Wooden Boat Plans Australia | An appeal for bow rollers

Wooden Boat Plans Australia

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 ever 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 $200 with shipping. And then you have all the fun of fitting it yourself.

I was lucky enough to own a boat that was designed from the beginning to have an anchor roller. It was part of a simple bronze fitting that incorporated the bow chainplate, a bow roller, and the stemhead fitting to which the forestay attached. I blessed its little heart every time I weighed anchor, which I was able to do sitting down on deck behind it and bracing my feet in the anchor well.

In the days of my youth I used to be able to raise that way a 35-pound CQR on an all-chain 5/16-inch rode in 90 feet of water. But when I later bought a 27-foot Cape Dory with a built-in roller, my anchor weighed only 25 pounds and there was only 30 feet of 1/4-inch chain; the rest was nylon line. So I had it a lot easier and I was very grateful.

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 were 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 Obamacare for the moment. Never mind Trump and Isis and Iran and North Korea. 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 know old Joe survived mustard gas and pepper spray?”

“No. How’s he doing?”

“Oh he’s a seasoned veteran now.”

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

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Wood Boat Plans And Kits | Why horror is sometimes rife

Wood Boat Plans And Kits

IT OCCURS TO ME now and then that I’ve written and repeated just about everything I know about boats and the sea, and that my readers must be getting just a tad bored with it all. But then I remember that new generations keep coming along, generations that have to learn all the same old things all over again, because humans don’t seem to be able to pass on the seeds of experience to the fruit of their loins.

So I console myself by catering to the newbies, the neophytes who are anxious to learn how not to kill themselves at sea, the ones who have not yet been bored by my ravings. And interesting things happen at sea, believe me.

So, in this vein of dispensing help for the unwitting, I ask: Do you know why boats so often broach, roll broadside on, and capsize when they’re running before the wind in large waves? It’s because when a wave breaks under your stern you have practically no steering power to keep her running straight. The rudder is suspended in foam, not water, and it can’t do its job. If you’ve ever been dumped by a big breaker while body surfing you’ll know the awful feeling of not being able to float high enough to get your head above water.

And if your boat heels to 45 degrees, you don’t have much steering ability, in any case. Think about it. The rudder is trying to lift the stern toward the sky as much as it is trying to turn the stern sideways. And, of course, if you do a 90-degree capsize you can’t steer at all. If the rudder isn’t totally out of the water, as it would be on a tubby light-displacement boat, it will be horizontal and unable to turn the stern either way.

Stability at sea is always a fascinating subject for sailors, whether they actually get away from the sight of land or not, and one of the very basic facts about boats is that stability comes as a cube of the length, other things being more or less equal. This means that a 30-footer is 72 percent more stable than a 25-footer, which explains why a 30-footer can stand up to its canvas so much better. It also explains why a 30-footer costs so much more than a 25-footer. But that’s another subject for neophytes to learn about. Some other day, perhaps. Class dismissed.

Today’s Thought

It hath been an opinion that the French are wiser than they seem, and the Spaniards seem wiser than they are; but howsoever it be between nations, certainly it is so between man and man.

—Bacon, Essays

Tailpiece

Golfer: “You must be the worst caddie in the world.”

Caddie: “Oh come now — that would be far too much of a coincidence.”

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

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Boat Plans African Queen | A thing of beauty is a job forever

Boat Plans African Queen

WHEN I LIVED in South Africa I once owned a 30-foot boat that had bulwarks, a caprail, and a rubrail made of beautiful hardwood. I couldn’t help myself, I varnished it. And varnished it. And varnished it.  That hot sub-tropical sun burned through the varnish as if it were melting butter. Every six months I rubbed it all down and put on another two coats of varnish. But, man, it looked beautiful. People walking past in the marina used to come to a sudden halt and stare at it in awe.

Eventually, though, the inevitable happened. I got sick and tired of varnishing. I was also intending to sail that boat to America and I had plenty of other preparations to attend to. I had just about decided to paint all that nice wood a suitable buff color that looked almost like varnish from 20 feet away when I noticed the brightwork on another similar boat a few berths away. It was a lovely shade of honey teak, a transparent matte finish that always looked as if it had just been applied.

I saw the owner on board one day and asked him what kind of varnish he used.

“It’s not varnish, it’s Deks Olje,” he said. “It’s Norwegian magic. You just wipe it on with a rag. Rub it well in, all over, and you’re done. Just let it soak into the wood and dry. You don’t have to bother with fancy brushes and there’s no trouble with wind or dust.”

I couldn’t get to the boat store fast enough. I bought a large can of Deks Olje, which, lacking any knowledge of Norwegian,  I confidently translated as Deck Oil. The instructions claimed it was the “easiest maintenance system afloat,” a protective traditional wood oil, an alkyd-urethane resin. I was thrilled to have discovered it. 

I spent a week removing all the old varnish from my woodwork and sanded it smooth. It was a lot of work. I then applied three coats of Deks Olje with a clean rag. Nothing could have been simpler. Sure enough, it looked magnificent. It wasn’t shiny like the old varnish, but it had a deep, warm luster that enhanced the color and grain of the wood.

We went sailing offshore on day trials shortly afterward, and within two weeks the combined efforts of hot sun and warm salt water had devastated my Deks Olje. It looked terrible. Half of it appeared simply to have been washed away, leaving bare wood already going grey. Much of the rest had turned white, as if it were encrusted with some kind of chemical salt.  Needless to say, I was spitting mad.

I went back to the owner of the boat down the way. “My Deks Olje is a disaster,” I said. “How does yours stay so nice?”

“Oh, my Zulu house servant does it,” he said. “He comes down once a week and just applies a fresh coat. It’s the simplest thing. Takes him half an hour.”

”Once a week?” I said. “You mean, every week?”

“Yes,” he said. “Surely you have a servant?”

We sailed for the USA shortly afterward. I gritted my teeth and let the sun and waves remove the rest of the Deks Olje, which they did with remarkable efficiency. The brightwork weathered to a dignified silver grey and needed no attention at all.

Six months later I bought a can of good old-fashioned tung-oil varnish when we got to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and treated the wood to the old familiar routine. Once again, it looked magnificent and I sold the boat a few weeks later. I didn’t tell the new owner how soon he would have to re-varnish. I figured he was just lucky I hadn’t slapped on another few coats of Deks Olje.

Today’s Thought

 I cannot pretend to be impartial about the colors. I rejoice with the brilliant ones, and am genuinely sorry for the poor browns.

— Winston Churchill, Painting as a Pleasure

Tailpiece

“Your wife tells me she found out you dated an eye doctor in Alaska.”

“No, no, that was no eye doctor. She was an optical Aleutian.”

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

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