Boat Plans Aluminum | Opinions are like assholes

Boat Plans Aluminum

Everyones got one.

Every now and then Ill ask a boat-related question on a public forum or email list.  It sure isnt a problem getting people to weigh in with their opinion, thats for sure.  The challenge, actually, is picking through the dross of misunderstanding, inaccurate information, speculation, and completely made-up answers to find the grains of expertise and knowledge.

This is precisely why I picked the boat designer I did, because they has already provided me with a wealth of trustworthy and well-respected information about boatbuilding before I ever bought my plans (read Boat Plans: Choices Made and Not Made).

For the most part, during my build, Ive hewed pretty close to the plans and the recommendations of the boats designer.  Im all for experimentation, but Im also deeply respectful of the experience and expertise of those who came before me.

In the planning stages, there were boats I liked that came close to what I wanted, but differed in some way from my vision of our little shantyboat.  I definitely flirted with the idea of taking those plans and making significant modifications.

I resisted that urge, for the most part, and picked a boat design that met my needs, at least in terms of hull design.  

For the changes I did plan to make, I had the good fortune to be able to talk to my boats naval architect and get his advice on these modifications (read Questions for the Old Man).

The opinion in boatbuilding forums is often to take this design and lengthen it, or add one of those or one of these.  And Im sure for those experienced boatbuilders, such modifications would be a breeze.  But what about the first-time boatbuilder, the person just starting out?

I think people get excited sometimes about sharing what they know, but forget that there is a bigger picture.  Too often, I think that picture holds the very real possibility of a half-built boat collecting rainwater in the backyard of a frustrated amateur boatbuilder.

Do you find information about Boat Plans Aluminum are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Boat Plans Aluminum. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Boat Plans Building | Finding the right balance

Boat Plans Building

A READER in Anchorage, Alaska, who calls himself or herself “Iceberg” asks if I could repeat a column I recently wrote about balance in sailboats. Well, I don’t remember writing about that subject recently, but I did write about it many years ago. So here’s hoping that this is what you’re after, Iceberg:

 

THERE ARE MANY DESIGN FAULTS that sailboat owners will admit to, but unseaworthiness is not one of them. A skipper might well shrug off a lack of accommodation. He or she might well agree the boat is slow, or hard on the helm. But nobody wants to own an unseaworthy boat.

Seaworthiness is the happy result of a lot of factors but there is one that is often overlooked. It’s called balance.

According to Tony Marchaj, a sailor, pilot, naval architect, and research scientist, “Almost by definition, seaworthiness cannot be achieved if the boat is badly balanced.”

So what do we mean by balance? That question was answered by a famous British designer, J. Laurent Giles. He said good balance is “freedom from objectionable tendencies to gripe or fall off the wind, regardless of angle of heel, speed or direction of wind.”

He added that a well balanced boat had an easy motion in a seaway, that is, she passed easily over the waves, neither tending to plunge the bow deeply into the next wave ahead, nor throwing her nose high in the air as a wave passed the fore body. She would also unfailingly lift her stern to a following sea.

“One requires of the balanced yacht that she should retain the utmost docility and sureness of movement in manoeuvering at sea, in good or bad weather,” he added. “She must maintain a steady course when left to herself, but must be instantly responsive to her helm so that the heavier seas may be dodged if circumstances permit. She must be capable of being left to her own devices, sailing, hove-to, or under bare poles.”

That sounds like a very tall order to me. What sort of hull has this wondrous quality of balance? Here’s Marchaj again:

“In a narrower sense, this means that the inherently balanced hull does not substantially alter its longitudinal trim, and does not alter its course during the process of heeling and rolling.” In other words, to be well balanced, a hull, when heeled, should immerse about the same volume of topsides forward and aft.

Marchaj points out that many of the good old boats still sailing now were either designed for, or affected by, the old International Offshore Rule, which produced shallow, beamy hulls with pinched bows. “Usually, when they heel, the stern is lifted and the bow falls. Consequently, these boats are difficult to control by rudder and are unseaworthy.”

If the bow digs in as the boat heels, a boat will try to round up into the wind, of course, not only because of the wedge effect of the forward sections but also because the center of lateral resistance has moved forward while, at the same time, the center of effort of the sails has moved outward and gains more leverage. This is when the person at the helm suddenly finds the tiller up under his chin. Not that it does much good if the boat heels too far and the rudder comes out of the water.

Luckily, most of us don’t often sail in sea conditions that challenge the full seaworthiness of our boats. But if you should be of a mind to cross an ocean or sail around Cape Horn, balance might be a good thing to keep in mind as you search for the right boat.

Today’s Thought

Everything splendid is rare, and nothing is harder to find than perfection.

— Cicero

Tailpiece

“Are you allowed to smoke at school?”

“No.”

“Are you allowed to drink at school?”

“Of course not.”

“How about dates?”

“Oh, dates are fine, as long as you don’t eat too many.”

Do you find information about Boat Plans Building are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Boat Plans Building. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Dinghy Boat Plans | Excellent taste in boats

Dinghy Boat Plans

CAMPION MARINE is a Canadian boat manufacturer that seems to be doing just fine in a difficult market. Campion has been making recreational boats for more than 40 years in Kelowna, British Columbia, and now sells its products practically all over the world, even in China.

But what interests me most about Campion (which, incidentally is Canada’s biggest fiberglass boatbuilder) is the fact that its boats are edible. At least I think they are. In a press release the company proclaimed:

Campion Marine Inc., Canadas largest fiberglass boat builder, is proud to announce that it will become the first boat builder in the world to manufacture all of its boats with Envirez®, a renewably sourced bio-derived resin from Ashland Performance Materials.
Envirez® resin is the first resin that uses a substantial amount of soybean oil and corn derived ethanol in its formulation.
So now, if you run out of food in mid-ocean, you can eat your boat. You’ll have to spit out the fiberglass strands, of course, otherwise they’ll get stuck in your teeth; and the diet of soybean and ethanol may start to pale after a week or two; but at least you won’t starve.
The only decision left to make is: Where do you start eating? Somewhere above the waterline, obviously. Not the cockpit floor, but maybe the coamings. Or perhaps the toerails if your crew wash their feet regularly.
The edible boat ushers in a new era of yachting and I look forward to the first book of recipes. Transom stew. Corn à la Cockpit. Poopdeck Purée. Pintle and Gudgeon Potage. It all sounds so delicious I can hardly wait to buy an old wreck of a Campion and invite my friends to a boat tasting.
Today’s Thought
This has got to be the most expensive food ever laminated.
— Bryan Miller, NY Times, (on Manhattan’s Casual Quilted Giraffe restaurant)
Tailpiece
“Don’t you think he looks like me, nurse?”

“Yes, sir, but don’t let it worry you.  All new-born babies look strange for a while.”

(Drop by every Monday, Wednesday, Friday for a new Mainly about Boats column.)

Do you find information about Dinghy Boat Plans are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Dinghy Boat Plans. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Canoe Boat Plans | Columbia Gorge Fishing Report 1 4 16

Canoe Boat Plans

Photo courtesy of Sam Sickles - Steelhead Outfitters

Fishing Report

It’s gotten cold, really cold. Water temps in most western rivers are in the mid thirties. Prior to that temps were hovering around forty and we were finding some fish. The last two steelhead I saw caught came on a third pass and a second pass respectively. What that means is, slow down. I generally take three to four steps between casts but right now the fish are glued to the river bottom and don’r want to move, so slow down and be meticulous. If you aren’t hanging a fly here and there you’re probably not close enough to the fish so tip up or fish a weighted fly and a bit longer leader.


The good news is we’ve got a good batch of early steelhead and they are grabby. Here’s a tip; when river temps reach rock bottom (right now) there’s only one way to go and that’s up. I know you’re thinking, Duh! What I mean is it’s tough to fish water temps on the decline, the fish get lethargic. The opposite is true for rising temps even if they are really low, so watch for warmer water temps, even a degree or two and be ready for fish that become a little more aggressive as the days warm up.


For now, heavy tips and heavy flies casting to the deeper slower water. Good luck.

Sandy River Steelhead

Sam Sickles

Steelhead Outfitters

"Fly Fish the World with Us"

Do you find information about Canoe Boat Plans are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Canoe Boat Plans. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Yacht Boat Plans | Searching for nautical humility

Yacht Boat Plans

STIRRING TIMES. Strange things happening. A Pope rides around America in a Fiat 500. Somehow I never imagined I’d ever see a Spanish-speaking Argentinean man in a funny hat and a long dress parading his religious wares in an Italian mini-car in the USA. Some people wondered why he didn’t appear in a bullet-proof limousine like everybody else does, but it was explained that this Pope was a very humble man and this was his way of connecting with the humbler and poorer masses who, his staffers assured him, have to be content with tiny Fiats.

There were, inevitably, the voices of skeptics who wondered why — if he was so humble — why he didn’t fly around in a modest Cessna instead of a palatial Alitalia Boeing, but they were quickly dismissed. Others surmised that lagging sales of Fiat 500s called for some helpful Papal advertising. Some suggested that if he really wanted to be ultra-humble he could have searched the junkyards for a used Yugo instead of a brand-new Fiat 500, but it was generally acknowledged that the man certainly has guts. Not everybody is willing to take the chance that a Fiat 500 will get you where you want to go. And if you think this is too harsh a criticism, I plead in mitigation that a girl friend of mine had a Fiat 500 that broke down in an isolated spot in Africa and left us stranded in the midst of black tribesmen who weren’t behaving very humbly. We survived, but this has affected my thinking about Fiat 500s ever since.

No matter. What I really wanted to ask was this: If the Pope were a boating man, what kind of boat would he choose to be humble in?

What about a Catalina 27? It’s one of a bunch of Belly-Button Boats (everybody has one) but it’s probably the best-selling 27-foot sailboat ever made.  And yet, while it’s modest, and largely non-polluting, it rather lacks a certain humility. This is not its own fault. The problem is that, as soon as you acquire what the hoi polloi perceives to be a “yacht,” you move into a different, less-humble social category.

Okay, how about a MacGregor26, then? It’s a boat for sailing newbies. But no, wait a minute. That 80 hp outboard motor doesn’t look too humble, does it? What you need for true humility is a 2 hp aircooled Honda. Ah, but then the nautical Pope would be even slower than a Fiat 500, so that wouldn’t do.

A Laser, maybe? Nah, he’d probably lose all his security men in one of those famous weather rolls while running dead downwind. And definitely no Hinckleys, of course. They’re modest-looking and understated, admittedly, but you could buy half-a-dozen Fiat 500s for the price of one decent Hinckley. Well, what about a Sunfish, then? Now there’s a real BBB for you. It has a nice old-fashioned rig, just like the Pope has. But wait, isn’t that a lateen sail? Wasn’t that rig introduced by ancient Muslim sailors? Good grief, they might have been Al Qaeda or ISIS. Whoa! Can’t go there. Not with a Pope in tow, anyway.  

Now I’m thinking Wharram Tiki 21. But there’s always the danger that a 79-year-old Pope could miss his step and fall into the drink between the two hulls. Did somebody say West Wight Potter 15? I’m afraid the sight of His Eminence perched in that tiny cockpit with a West Marine inflatable life preserver covering the papal robes is not one I care to imagine.

So I guess the answer is a gondola. I should have thought of that before. After all, it’s the Fiat 500 of the Venetian waterways. Small and slow and strangely shaped, but not so bad if your gondolier is trained to sing your kind of hymns and vespers and matins and things. Nothing makes you humbler than a gondolier who doesn’t know how or when to shut up. If you can manage not to strangle him, you must know the true meaning of humility.

Today’s Thought

Early in life I had to choose between honest arrogance and hypocritical humility. I chose honest arrogance and have seen no occasion to change.

— Frank Lloyd Wright (Recalled on his death, 8 Apr 59)

Tailpiece

“I hear you’re related to European royalty.”

“Not quite, but I had a British uncle who was a Peer.”

“Really? I had an uncle with bladder trouble, too.”

(Drop by every Monday, Wednesday, Friday for a new Mainly about Boats column.)

Do you find information about Yacht Boat Plans are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Yacht Boat Plans. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Boat Plans Pdf | Remember boaters are voters

Boat Plans Pdf

MY FRIENDS, a lot has been said recently about immigration and gun control. Much hot air has been released over who did what in Benghazi, and how to deal with Mr. Putin and ISIS. But what have our elected representatives done to ease the lot of suffering boatowners? Who has spoken a single word in favor of fewer taxes and more amenities for sailors and powerboaters?

Is this not wicked? Is this not discrimination? Is this not un-American behavior of the worst kind?

It’s as if Obama and Mr. Boehner have never heard of decent, hardworking owners of sailboats — people who live honest lives, pay their taxes, and contribute to the economy by consuming large amounts of beer.

A pox on such thoughtless politicians, I say. You can’t trust a presidential candidate who doesn’t sail. Have they never wondered what happens to old shellbacks when they are cruelly deprived of their beloved boats? They tell me that old golfers never die; they merely lose their balls. But what happens to sailors confronted with ever-rising slip fees and haulout charges? They can’t even afford to paint their own bottoms.

My friends, we must use the power of the vote to change this desperate state of affairs. We must let it be known that we want a president who can steer a ketch or at least helm a Sunfish. We want a Vice-President who can hand and reef and splice as well as take over the White House when the President is away playing golf in Hawaii. We want leaders who aren’t afraid to fight for a boat owner’s right to bop a banker on the bean when he tries to repossess a humble sloop or cutter.

My friends, in this present hour we are all gearing up to vote. If your candidates can’t sail, it probably means they have no hearts. Throw the bums out.

My name is John Vigor and I approve this message.

Today’s Thought

I tell you, Folks, all Politics is Apple Sauce.

— Will Rogers, The Illiterate Digest

Tailpiece

“She told me you told her the secret I told you not to tell her.”

“Aw gee, I told her not to tell you I told her.”

“You did? Well for goodness’ sake don’t tell her I told you she told me you told her.”

Do you find information about Boat Plans Pdf are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Boat Plans Pdf. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Dinghy Boat Plans | Hockey Puck Manufacture or Epoxy is Stressful II

Dinghy Boat Plans

Did I mention that epoxy is stressful?  To recap:  You have 15 to 30 minutes to get a bucket full of epoxy mixed, applied, and secured down before it turns into a rock-hard mistake that must be laboriously chipped, chiseled, and sanded off. 

Add to that, less than ideal conditions of 95°F days and adding a thickening filler that reduces the epoxy pot-life by a huge factor. 

During our days of mixing thickened epoxy (to adhere joints together and fill gaps), we inadvertently manufactured many hockey pucks in the bottom of our mixing containers. 

But by far the most interesting mistake I made was one one particularly hot day that I made a triple batch.  I broke the batch down into three containers, and successfully used the first batch before realizing that the other two batches had already begun to gel.  One of the three had kicked off dramatically and begun to melt through the plastic mixing container.  I set it out in the yard somewhere safe.

"Before Its Time"  2012.  Mixed Media: Plastic, epoxy resin, natural materials.

It formed an interesting, uh, sculpture as all the epoxy melting through the bottom oozed into and solidified around various bits of yard mulch.

Here is out collection of hockey pucks and sculptures weve created.  As we move to finishing the hull, well be mixing thin batches with no filler, so the likelihood of unexpected epoxy disasters decreases.

This is what a long day of working with epoxy does to me.


Do you find information about Dinghy Boat Plans are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Dinghy Boat Plans. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Boat Plans Bateau | Racer cruisers and vice versa

Boat Plans Bateau

I WAS THINKING the other day that I need another little Santana 22 sloop.  I owned one about 20 years ago. I turned her into a miniature “sport cruiser” and loved her to bits. She was the first successful  design from the board of Gary Mull, one of my favorite sailboat designers. About 800 Santana 22s were built by the Schock company in California in the late 1960s and early 70s. You’d think there would be at least one still around here in reasonable condition, but if there is, I can’t find it in this neck of the woods.

Mull was one who had very definite ideas about the difference between cruiser/racers and racer/cruisers. He didn’t design either. He simply created what he called “good sailboats.”

He was quoted as saying:  “If you call one a club racer, what you are really saying is that it is a racing boat that isn’t quite good enough to race against the real racing boats. It can only do club racing.

“If you call it a cruiser/racer, that’s some sort of hermaphrodite that is neither fish nor fowl, but is probably slower than a racer/cruiser, which is also a hermaphrodite but maybe looks racier than its cruiser/racer cousin.”

Whatever other people called his designs, it didn’t matter to him. Here is what he strove for in all his boats:

* Good looks and performance. “It has to be good-looking and it has to sail well.”

* Good balance.

* An airy, bright, pleasant interior. (“So you don’t feel like you’re going to jail when you go down below.”)

* A comfortable cockpit. (“Where you can work the boat without bashing your elbows or tripping over or whatever.”)

As for cruiser/racers and racer/cruisers, his philosophy was simple: “If you want to cruise for a while, you can do it by simply loading aboard the stores and some clothes, and just do it. If you want to race it, you can do that by off-loading some of the stores and gear and going racing.

A “good sailboat” like this wouldn’t be a successful racer under the International Offshore Rule “because it’s not an IOR boat,” said Mull. “But it’s probably going to be a better cruising boat than 99 percent of the cruising boats on the market, which are caricatures of cruising boats.”

Strong words from a strong character who was one of America’s most talented designers.

Today’s Thought

To me, the drawn language is a very revealing language; one can see in a few lines whether a man is really an architect.

— Eero Saarinen, NY Times, 5 Jun 77

Tailpiece

Rumor has it that the Feds are going to replace the dollar bill with a metal coin.

It’s called the quarter.

Do you find information about Boat Plans Bateau are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Boat Plans Bateau. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Pontoon Boat Plans | Fiberglass Bond Coat

Pontoon Boat Plans

Okay, so lets review.

Fiberglass (of more accurately glass-fiber reinforced plastic) is a composite laminate of hardening plastic goo reinforced with Ziggy Stardust-esque silvery spun glass fabric.  We have already applied the "seal coat" and need another several layers before were done.  I found the Glen-L instructions for applying fiberglass for you.  This is pretty much what we used.

Heres the application sequence for the "dry method:"

1. Seal Coat - seals the wood surface prior to applying the cloth
2. Bond Coat - used to wet out and bond the cloth to the surface
3. Fill Coat - fills the weave of the cloth
4. "Finish" Coat - provides enough resin build-up for final sanding and finishing
5. Arent We Done Yet? Coat - enough epoxy hopefully to hide the texture of the cloth
6. Seriously, This Is The Last Coat - finally enough to more or less completely hide the texture underneath

And then after that we have to protect it like a new born baby from dangerous UV rays with paint or varnish.  Well do varnish.

We agonized over this day for weeks.  We thought it would be stressful and it did not disappoint.  We enlisted the help of Jen to complete our three person team.  This was one of those days we talked a lot about The Plan and worked out roles beforehand.  Kai was the epoxy mixer (and later the touch-up person).  Jen was the epoxy applier/roller/splooger.  And I was the smoother downer/problem fixer/epoxy redistributor. 

All summer, it had been ridiculously hot and sunny.  But the day we chose to do the stressy bond coat, the sky threatened to rain and spit occasional little dribblets on us.  Grrr. 

We stapled the cloth in place to the hull smoothing out the wrinkles best we could.  Though the instructions suggested removing staples before the cure, we found it was better to wait until the epoxy was completely cured before removing the staples lest you pull up the cloth.  Note that putting the staples in, we were careful to make sure they stuck out enough to allow them to be easily pried up with a screwdriver.

The Glen-L instructions suggested that for places where the cloth met it be double-lapped with tapered edges tapered.  That is, lay one layer of cloth, sanding the edge to a taper after it cures.  Then lay the other layer of cloth overlapping, and then sand that other edge after it cures.  That meant that since we couldnt do the overlap in one day, we needed at least two days to finish the bond coat.  

So we got all clever and did half of the bottom and one side on Day One.  Then the other half and other side on Day Two.

Each of us had a set of tools.  Kai used the usual measured containers and an endless supply of stir sticks.  Jen used a dense foam roller with a long handle.  And I used a wide trowel and a fiberglass roller that I handmade with alternating-sized washers and a paint roller.  My job was to go behind Jen and trowel any pools of excess resin into areas that needed more of it, and then roll down the stubborn cloth that had bubbles or warbles in it with the roller.

The magic of this process is that as soon as the glass cloth is covered with wet resin it turns transparent.  So it is easy to see if youve applied enough resin to wet it out.  Here Ill interject a warning:

Do not skimp on resin during the bond coat.  Make sure every bit of the fiberglass cloth is wetted out and transparent.  The next coat WILL NOT cover any areas that got too little resin.

We had some spots like this.  We learned the hard way.  Take a look at the very edge of the corner on the photo above.  Tiny but still irritating.  These places where there are air bubbles behind the fiberglass are potential places for air and moisture to gather and rot to form.

However, other blemishes, like little bits of resin-saturated glass fiber that stuck out (got snagged by my trowel in many cases) or awkward corners, were easy enough to sand down and resin over in the next layer.

In general, places we had worried about, particularly the seams looked great.  After they cured I would have to sand them down in preparation for the next layer.

After this first bond coat layer cured overnight, we sanded down any wacky blemishes and tapered all the places where the glass cloth would overlap.

Then we laid the cloth over the other half of the bottom and the remaining side and applied epoxy over that.

When this second half of the bond coat had cured, we tapered those edges and the result was quite beautiful.  The texture of the cloth was clearly visible, so the next step is the fill coat.

Youll notice there are few photos of us actually working this work day.  Uh, no surprise.  We were definitely eyes on the prize in order to get this done in a way that didnt suck.

Do you find information about Pontoon Boat Plans are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Pontoon Boat Plans. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Boat Plans Aluminum | An explosive tale from Down Under

Boat Plans Aluminum

STAND BY for a long, long story. It comes from a reader in New Zealand who saw my previous column about automated ships. It reminded him of an incident that happened some years ago, and which seemed to be worth relating in print. He doesn’t want his name used so I have taken advantage of his anonymity to change some of his prose from New Zealandish to American — mostly harbour to harbor, even where harbor is actually wrong.

So I recommend that you fortify yourself with a six-pack of your favorite beverage and settle down for the longest read this column has ever produced:

 

The followingis a story that while seemingly unlikely, is true.  It occurred sometime in the late 1980s or possibly the earlier part of the 1990s, however I cannot recall the actual year. I read about it in an obscure magazine in the 1990s.  I believe very few people actually know the tale.  Just a few years ago I happened to mention it to an acquaintance with a long history in the navy, whom, it transpired, had been directly involved in the issue at the time (New Zealand has a small navy). 

I related the story to him as I remembered it, he told me that I had a good memory and whoever had written the article had known what they were talking about.  He assured me it was completely correct.

To fully understand the saga it is firstly necessary to provide a background to the harbors of Auckland and the navy of New Zealand at the time.  The main North Island city of Auckland has two coasts, the East Coast and the West Coast and two harbors, one on each of these coasts.  The East Coast is generally reasonably calm.  The main harbor is the Waitemata Harbor and the city was originally started around it.  Within it is the main commercial port for the city, directly in front of the central business district on the Southern shore and the naval base opposite on the Northern Shore, known as Devonport. The Waitemata is very well protected and opens into the Hauraki Gulf, a large body of water itself quite protected, surrounded on three sides by land and containing hundreds of islands big and small, truly one of the best small-boat cruising grounds in the world, as people like John Welsford attest to.

The West Coast Manukau Harbor is several times larger than the Waitemata, and consists mostly of shallow sand and mudflats.  A 15-mile-long tidal channel from the entrance to the city provides access to a small commercial wharf that hosts fishing boats and very small coastal container ships.  As with most West-Coast harbors, there is a narrow entrance with a highly dangerous shifting bar (of the sand variety, not the alcohol type).  Tidal currents here push well over 5 knots with seas of 2–3 meters on a good day. In bad weather seas can be in excess of 10 meters. There is a harbor station on the remote southern head where signals indicate the state of the bar and whether the entrance is open or closed due to dangerous conditions. Once outside the harbor you are in the often stormy Tasman Sea, the coastline inhospitable, the next land Australia. Whereas the Waitemata and Hauraki Gulf are packed with cruising boats, virtually no one cruises the Manukau Harbor, though a smallish number of recreational fishing boats do use it.

The two harbors back onto each other and almost cut the North Island into two separate pieces.  At the narrowest point, only about a mile separates a muddy mangrove lined upper Waitemata creek from a muddy mangrove-lined upper Manukau one. A long time ago there was talk of a canal to link the two harbors. But the reality is if a boat in one harbor wants to become a boat in the other harbor, then (short of a trailer), the vessel must voyage up to and around the top of the North Island and back down the other side, a distance of around 400 nm, or a journey of twice that distance around the bottom of the Island and back.

In the 1980s and early ’90s, NZ’s Navy consisted primarily of four elderly frigates —  in size and capability Americans would probably consider them a light destroyer.  They were of the Leander Class, a British design from the late 1950s/early ’60s with a twin-barrel 4.5 inch turret gun, a small first-generation surface-to-air missile system known as Seakat and an antisubmarine mortar. A small torpedo-carrying helicopter known as a Wasp was carried in a hangar on the rear deck.

Live ordinance for weapons is not stored at the main naval base due to the proximity of residential housing and the commercial port. Instead there is a small base for this in the upper Waitemata known as Kauri Point. Naval vessels requiring ordinance provisioning are towed up the narrow channel to Kauri Point and loaded there. When supplies were needed, they had to be ordered from Europe – I assume England, due to the origin of the vessels and weapons systems. These would be sent via a charted freighter which would arrive in a designated ‘safe’ area for explosive-carrying vessels behind Browns Island just outside the port, whence the navy would meet the vessel and take it through the main port and up to Kauri Point to unload. As the navy had not seen any live action for at least several decades, ordinance usage was limited to training and quite minimal. I am not sure, but I suspect resupplying only occurred every few years at most.

And so it came to pass at this time that new supplies were needed. An order was sent and someone got hold of a small Danish-registered freighter. This was loaded with all manner of the above weaponry and away it sailed from Europe to New Zealand. An expected date of arrival behind Browns Island in the Waitemata was noted. The weeks passed. The expected arrival date came. And went. Every morning the navy would literally look out of their office windows in Devonport and check behind Browns Island. No ship. They began sending out radio calls and asking arriving vessels for sightings. Nothing. Over a week went by. Just as people were starting to get a little nervous, the navy received a call from the Manukau Harbor Master at remote South Head.  The harbor was closed due to poor conditions at the entrance, but a strange foreign ship had appeared off the bar requesting assistance to enter ‘Auckland Harbor.’ The Harbor Master had heard the navy trying to locate a ship.  Might this be the boat in question? The navy despatched a car to the site. Trusty binoculars confirmed the identity of the vessel.  Communication was established. The conversation with the Danish Master went something like this.  You’ll have to make up your own accents.  I imagine something like the Swedish Chef of the Muppets on one side and a toned down Crocodile Dundee on the other (New Zealanders sound like cultured, polite Australians, though I realize this is something of an oxymoron):

Ship: “’Ullo ‘ullo. Ve are trying to vind Auckland Harbor and zee navy. Ve haf a delivery.  Lots of boom bang stuff?”

Navy: “Gidday Mate. Well this is Auckland and the navy, but you’ve got the wrong blinkin’ harbor. You need to be in the other harbor.”

Ship: “Vich ozer harbor?  Can ve not cume into zis one?”

Navy: “No way hozay.”

Ship: “Vere is zis ozer harbor?”

Navy: “On the other coast mate. When you came across the Pacific, you should have come through into the Waitemata Harbor. Crikey, you’ve gone round the block and come to the Manukau Harbor.”

Ship: “Blast and damn. How do ve get to zis ozer harbor?”

Navy: “Shake out your chart mate.  Feast your eyes on that and you’ll see you need to turn around and go back around the North Island and come down the East Coast.”

Ship: “Um. Er. Uh. Can you gif me directions pleaz?”

Navy: “Hang a 180. Steam North for about 200 miles. When you run out of land, hang a right. About twenty miles on you’ll run out of dirt again.  Hang another right. Trundle on about 200 miles. Keep close to the coast and you’ll enter the Hauraki Gulf. The Waitemata Harbor is on the right when you run out of sea. Ah, watch out for Islands, rocks, and reefs and she’ll be right.”

Ship: “Roger, Wilco. Out” (or the Danish equivalent)

Navy: “Beaut mate. Catch ya in a couple a days.”

The vessel duly appeared in the Waitemata several days later. When the navy went on board it was discovered that although the ship had charts for the Atlantic, it did not have a single nautical chart for the Pacific Ocean. All they had was a school atlas. They had navigated their way across the entire Pacific using nothing more than an A4-sized child’s map. Given that New Zealand was little more than a squiggle in the corner, it was unsurprising they had mistaken which side of the country the correct port was on. Quite how they had managed to avoid the countless islands and atolls across the Pacific, to say nothing of the hazards of the NZ coast was, and probably will always remain, something of a mystery. This was before the days of GPS.

Normally spending most of their days steaming around the Atlantic, they apparently saw little point investing in charts for other places and decided to wing it when they entered the Pacific. Imagine that day on the bridge. “Well, Number One, that’s the Atlantic gone. Roll out the Pacific charts and let’s have a look.” 

“Ah, Captain, there are none.  However I noticed I accidently packed my son’s school book. There’s a map of the Pacific in there somewhere.”  “Jolly good. Pop it down here on the table. How hard can it be? Full steam ahead!”

I suppose you have to admire the fact that they got all this way without serious mishap, while carrying enough high explosive to do some serious damage and start a small war.

Today’s Thought

There is a great deal of unmapped country within us.

— George Eliot, Daniel Deronda

Tailpiece

"Dad, whats bigamy?"

"Well, son, its when two rites make a wrong."

(Drop by every Monday, Wednesday, Friday for a new Mainly about Boats column.)

Do you find information about Boat Plans Aluminum are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Boat Plans Aluminum. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Kayak Boat Plans | What are we fishing Winter Steelhead Gear

Kayak Boat Plans

John fighting a Chrome winter Steelhead while the snow falls

We get asked a lot what gear we are personally using here in the shop. Well, it is winter steelhead season here, our favorite time of year to fish, and all of us at the shop are polishing up our rods and reels, collecting lines and sink tips, and tying flies like madmen. John, Ryan and I fish as much as anyone else out there and this is the gear that we are rocking for the winter.

John:

G. Loomis NRX 13’ 7/8
Galvan Torque T-10

G. Loomis NRX

The G. Loomis NRX 13’0” 7/8wt is one of the sweetest rods out there. It is light in hand, and the grain window is huge, but it fishes best with lighter lines than most 7 weight rods, and likely all 8wt rods. Most 7 weights fish well with a 500-550 grain Skagit head, but this rod is dialed in with a 475 grain Skagit, yet it still has plenty of backbone to land those big winter hogs that John gets into.

It is really easy to cast, even though it is a fast rod. Most fast rods are difficult to stay dialed in with. Once an angler starts to get tired after a few hours, their casting stroke falls apart. With faster rods, casts can get ugly quicker than with slow rods, but with the NRX, the balance between the flex in the tip and the stiffness in the butt end gives this rod some room for error and recovery when casting. There is also tremendous power behind this rod even with how light it is and how light the grain window is.
The thing that really drives John to love this rod is that it is comfortable in hand. The cork is high end, thin and very easy to hang onto and fish all day.

John likes this reel for several reasons. The price is right, it looks cool and has a sweet sound. Those are the superficial reasons, which often seem to be more important to consumers than the solid construction, the easily adjustable drag and smooth overall function. This reel is light in hand, but balances the lightweight NRX perfectly. Galvan makes “spey weights” for adding weight to a reel in order to counterbalance heavier spey rods, but this is unnecessary with the NRX. Another reason that John likes the Torque is that in all of the years that we have been selling reels, Galvans rarely, if ever, come in for repair work, less than any other reel per unit sold. We’re not saying that they are maintenance-free, but they are definitely very reliable and low-maintenance.

The RIO Skagit Max lines are smooth and easy to cast. Rods shorter than 12’6” are best served with a Skagit Max Short, while rods between 12’6” and 14’0” take the Skagit Max perfectly. Long rods over 14’0” will take the new RIO Skagit Max Long. We have had a few guys tell us how they tried the Max Long on a shorter rod and didn’t like it all that much.

John likes the Rio Skagit Max because of the bright orange back end and the subtle blue color that still shows up well in low light. It casts well too, but mostly John likes it because when matched with 50# RIO Slickshooter and chartreuse backing, it creates a nice Seahawks colored theme on his reel.

Ryan and I couldn’t choose one set-up each. We both take two rods/reels to the river, so you get to hear about both of them.

Ryans Winter Setups

Ryan:

Sage ONE 7116 Switch
Tibor Signature 9/10

Winston Boron III TH 7133-4
Tibor Riptide

Ryan has been a big Winston fan (like me) for years now. The new Boron III – TH 7133-4 is another beautiful, powerful, smooth rod from Winston, and it is the star of the Winston Spey lineup. The 13’3” 7wt is the go-to year-round steelhead rod for the Northwest. It has a deep load and a smooth, powerful release. Coupled with a great finish, good grip and excellent components, Ryan loves this rod for all of the reasons mentioned above, but there is one thing that drives him to. Winstons are smooth and it’s hard to describe until you have cast one, but there is no “smoother” rod out there.

Another reason that Ryan is high on Winston is that the boron in the butt holds a
“reserve” of power for when you need to turn a fish or push that cast a few more feet. It is what they call the “Boron Advantage”.

The Winston is loaded up with the new Airflo Skagit Compact G2 540 grain head, and it matches perfectly. The 540 grain is a great match that allows an angler to throw larger flies, and as a Midwestern Muskie fisherman, Ryan sure likes his big flies. The G2 Skagit Compact line is just about perfect. Ryan likes it because the two tone color scheme is pleasing on the eyes and the length is just right for 12’6” – 14’0” rods. He knows that it does everything that you could ask of a Skagit Head.

Ryan also picked up a Sage ONE 7116-4 earlier this year. Switch rods are not the go-to rods around here, but having one in the arsenal is a must if you are a steelhead junkie which Ryan has become (especially because of the lack of muskie). He picked this rod up because it is very lightweight, and easy to cast. The Sage ONE is fast, but not too fast and it is the easiest switch rod to learn on. Matched up with a RIO Skagit Max Short 475, this 7116-4 will huck big flies and heavy sink tips, yet it will maintain tight loops at long distances. He picked this up primarily to fish Rock Creek in Stevenson where he lives, but switch rods are the preferred method to fish big boulder gardens on large rivers, and to rule the small coastal rivers like the Wilson and the Trask.

Now Ryan loves his Tibor Reels. I have never seen him fishing anything else. He loves them because they are rock solid in fresh or saltwater, but the biggest reason he loves them is reliability. Much like why John loves his Galvan. After years of abuse, dropping, kicking, and scratching these reels all up and down, he has never had a problem with any of his Tibor reels. In fact, he just ordered the new Signature 9/10 to put on his switch rod. He does like to remind me that there have been more world record fish caught on Tibors than any other reel.

Andrew:

Burkheimer 7134-4
Lamson ARX 3.5+

Echo Glass 7110-4
Hardy Salmon Marquis #1

I love my Burk! If you follow the blog, you may have noticed. I can go on for days about the quality of the rod from the cork to the guides to the finish, but in the end, it is very easy to hold all day, it casts like a dream and I love the way it handles fish. I have a more complete write-up in Why I Love my Burkheimer. This rod loves the Airflo Skagit Compact G2 540 grain head, but I have been fishing the S/A Third Coast Skagit 520 grain head on it recently.

The new Scientific Anglers Third Coast Skagit a very good, very overlooked line in the spey world. Scientific Anglers, in general, does not get much love in the spey world, but this new line casts just as well as any RIO or Airflo head. The Third Coast has a good color scheme, and it turns over big flies and tips with ease. I have been very impressed with it so far and would recommend it to anyone that is looking for a Skagit line.

Echo Glass 7129 Rod Review

I recently picked up the Glass Switch 11’0” 7wt and I am in love! This rod is converting me into a switch rod believer. I was already a believer in the slower action of fiberglass due to the incredible power behind it. I no longer own any spey rods that I would consider to be fast action. Glass is great for guys that get lazy with their cast after a few hours. A lazy cast on a glass rod still goes the distance with ease, while many faster rods get frustrating about five hours into a long day of fishing.

Echo Glass

I matched the Echo Glass Switch 7110-4 up with an OPST Commando 350 grain head and it is an absolute joy to fish. There will be a full article on OPST heads shortly, but just know that the OPST heads run at 75-100 grains lighter than their Airflo Skagit Switch and RIO Skagit Max Short counterparts. We’ll get into why in that other article, but if one were to fish the Airflo Skagit Switch or Rio Max Short in a 420-450 range on this rod, they would be very happy. The OPST head is amazing in the fact that my casting time and stroke is shorter, so I am spending less time in between casts and more time with my fly in the water.

Now I am a Lamson guy, much like Ryan is a Tibor guy. I have a ton of Lamson reels and the reason is that I bought a couple of them when I first started fishing and I liked them enough that I bought another, and another, and here we are. In the thirteen years of owning Lamson Reels, I have had zero problems with any of them that I did not cause myself. (I bent a spool when I sat on it, and I failed to rinse one out after fishing in saltwater and the bearing rusted).

I love the ARX (Lamson ARX 4+ Spey Reel review) for a couple of reasons. The first reason is the Heavy Duty caged frame. Monofilament running lines (like the OPST Lazar Line) tend to sneak through the gap between the frame and spool, but the Heavy Duty frame makes that impossible. The HD frame also adds integrity, making it more difficult to bend the spool or frame. There is still plenty of surface area to palm the reel, and the drag is just as smooth as any other Lamson reel. It balances well with the Burkie and it looks cool too.

I will soon be getting a Hardy Salmon Marquis #1 to put on this new Echo Glass Switch 7110-4. Right now, I am fishing an older Lamson Velocity 3.5. The Echo Glass has a classic look with classic, old-school materials. I want to match it with a reel that has that same classic look and feel to it. The Hardy Salmon Marquis #1 is a good fit. It has a click-pawl drag system, the same system that has been used for over 100 years for good reason. It is the AK-47 of drag systems. It is nearly foolproof and will work no matter what you do to it. There isn’t much stopping power to a click-pawl reel, but it does have the most classic sound that has ever been produced by a reel. It also has a heavy-duty frame to prevent mono from slipping, extra reinforcement for accidents, and the #1 a good size for the Glass Switch, plus the price is right.

You may have noticed a trend here. We love reels that are reliable, especially reels that tend to have a long history of solid performance across the industry, as well as with us personally. Each of us likes a reel that is cool looking, but for the most part, we look for a reel that is unlikely to fail.

We prefer rods that are easy to hold onto for a day of fishing, as well as rods that are forgiving and easy to cast. We all have different casting styles with different tempos, but for all three of us, the most important thing is a comfortable grip that is fun to cast all day.

As far as lines go: Winter time is Skagit time. If you are fishing a spey or switch rod, but not fishing a Skagit head, then you are missing out on fish and making things harder than they need to be. RIO, Scientific Anglers and Airflo all make equally impressive lines, and any angler should be happy with any of them, but the most important thing is to match the right length and grain weight to the rod. The OPST head is a bit different, but amazing in its own way. Again, we’ll get to that later.

Well, that is what we are fishing here at the shop this winter. Now it’s just a matter of putting these fine products on the water and getting into a fish or two.

Andrew Perrault
Gorge Fly Shop | Product Specialist
541.386.6977

"Fly Fish the World with Us"

Do you find information about Kayak Boat Plans are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Kayak Boat Plans. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..

Boat Plans Bolger | Where are the anchor rollers

Boat Plans Bolger

WHEN I WALK AROUND our local marina I can hardly believe how many boats lack anchor rollers. What were the manufacturers thinking? Thirty footers and bigger, without any proper means of retrieving the anchor and its rode. Did they imagine their boats would never anchor, from choice or necessity?

In my humble opinion, no boat over 20 feet in length should be allowed to leave the factory without a proper anchor roller at the bow.

Anyone who has ever tried to weigh anchor by hand in a boat without a bow roller knows how awkward and difficult it is. Consequently, you’ll notice that all sorts of after-market rollers get bolted on by boat owners seeking to ease the pain of retrieving the anchor. Some of them look far too flimsy for the job. Some stick out from behind the forestay at an odd angle. Others have to be bolted on top of a bed of teak to bring them to the correct level.

And they’re not cheap, either. A reasonably sized one that will house the anchor costs in the region of $100 to $200 with shipping. And then you have all the fun of fitting it yourself.

I can only imagine that unscrupulous boat manufacturers deliberately omit a bow roller in an effort to keep the selling price down a few bucks. It’s a wicked practice, like selling a new car without a horn, or without a spare tire. If I was in charge of the boat-manufacturing industry I would make it a federal crime to sell a boat without an anchor roller. But since they’re never likely to elect me to that position, the situation is unlikely to change unless we all start complaining to our representatives in Congress.

Never mind health care for the moment. Never mind ISIS and Afghanistan. Forget all that for now. Surprise your elected U.S. representative. Ask him or her to sponsor legislation about bow rollers. You never know. It might be such a refreshing change from the same-old, same-old, that Washington DC could catch fire with enthusiasm for compulsory bow rollers. And if that means some boat manufacturers will end up behind bars, so be it. They deserve it.

Today’s Thought

The law is the last result of human wisdom acting upon human experience for the benefit of the public.

—Samuel Johnson, Miscellanies

Tailpiece

“Did you realize that old Joe survived mustard gas and pepper spray?”

“No. How’s he doing?”

“Oh he’s now a seasoned veteran.”

 

Do you find information about Boat Plans Bolger are you looking for? If not, below may help you find more information about the Boat Plans Bolger. Thank you for visiting, have a great day.

Read More..