Pre-Launch Newsletter 6th Sept 2026

It has been a hectic time since our last newsletter. We have been pushing to get more done each day so it is hard to remember what has happened! We woke up one morning at 7am and realised it was a dead calm, so jumped up and fitted the furler system for our Yankee sail. We are pleased with how that looks, although the fitting at the base needs a bit of tuning.

The continuous red and white line furls and unfurls the Yankee from the cockpit. It is completely furled or completely unfurled, it doesn't reef the sail. While it is furled we can lower it to the deck and take it below.

We wanted to clean the topsides of the boat before we started putting on antifouling so we spent an exhausting couple of long days using a mechanical polisher to brighten up the old fibreglass. We haven't yet done any wax polishing as the dry weather spurred us on to start the antifouling. We are very pleased that the runs of epoxy and old lettering on the stern came off with a bit of scrapping and a heat gun 😄

We made a controversial decision (so unlike us 😉) to go with non biocide antifouling which relies on very slippery silicon which fools the tiny sea creatures into thinking they can't grow there. It is a set of three layers of paint and has some pretty tough overcoating requirements. The lowest layer is a seal of epoxy to cover over any old antifouling or mixed layers. Then you add a Tie Coat at specific overcoating time depending on the temperature. This gives a sticky layer that the silicon coat goes onto. Two coats of the Silicon are needed and the whole coating should last between 2 and 5 years (after that the silicon might need an extra coat).

Our initial estimate of the area was about half of the actual size which meant we had to choose which parts to paint first and wait for more paint to arrive. The paints are very, very smelly but not too difficult to apply. The Tie Coat and Silicon have to be applied within 1 hour of opening the tin, which adds to the stress of buying the correct tin size.

However, after just under a week we have the bottom coated in lovely slippery black silicon. We hope you agree from the picture at the top of the newsletter, that she now looks a lot smarter.

You can also see that we are applying the same type of antifouling to the propeller and Rudder Shoe. These needed 2 coats of a different primer and had to be overcoated with Tie coat while this was still tacky. They really know how to tax your brain while you are breathing in all the awful fumes from the paint.

Yesterday we made a big step forward by selling our car! It feels like a huge step towards sustainability too not own a car at all. We have hired one to do the final moving on, and we have to go to Cornwall again for another funeral tomorrow.

We have done lots of other jobs that make the boat less likely to sink. All the underwater "holes" are now finished, we even added two underwater lights (for checking the propeller isn't caught in fishing gear at night and looking at the pretty fish. Just the final connection of the propeller shaft to do.

We hired a skip this week which we have filled with stuff that had accumulated around the boat (scraps of wood etc), plus stuff from the storage container. That makes emptying the container look less scary for the future.

There are quite a few smaller jobs to do. The final coat of Silicon, connecting the steering to the rudder, and just moving stuff/clearing up are the biggest that are left.

It was very windy this afternoon and due to the painting we are only held by the 4 cradle legs (we normally have 7 timber props as well), which meant things were a bit wobbly. So as a treat we went to see Malcolm at the Anglesey Bait Centre and he sorted us out a fishing rod, reel, lures etc. We should now be able to catch fish weighing up to 10kg ;-) (fat chance!).

The weather forecast is still changing rapidly for Thursday 10th. It might mean we end up launching on Friday when the wind should be lighter and from a better direction.

Whatever happens we are still going to be at the Southampton International Boat Show (we will be there Tue 22nd to Sun 27th). We are giving talks on Tue 22nd "Electrifying a 1970's Boat" (at either 11 or 12) and Fri 25th 'Real sustainable sailing- don't get greenwashed’ (at either 2 or 3) on the YouTubers stand. We will have a discount code in the next few days.

Love

Dave and Jane