so the bolt would thread in farther into the mast.  I use the thicker one below.  Below is my set-up.

Note that the bolt is metric so you will need to use a metric stainless steel lock nut to fit the bolt.

I’ve been thinking about putting some kind of battery operated masthead (all around red over green) light at the top of the mast but the regulations say the red and green lights should be separated by at least 1 meter and that would mean a one-meter pole would need to be added to the top of the mast. That may not be feasible. I don’t think a white anchor light would have any use since I would typically pull the boat ashore instead of anchoring out at night.  I’ll probably just leave the masthead with this simple nylon washer extension.

I haven’t rigged up the spinnaker yet but this is what the retrieval device looks like.