Innehållsförteckning för January 2024 från Practical Boat Owner

To boldly go For many of us, boating is more about cruising along the coast or up a river than pushing the boundaries, and there is much pleasure to be had from it; I for one love nothing better than a gentle potter. But I am always intrigued by those who do err on the side of adventure. Belgian sailor Fons Oerlemans (page 43) certainly fits into this category; he has completed five Atlantic crossings, none of them by conventional craft. Instead, he has designed and built his own ‘boats’ – a raft from dredging pipes, a floating truck and even a sailing vessel from a 40-tonne steam boiler. Fons has got to be one of the most practical boat owners I have ever met, troubleshooting problems at sea in…

A record-breaking 95 boats left Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, on the ARC+ on 5 November, the largest number to date for the World Cruising Club rally. The yachts from 24 different nations (a third of them British) are bound for Port Louis, Grenada, with a stopover in Mindelo, Cape Verde. Youngest crew is seven-month old Roux Clarke Stevens on board Pinnacle, while skipper Chris Lotthé, aged 87, is the oldest, sailing on Namaste. Almost a third of the boats are multihulls, 11 vessels were launched in 2023, and there are 44 children taking part – another event record. Well-established northeast tradewinds should see the yachts arrive in Mindelo, Cape Verde, from 10 to 12 November having sailed 850 miles. After a week’s break, they will then set sail on 17…

While I was busy doing strengthening exercises and learning to walk again after my rather serious regatta accident, Karima was sitting in her marina berth, exactly as I’d left her three months before, expecting to be back in days. Graham of the garage had said he’d take a look at her engine, but refuelling was on my urgent list. Philip had emptied the bilges, which was gold-star helpfulness, but we’d had a spell of rain so I wanted to check them again. I wanted a calm day to hoist the mainsail and re-stow it beautifully before it went below for the winter, and we’d need to get the jib off. I just wanted to get on board my boat. “How are you thinking to work this?” Phillip asked. “Is there…

Leisure boats don’t need to pass an MOT. You can buy one tomorrow, sail it away, and if it sinks because a skin fitting shears off, or if it explodes because of a gas leak, then that’s your bad luck. Caveat emptor – buyer beware – applies when it comes to buying a boat, as the RYA explained in last month’s PBO. There are unscrupulous sellers out there who think nothing of slapping a bit of filler and paint over a serious fault. Marine surveyor Ben Sutcliffe-Davies has seen it all. What you can – and should – do, is commission a marine survey. Even if the boat’s asking price is less than the cost of a survey, you could save yourself a hefty boat disposal fee, injury or worse.…

The couple next to us in the marina at Albufeira in Portugal are lovely. They bought their Dufour 36 Classic two years ago from a Frenchman and have been fettling it since, ready to do a transatlantic circuit. Their Volvo Penta 2030 engine has only done 600 hours (the Frenchman didn’t do much!) and I’d shown them how to change the filters and oil etc. However, from day one there has been an issue with the cooling system. The engine sets off its overheat alarm if it is motored hard and the raw water system leaks from hose clip joints. The previous owner paid for the local workshop to sort it as part of the deal and the intercooler rubber end caps were replaced to allegedly cure the problem. They…

Electrical wire used on boats should be tinned (covered in solder) along its whole length. This is expensive, so most production boats have ‘automotive-type’ wire, which allows corrosion to spread along the strands of wire under the insulation. This makes it impossible to remake joints successfully. Where one end of a wire is located in a damp atmosphere, tinned wire should always be used. Unless it’s unavoidable, don’t run wires through the bilge where their condition will deteriorate. Running wiring Use a push wiring threader to run wires through conduits and pipes. 1. Insert one end into the conduit or gap through which you need to run the wire. 2. Then push the threader through. 3. Then use the threader to pull the electric wire all the way back through.…

People think of the doldrums as an area of light or no wind (it can, indeed, be like this), but it is violently stormy, equally often, with wind from any direction. Moreover, it is not an evenly wide band stretching across the oceans just north of the equator as the school atlas shows. Rather it moves north in the northern hemisphere summer and south in winter; it is also T-shaped with the head of the T oriented north and south, giving a much thicker band at the eastern side of the great oceans. We were sailing down the head of the T when things began to go wrong. The mainsail outhaul snapped; the frayed end disappearing into the boom – a quick fix was to put a reef in; as each…

Designed and launched at our small Plymouth shipyard in 2012, Integrity is a 23-ton gaff cutter. Seasoned English oak, copper and bronze with a heavy dose of lead underneath. Five years of use in all seasons within hailing distance of the shipyard had allowed us to test and improve the boat, but also to teach ourselves how to sail her. In recent years she has sailed in the European Arctic, exploring East Greenland, Iceland and Jan Mayen. These relatively short expeditions were a means of gaining experience before an attempt to transit the Northwest Passage in the summer of 2023. The voyage was expected to take around four months to cover approximately 6,000 miles from Nova Scotia to Alaska via Greenland and the Canadian Arctic. Our long term plan with…

Storm Babet left a trail of devastation across Britain and Europe after bringing winds gusting 67 knots (77mph) at Inverbervie, Kincardineshire, and more than 100 knots (115mph) across Scotland’s mountain summits, along with ‘exceptional rainfall’ from 18 to 21 October. The Met Office issued ‘red’ warnings for danger to life, and seven fatalities were reported across the UK. Parts of eastern Scotland saw 150-200mm of rain fall. Heavy, persistent and widespread rain also affected much of England, Wales and Northern Ireland. A Met Office report said: “Storm Babet resulted in the most severe and widespread disruptive weather impacts of 2023 so far.” Multiple severe flood warnings were issued by the Environment Agency and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, thousands of homes and businesses were flooded, schools were closed and Scottish…

SOUTH COAST & CHANNEL ISLANDS Boat blaze Two people aboard an Axopar 28 which burst into flames and later sank in Lymington Harbour have been rescued by a passing fishing vessel. Firefighters from Lymington and Brockenhurst, alerted just before 1500 on 22 October, worked with Coastguard teams to access and extinguish the blaze, but the boat had already suffered significant damage. A Hampshire & Isle of Wight Fire & Rescue Service spokesperson said: “Two people on board were rescued by a passing vessel on the river as a significant amount of smoke began emanating from the boat.” The two people rescued were uninjured. The cause is believed to be an electrical fault. Hoist collapse An investigation has been launched after a 40-tonne slipway hoist, worth more than £400,000, collapsed and…

Twinkling stars shining through the hatchway gave me just enough light to savour my surroundings, as I snuffed out the gimballed brass oil lamp on the mast post and closed an old hardback copy of Maurice Griffiths’ Magic of the Swatchways. The plush deep burgundy bunk cushions, the mahogany slats on the cabin sides, the knees and frames and tongue-and-groove cabin top filled me with wonder at the artisans who’d made Snipe of Maldon back in 1953. Snipe, my 23ft 6in 3½-ton Blackwater Sloop, was halfway home on a sentimental journey back to the Maldon boatyard where she’d been built. Shipwright John Yardley was about to retire and I wanted to surprise him by showing him a boat he had helped give life to five decades before as an apprentice,…

Rye is my home port. It’s full of old-world charm with a working river to add interest and a little light industry along the harbour road. It’s home to the RX fishing fleet and is visited regularly by coastal vessels bringing aggregates and other bulk cargo to Rye Wharf. It must be one of the nicest towns anywhere to visit But for a sailor, the drying river offers many challenges and traps for the unwary – steep-sided mud banks, a submerged training wall and a strong tidal flood capable of creating awkward standing waves. The entrance is narrow and with constant commercial traffic, there’s little room for a dinghy to make a mistake. Once over the bar yachts sailing up Channel have to watch out for the firing range. I’ve…

For looking after Ammos – the 30ft Discovery 3000 I bought in 2001 – my philosophy has been to keep everything as simple as possible. This is primarily to minimise the time needed for maintenance, so I spend less of my time in Greece working on the boat and more of it sailing. It’s also an approach that has the happy side-effect of reducing the costs of owning a boat. However, it’s emphatically not an excuse to bodge maintenance. From the outset the plan was to carry out any repair or replacement to a higher standard than the original, aiming to do each task that cropped up only once, but in a manner that will last for decades. The boat also has to be super reliable – many Aegean islands are…

“Across the Atlantic we had to fight. In the beginning, we had an automatic steering system, but after a week or so, it stopped, so we had to use the wheel of the truck and we could be on the wheel only two hours at a time because it was so tiring. We had to work very hard to keep ourselves alive,” recalls Fons Oerlemans of his hardest Atlantic crossing in his vessel, Floating Truck. As the name suggests, the ‘boat’ was an 8-tonne Dodge truck with a 120hp engine on a raft. With his wife, Kee Arens, Fons took 58 days to cross from New York to Lisbon. As he’s fond of saying, “Mission impossible doesn’t exist”. The Belgian sailor has completed five Atlantic crossings, all in unconventional craft:…

Over recent years La Rochelle’s Grand Pavois, held in late September or early October, has become one of my favourite boat shows. The town is the largest boatbuilding hub on the Atlantic coast, south of Nantes, and the show is held in Les Minimes marina, one of the largest in Europe, with almost 5,000 berths. Typically there are 750 boats on show, with a little under half of them afloat. Visitor numbers are generally in the 70-80,000 bracket, making it a little smaller than Southampton. Traditionally, La Grand Pavois has been mostly sail-oriented, although power-driven craft are growing in importance. Whatever your inclination, you’ll find the big names and a myriad of smaller brands that are a refreshing change to the mainstream but often don’t have resources to exhibit elsewhere.…

SURVEY & CORROSION Corrosion in its many forms Q During a recent chat at my sailing club questions were discussed about anodes, galvanic corrosion and earthing, sailing in salt water and then into fresh water.As expected, there were many different views and disagreements. What are the best methods to protect a vessel going from one water type to another and what earthing methods would you recommend? Could a lightning conductor, as used on tall buildings be of use, either the rod type or the flat plastic-covered type that can be bent to follow the contours and shape of a vessel? Would it also protect against galvanic corrosion? Bob Williams Colin Brown replies: It would be easiest to answer your questions with a quick summary of the hows and whys of…

Vessel preparation Codroy Harbour Integrity was designed and built by Stirling and Son in 2012. After extended Plymouth-based sea trials, Integrity spent five years in and around Iceland with a number of summer voyages to Jan Mayen and East Greenland. These years based in Northern Iceland brought a different type of boat preparation and training to build on the foundations laid in Plymouth. Each successful voyage deepened our assurance in the qualities of the boat and the crews. Crucially, there was also the developing experience of navigation in ice, building on previous expeditions to Spitsbergen and the Canadian Arctic prior to Integrity. Personal growth We were also learning about ourselves; we had to deal with the boat and manage our own behaviour when tired, cold, hungry and at times frightened. Facing…

Sailors bound for the orca interaction hotspots of the Strait of Gibraltar and the Iberian Peninsula can feel reassured that their insurance cover will not be in jeopardy. Since the launch of its orca project in June 2022, the Cruising Association (CA) has received 154 reports of interactions – mainly bumping or ramming the hulls of small yachts and damaging rudders. The hotspots follow the migration of tuna exiting the Mediterranean from the Strait of Gibraltar and heading west and north around the Iberian Peninsula. Of the ‘eventful passages’, 38 yachts (24.7%) required extensive repair; 59 (38.3%) moderate repair; 12 yachts (7.8%) needed minor repair; 45 (29.2%) none at all. Some 33 yachts required a tow (21.7%) while 119 (78.3%) did not. This compared to 326 ‘uneventful passages’, of which…

To mark 200 years of the RNLI in 2024, sailing clubs across the UK and Ireland are being invited to join the All Hands on Deck campaign. Clubs across the UK and Ireland are being asked to hold fundraising commemorations to help ensure the charity can continue to provide its life-saving service to water users. Supported by the RNLI’s corporate partner GJW Direct, the campaign, which was launched at the Southampton International Boat Show, invites sailing clubs to organise a race, connect with other clubs for based charity day to show support for the RNLI’s volunteer lifeboat crews. Jeremy Entwistle from GJW Direct said: “You can make an event already in your calendar – be it a race, a cruise or a family fun day or barbecue – an All…

Single-hander sign On a recent trip, I met several sailors from the Baltic. They told me that a single-handed sailor would fly the Number One Pennant to signify they are alone (or have non-sailors on board) and would welcome help mooring up. It might also be useful when putting out warps and fenders when single-handed. As someone who sails solo a fair bit, it struck me as a good idea. ebay was my next stop where I bought a new, ex-Royal Navy pennant for £15. Unfortunately, I didn’t pay due attention to the size, and while it may look right flying from a destroyer it’s a bit big for my little boat – so it’s out with the scissors and sewing machine. Gilbert Park Fond memories ‘How to choose the…

Fascinated to read lately of the adventures of Sandy Mackinnon, who some time ago rowed and sailed, Heaven help us, from Shropshire to the Black Sea, and more recently from the Black Sea to Venice, in a Mirror dinghy called Jack de Crow. On hearing this kind of news, wise folk sitting in the cockpits of their Bavarias may shake their heads, tap their brows, and wonder whether to get another beer out of the fridge or make themselves a nice double espresso from the machine in the galley. Less wise folk nod and ponder. I’m one of the nodders, but I don’t have to waste any time pondering. This is because I am the earliest known link between Jack de Crow and PBO. In the early chapters of Mackinnon’s…

One of the delights of coastal cruising is exploring river estuaries and meandering upriver to experience more tranquil waters and secluded anchorages. River sailing can be exciting, albeit often quite challenging too. Shallow sandbars, channels that end suddenly leaving you trapped, uneven river beds that can cause havoc when taking the ground and more. If you get it right, though, the rewards are wonderful, especially when you discover areas of outstanding natural beauty only accessible by the water. A problem with sailing in rivers and estuaries is they usually have very strong tidal currents and eddies. Battling into these requires a decent keel to reduce leeway, but once you reach shallower waters it quickly becomes a liability! Shoal fin, bilge keels or better still, centreboards are all possible compromises. One…

One of the ultimate cruising freedoms has to be the ability to anchor where you choose, without being confined to marinas. Sometimes, however, lateral thinking will be required to get into a tight space. Set a second anchor This is time-consuming but can resolve a heap of boat handling issues, allowing you to set a second ‘positioning’ anchor in shallow water. Transfer your second anchor, rope and chain into the bottom of the tender. I use two plastic tubs – one with chain, one with rope – lowered on a halyard. Attach the bitter end to a secure point on your tender. Ensure the chain is loaded into the bucket so it will run freely from the top. Attach a line and buoy to the tripping ring – you’ll use…

Are you happy with your hat? Does it stay on your head in a gale, keep you warm, dry and protect your face from the sun? Do you have different hats for different conditions? And do you find that you’re often wearing the wrong sort of hat? Hats come into and out of fashion. But for sailing, there is only one type of hat that works in all situations – the Breton cap. They look equally fine on male or female heads and are good at staying on in strong winds. Variations include the Greek Fisherman’s cap and, of course, we in the UK have been wearing this style of hat for centuries. The basic shape has always been used in the UK Merchant and Royal Navies (dressed up in…

Are you a winter dabbler, or do you lay up your boat and forget about it? Either way, early maintenance and mid-season boat checks can save you time and money. Come the spring, sailmakers, shipwrights, riggers and other trades will be busy, so the more you can tick off over winter, the smoother your launch will be. You’ll find a detailed winterisation list at pbo.co.uk/winterjobs. However, here are a few things you might wish to tackle over the coming months. Hull, rudder and keel Dings to the hull can lead to water ingress. Here, a stitch (or gel coat repair) in time, saves nine, as the saying goes. Check for gel coat chips, scratches and gouges and fill these before the boat goes back in the water (for details visit…

Most of us own boats with at least some minor imperfections, but of those flaws, the ones that are self-inflicted are the ones I find most frustrating. It’s just this scenario with my Swift 18, Nok. A few years ago I was refitting the forward headlining panels following an internal wiring job and picked up two slightly longer screws from the tray. As I refitted the panel with an impact driver I felt the screw bite into the inner moulding, the balsa deck core then to my horror felt it go right through the top moulding into the great outdoors. I then, incredibly, repeated the same error about two minutes and two screws further on, with yet another slightly longer screw that had somehow also found its way into the…

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You don’t have to be a professional boatyard to carry out essential maintenance on your boat during the autumn and winter months to ensure it remains in tip-top condition for when it goes back in the water next season. There is always plenty of cosmetic work to be done when the boat is out of the water, and one of the biggest jobs involved is surface preparation. With multiple surface types on boats, it’s important that owners, no matter their level of knowledge and experience, have access to the necessary skills, techniques and products to ensure a high-quality end product. Practical Boat Owner met up with Andy Mierau, business development manager in Marine for Mirka (UK), to find out what is required when it comes to prepping a surface for…

1 In mild areas keeping your boat afloat in a marina through the winter could be cheaper than hauling her out – and you then also have the option of an occasional trip on those gloriously sunny winter days. 2 A swinging mooring is even cheaper, but do talk to your insurance company as some moorings are not covered for a full 12 months occupancy. 3 A full cover is awkward to rig, but one just over the cockpit will keep the snow out and protect all the surfaces and instruments. 4 Without a cover, some people add a rough winter washboard, with a large air circulation vent, to prolong the life of their more precious varnished washboards. 5 At the other end, they rigThe weight of another large vent to…