Sailing with Natalie

Finally my wife Natalie and I were able to spend a weekend on the boat sailing since the day of the dead engine. We came out on Friday evening and stayed till Sunday evening. Sailed on Sunday but the wind all weekend was either becalmed or 4-5 knots. We left the boat on Saturday to go see the X96 Big Ass Show. No there were no large donkeys there its a rock concert that this year had 12 different bands and runs all day long.

Engine Finally Fixed and Sailing again

I managed to install the last piece of the exhaust today. An adapter to adapt the 1 5/8" exhaust hose to the 1 3/4" hose at the through hull fitting. My son Sean came by (today is his 19th birthday) to take the boat out for her first sail since the engine died in August. I had to make a small adjustment to the new shift cable to allow it to fully shift into reverse and we were off. Sean took the helm for the entire trip and we reached a top speed of about 4 knots. The wind was pretty dead running from 3 to 5 knots all day. At least it wasn't dead calm like the last time Sean came out for a sail.

New foward hatch, Sad Atomic 4

Well I finished building a new forward hatch and got it installed on the boat. I originally tried to repair and refinish the old hatch but I reassembled it with the new Acrylic oriented 90 deg off and disassembling it caused the cracked wood to break up even more. My final solution was to get some rough cut Mahogany from the Wood Craft store and make my own from scratch. I wish I had a before picture to put hear, my fault, I need to take more before pictures. The bad news is after installing the hatch I was unable to start the engine. I had to remove the head because the #3 and #4 exhaust valves were stuck. Once the head was off I found the #4 valve broken. I removed the exhaust from the boat and took it home to test and found there was an open seam inside the wet muffler that allowed sea water to run back down the exhaust and hit the hot exhaust valved #3 and #4 being the lowest point on the engine. So every time I shut off my the engine cold water would quench the hot exhaust vales eventually causing one to fail. I'm now waiting for a new valve and gaskets from Moyer Marine this week and I'll be fabricating a new water lift exhaust system for the boat.

Picture of Natalie and I sailing

Another sailor from the marina took this picture of Natalie and I out for a Sail on June 25th.

Spirited Sailing to Stansbury Island

We decided to spend the day sailing west to Stansbury Island. I took this video along the way. I'll apologise now for it being so shaky. We were unable to reach the far northern end of the island with out beating to windward so we held a close reach till we were about a 1/2 mile or more from shore and then ran down wind back towards the Marina.

White Rock Bay

We woke up this morning to the sun rise over Antelope Island from our night at anchor in White Rock bay. We had to motor most of the way out to make it before sunset last night since the wind had died down and the GPS said it would take us over 13 hours to reach the bay sailing less than 1.5 knots.

On any Sunday

There were allot of boats out today despite the light wind in the afternoon. Natalie and I left the marina at 4:00 but the wind dies out by 6:30 and we had to motor back. I installed my new instrument panel and was going to take a picture before and after, but I forgot to.

No Wind Today

My son Sean and I took the boat out this afternoon, but there was no wind at all. I believe we were going backwards at one time. It was a good thing the engine ran well. I had planed on fixing a gremlin with the temperature gauge but it went away on its own, I'm sure it will be back to haunt me soon enough. We installed a new main sheet double block on the boom. The old one was a little small for the 1/2" line and had a tendency to rub on the cheeks (Side plates of the pulley). Here is a picture of the used Lewmar 60mm racing block I found on eBay before we attached it to the boom.

First day sailing the "SHIP"

We out sailing for the first time on the new/old boat today and christened her "Silver Girl". Amongst allot of fanfare and pouring of champaign. The wind was only blowing 3-5 knots so we were at about walking speed most of the time but that was okay it was a nice quiet and smooth ride.

Spiral Jetty trip

The state park marina organized a trip to the Spiral Jetty today. Well we didn't sail there, the waters only 2-3 feet deep on the north edge of the Great Salt Lake. The jetty is a land art piece built in 1970 by Robert Smithson.

Mast Photo

Okay I finally got a photo of the mast since its been put up.

Mast Stepping Day

We stepped the mast today using the main halyards of two boats in neighboring slips. Sorry no pictures I promise to snap a few when I go back to finish tuning the rig.

Red Flag Day Today

No sailing fun today The red flag is out for bad weather with wind gusts aproching 40 mph. I Did manage to get the new Jumper stays installed and now I just need the marina to finish installing the new mast lift so I can put the mast up.

The jumper stay parts have arrived today from Rig-Rite and now were one step closer to raising the mast and $141.00 lighter in the pocket book.

March 15th Launch Day!!

Launched durring crane day today.

I thought I'd put up some pictures of the engine repair/rebuild. I started working on the engine in November of '07 since it had quit running on the previous owner and he was unable to get it repaired. Since that time I've unstuck the #3 and #4 intake valves, replace the #3 and #4 exhaust valves, done a 3 angle valve job, made a new engine water jacket plate ( the old one was completely rusted through), made a fuel pump block off plate, rebuild the raw water pump, rebuilt the alternator, rebuilt the starter, rebuilt the carburetor, drilled out and replaced the broken head studs, and completely cleaned and repainted the engine. Here's the results.