Made the final reversible cushion for the back of the seat by the fireplace. Now all the remaining ones are simple box cushions and should move quicker. Fingers crossed.
3rd saloon cushion ready
Returned to home marina
Used the high tide this morning to return back from Spaulding Marine Center yard to home marina. This was the first trip under own power with the new Victron system in. Still a bit of vibration due to shaft mis-alignment that I’ll need to chase but overall the boat performed great!
Towed to the yard
With vibration in shaft still quite present I decided not to risk making my own trip to the yard and took advantage of the BoatUS membership to get towed. Timed it to high tide and got lucky with perfectly calm weather. Tied up at Spaulding Marine Center for a quick haul out for cutlass bearing replacement.
This is the last piece of the puzzle – it may take care of the 100% of the vibration problem or most of it. I’ll likely still need to play with shaft alignment. We’ll see.
2nd saloon cushion done
Making progress on cushions. Made the 2nd reversible cover for the back of the saloon seat. Turned out pretty nice – happy with it.
Made the first cushion cover
The first cover turned out pretty well. Used the traditional method with continuous boxing to make it reversible.
Realized last minute that I ordered #5 zippers and then got #10 pulls that totally don’t fit them. Doh! Tried to find #5 pulls anywhere in SF and managed to find 1 at a store on Clement st. That one was white. So this first cushion has black zipper with white pull. Will have to wait for more #5 to arrive in mail before I can tackle the other cushions.
Fabric arrived!
Got the fabric for the cushions today. Soooo looking forward to making the covers and seeing how the saloon looks.
Finalized main sail cover/bag
Finalized the front section of the new sail cover/bag by adding straps and buckles.
Golden Gate
Main sail cover conversion
When I first made the cover for the main sail, back in 2018, I used a kit to create a traditional cover:
There were a few problems with it:
- It was a bit too short and the end of the boom was sticking out from it giving seagulls a nice place to hang out at and poop all over the cockpit.
- The shape was off – it had a pronounced hump where the head of the sail was supposed to be in but my sail didn’t need all that space so the hump looked weird.
- Finally, I had to setup and remove lazy jacks every time because the cover couldn’t go over them.
Besides, it started showing some signs of wear with holes appearing at the top.
So, I hatched a plan to remake it into a stack pack that would allow me to 1) keep the lazy jacks deployed permanently + 2) don’t requite to take the cover off entirely and put into cockpit when sailing + 3) have a nice ridge at top as seagull deterrent 4) reuse the same material but upside down so that I can cut off the worn out parts.
First part of the remake is done – ripped it in half and sawn back together on the other side, added track sliders at bottom, and added velcro for the top ridge. Left the area around the mast for the next time. The boat looks so much more sporty and perky with that tight fitting pack! Love the result so far.
Organized DC cabling
When we finished connecting all the DC stuff last time we left a giant mess of cables inside the compartment under the saloon seat. It was getting dark and we were just too tired.
I’d love to someday use that compartment for storage so today I tidied up all the cabling and washed that locker inside. Looks much better.
