Sea Trials - First Sail

First Sail!

It was a beautiful day. Sunny with 11mph winds. I only went out for an hour to test the rigging. Everything went very well. She sails great.

I need to change some cleat locations and add a tiller extension to make her more convenient to sail. The hardest part was actually securing the boat to the trailer. I'll also get a spar/sail bag for transport and storage.

As I was by myself, only 1 picture. I'll add more soon.

Trailer build and registration

Finally back to work after a long winter. I ordered a trailer from Harbor Freight. It took about 4 hours to unpack and assemble. Then another 4 hours to wire the trailer and the car.

In Michigan I needed to display 3" tall letters for registration. So now I'm legal. If I could do it over, I would have gotten a narrower font.  The height was dictated by state law.

Sail arrived

The sail arrived. Was a nice day today so I rigged the sail for the first time.

I'm choosing to lace the sail to the mast. At least for the first few times out.

Winter is coming...

I'm waiting on a sail and a trailer.  It is going down to 31 tonight - so time for winter storage. The boat wont see water until 2016. I'm already excited about next spring.


Ryan came home from practice while I was experimenting with the rigging. He hopped in. I learned that I'll probably need to add a tiller extension. I've got all winter to decide whether to buy one or make one.

Rudder assembly mounted. This is one of the areas that I deviated from the plans. I elected to use pintles and gudgeons instead of eyebolts and rod.

Experimenting with the rigging.


























If we get a warm spell after the sail arrives, I'll rig it up. If not I'll be back in the spring.

Go fever

The end of sailing season is quickly approaching. It is tempting to rush steps or skip them altogether so I can get on the water. It is tough to contain this go fever. For the last 10 days or so all I have been doing is sanding, painting, sanding, and varnishing. Tedious work.

Below are pictures of my current progress. I still have several more days of sanding, painting and varnishing to go.

Still much to do including:

• Several days of varnish, sand, paint
• Mount rudder, cleats, oarlocks, inspection plates
• Decide on final rigging and purchase/mount appropriate hardware
• Register with the state and apply mandatory lettering
• Purchase/assemble trailer
• Get a sail

Dagger board, rub rails, trunk trim. Milestone 1 complete!

Today is a milestone. All wood parts are fabricated and installed on hull. Still much to do but getting closer now.

Well starting to paint the hull before finishing construction was a minor mistake. I thought it might be easier but I was wrong. I had to be very careful adding the rub rails and the cap for the trunk so as I didn't ruin the paint job.

Daggerboad is now laminated, shaped and stops added.

Trunk cap installed. First coat of epoxy on the daggerboard hanging in the background. The final piece, the port side rub rail, was added!

SAND, prime, SAND, paint, SAND, varnish, SAND...

Sand, prime, Sand, prime more, Sand, paint, Sand, varnish, Sand ....

You get the point. Sanding and more sanding. This post wont be updated for a while because all I'm doing is surface preparation and final finish.

On this picture the hull has 2 coats of primer on. Seats still have only epoxy. The rudder/tiller assembly is complete. It has 3 coats of varnish. I'm happy with the results.

Interior of hull fully painted with 2 coats of primer and 2 coats of Easypoxy. First coat of varnish has been applied to deck and seats.