Sailing
Staysail sheet winch options
We managed to get two old Lewmar 30 self-tailing winches from ebay to use for our staysail. Four options for where we might position them. At present we favour the first option (very close to the primary winch).
Sailing
Safety
Sailing UMA scary delamination. Are we ok?
This video from the lovely Sailing UMA is scary. It does end on a cliffhanger. We see that the test model they built failed catastrophically. They built a small section of GRP intended to replicate the original hull. They added a foam core rib, covered it with GRP and then
Environmental
Raspberry Pi Pico for boat projects
So our Raspberry Pi Pico W microcontroller kit arrived today. We have been through a first video tutorial which has got us to connect it to my laptop, download MicroPython and Thonny. Then when wrote a little program to make the LED flash. The kit comes with over 450 items
Cooking
Slow Galley progress
We seem to spend a lot of time moving stuff around the boat to get it out of the way for jobs or meals or sleeping. Then lots of time working things out and planning. Plus I had to buy a full sheet of marine plywood and very carefully bring
Dyneema rigging
Mizzen supports
I haven't been posting much here as I've mostly been working on our YouTube channel, however, I thought I would show some pictures of the new mizzen mast foot support work. I am also adding some fibreglass tape to increase strength where we have cut away
Plans
Lots of updates
Been a bit slow updating the blog, we have several new videos and this evening I have bought a new-to-us mainsail (from a Westerly Fulmar). We will probably have to add a very small extra reef point as the default setting point because it is very slightly too large but
Sailing
Load tested our Dyneema Chainplate loops to over 4, 000kg
We have just finished testing our Dyneema Chainplate loops to over 4, 000kg. They didn't break, although something did at about 4,175kg. Hopefully we have caught it all on video which will be out soon 😊
Environmental
Great Sailing Uma TedX talk
So Kika spoke at a TedX event in Cowes. A really good talk that fits very much with our philosophy here at Sustainable Sailing with our subtitle of "SUSTAINABLE: Environmentally, Financially, Mentally, Physically" So highly recommend this short talk:
Safety
Dyneena chainplate testing video
Our next video showing our new chainplate loops being tested is now available (took 9 hours to render because we have prepared it at 4K resolution). Hopefully this will make the way our chainplates will work far clearer.
Cooking
The end of our saloon or end of half term or both?
We ended with a day of better weather and real progress. We were able to test the bow roller with the anchor despite not having been able to do any outside epoxy work all week. Our 30kg Spade anchor fitted nicely. And the remodelling of the saloon went through a
Progress
Another stormy day outside
In fact there has been so much rain that when we did leave the boat to use the clubhouse facilities our ladder was standing in a bit of a lake and we had to paddle. Despite this we decided to clear the port side of the saloon to improve the
Appliances
Mixed bag progress
Today was definitely another no outside jobs day. So we went to Aldi in the morning and got soaked as we came out. In the afternoon we worked on different things. Dyneema Chainplates Jane started learning Dyneema splicing and after a practice, she produced our first real Mizzen chainplate: This