Plastic Classic Forum

Plus, what looks cooler than strutting up the dock holding one (or two!) of those little holding tanks by their handles...it's the best way to win new friends. This is the time you trip over your own 2 feet - or worse yet, just as you are climbing out the companionway... either way, there is likely...

Hence the cheese...

I have a friend with a porta-Pottie on his boat. It was a rather inexpensive one built offshore that he bought in the camping section of a hardware store. He wished he had purchased one that was easier to get parts for, as he says the tank is a little to small. He wanted to buy a second tank to keep...

I think the trickiest part was determing where to mount it, and how long to make the arm. I wanted enough room to be able to use the companionway while the arm was out. Peter, is this for your Vega or San Juan? If it is for your San Juan, I can take some measurements if you would like.

Hi Peter, Here are some shots of the depth sounder bracket I made. It was made out of scrap stainless steel (lid of a broken alcohol stove), and some scrounged teak (broken autohelm bracket). It is basically an oval shaped piece of stainless with 3 holes drilled in the bottom an one in the top. I be...

I'm thinking about one of those Vietnamese super-long shaft things for the back of my catboat so's I can go way up the river. I believe those boats are called "long tails". I say go for it - a long tail motor, and a giant fan. With some winglets on your keel, you could have a hydrofoil...

Is it just me, or is the covered motor further outboard than the other motor? Perhaps this is to make up for the difference in thrust from the mismatched outboards?

Rick: I'd like to see some pictures of your bracket. Thanks!

I'll see if I can snap some photos of it this weekend.

Tim - your workmanship makes me strive to always do the best work I can, even if the work is hidden, and nobody knows it is there but me. Nice GPS swing-out bracket, too. Can you share the details on that one? I built a swing out bracket for my depth sounder/fishfinder. It was made out of some scrap...

Tim - if the battery was turned the other way - you wouldn't be able to see the Ryobi insignia. I think the marketing department had more say than engineering in the design of this ;-)

I would show the chainplates to Chesapeake Rigging before I decided what course of action to take. They may have some good ideas, esp. if they are doing an anlysis on your rigging, they probably have a pretty good idea about the strengths and weaknesses of your rig.

WD-40
Water Displacement Formula # 40.

It was a NASA contract for a product to protect unpainted metal that was stored in dry places (like deserts). It never really worked that well as a protectent, but was found to be great as a penetrating oil.

Naming it would be fun - Titanic, Lusitania, Flying Dutchman, Black Pearl, Hispaniola... the possibilites are almost limitless.

5 (and a dog) on a 21' Glassply (powerboat - I have since seen the light). We would usually get 2 - 10 day cruises, plus many weekends and overnighters a year (starting as early as spring break).

I have a Garmin eTrex Legend C GPS. It is a great little unit. I don't have it interfaced with a laptop yet, however, I am planning on doing it some time in the future. The mapping software I am looking at for the laptop is some free stuff called SeaClear GPS Navigation. http://www.sping.com/seaclea...

My Dad put a Campbell Sailor 3 blade prop on his 27 Catalina. It replaced a 2 bladed prop. The difference in reverse was significant. You might want to check them out. I am not affiliated with them in any way, I just remeber how much better my Dad's boat sailed and motored with one on. http://www.we...

My son, Jakob, now two, is my almost constant companion when it comes to sailboats. From sailing together to decommissioning at the end of the season, to visiting Ariel when she's on the hard to complete projects - lately, measuring to fabricate our own boat cover - to commissioning in the fall, th...

A reverse transom is created by putting a "dam" at the back of a mold. Once the hull is molded, the dam is removed, allowing the hull to pop out of the mold. I would suspect that someone got a hold of an ensign/electra mold, created a new "dam" for the transom, and started poppin...

When my son was 2.5 (he's almost 5 now), and looked out the window, he would say - "Let's go sailing daddy, wind looks pretty good, it is coming from the north." Sure enough, the wind would be a 10-15 northwesterly. At that age (from our house) he new which direction north was, but had no ...

Check out local tool rental places. I know where I live you can rent a supplied air rig. It sounds like you can do the painting in one day, so you would only have to rent it for one day - price shouldn't be too bad.

Thanks Tim! I will be looking at ply this weekend, I am actually hoping for 1/8", but I'm not holding my breath, so I gave you my "worst case" as I know I can get 1/4" locally. I think given the size of the chairs, 2 - 1/8" laminations will give me a back that is more asethi...

As a newcomer to this group (holding the proud title of "Bottom Sanding Grunt"), I hope I am not stepping over any boundaries here. I have a non-boat related question I would like to ask, that I am sure this group will be able to answer, as it involves laminating some mahogany ply into a c...

I have that foam backed vinyl on my San Juan. It is a '74, and hasn't started to crumble. 10 years ago, I got tired of looking at the yellow/tan stuff, so I picked up a quart of grey exterior 100% acrylic binder latex (used for painting exterior stucco) paint, and a quart of white. I painted it a ba...

My neighbour stripped the bottom paint off of his Thunderbird with one of these "safe" strippers. He absolutely hated it at first, until someone suggested brushing the gel on, covering it with saran wrap, and walking away for 45 minutes. Then he was happy with it. He says it needs to be in...

Does the silent sailor help prevent the dark soot marks on the transom?

Western red cedar has a slight smell, however, if you put a finish on it (or aromatic cedar for that matter), you've effectivly covered the smell. The reason I like to use red cedar is it is not particularily expensive, easy to work, resistant to rot, and comes in some great colors. It can be very l...

I've used wet or dry sandpaper on a sanding block with some light oil to remove rust off of machined surfaces - works great. I've cleaned the rusty oil off afterwards. Tim's wax idea sounds like a great way to protect it. If it was buffed well, it would help the wood slide smoothly.

I think you will find slats of wood to be pretty similar in price to sheets of Formica, provided you don't get carried away with exotic hardwoods. I would probably go with red cedar slats finished bright. That being said, there is alot of red cedar where I live, and prices may be alot more reasonabl...

Are you looking for a furler for your San Juan? I'm assuming that you are looking for one that isn't too expensive, and that will reef your genoa reasonably well. 3 years ago, I installed a Simplicite furler on my 24 San Juan, and really like it. Like you, I don't race, and am almost always either s...