9th November

I decided to keep my little fishing boat in my marina slip over winter to do some fishing on the few good days over the windy and rough season.  Therefore going slowly on Nuts as only planning to launch in spring.  Only a few jobs left to do and plenty of time over winter.

Windvane support all epoxy glassed and painted and mounted in position.

Power outlet for tiller pilot (not allowed on challenge)  or floodlight etc plus inlet for solar panels.  Coax for AIS antennae through a waterproof gland and ready for soldering a PL259 to connect.  I received my radio station license and MMSI a while back and have programmed the AIS (ONWA KP25A) and VHF radio for DSC calls.  All tested and NMEA connection working fine.  Also did an AIS test from my car to check reception and transmission.  Was picking up ships from 20 miles away and got my position registered on vessel finder after about 5 minutes of transmission activated  Had to wait for the cross channel ferry to dock to not confuse them!  Using the identification name  "Solo Sail NUTS" to hopefully give shipping some info.  I notice many of the IMOCA yachts also put solo sail as a prefix.

All electrics finished. 

Crappy photo in bad light.  Not much equipment.   VHF,AIS/plotter, 2 interior lights, compass light, tricolour nav light and anchor light.  A 12v outlet plug (Hella) for whatever might be needed and several usb charger outlets for phone, tablet, Garmin Inreach . Kindle etc.

Been checking out navigation options.  ONWA have free K Charts which you can download.  I have downloaded heaps. Got coverage of the whole of Africa, South America, Carribean, North America.  Very nice to get free coverage for ONWA products but not the best detail.  I also have been using Navionics and it is much better.  I have purchased the NV charts to get up to date paper charts but have not yet activated the electronic chart app as is it is only valid for 1 year before having to pay again for the next year.  Does not make sense to activate yet.  The paper charts are very detailed and easy to use and come in an A3 book form which folds out.

Some examples - 

K Chart on the top and Navionics on the bottom of Horta port.  Both would work.

Lages port in Pico Island.  K Chart on top and Navionics on the bottom.  K chart almost useless with very little info.

Looking at Lisbon the K charts looked pretty good so I think they are very dependent on where you are.  I had hundreds of charts which I gave away but they were from the 1980s and even though the land hasnt moved much- most ports and anchorages have changed a lot.

Mrs Nuts started doing the upholstery but not in a rush.

My last jobs are the push and pullpits and railings, boarding ladder and engine mount.

 17th October

Long time no update.

Done some more bits on the windvane.  

Jacked stern up a bit to fit the rudder for trial fitting of windvane linkages.

Rudder top with lots of holes on linkages for testing what works the best.

Bottom of windvane tube linkage with pushrod connection to rudder top.  It can just be lifted off to disengage.

Top of vane mounting tube.  Vane can swivel through 360 degrees and pushrod onto top of rudder can be moved further or closer to rudder axis to give more or less feedback.  (Tiny temporary ply vane at an angle to not hit stuff in my roof - I guess it needs to be a lot bigger but can experiment with different sizes and counter balance weights)   Got to be on the water sailing to test if it is any good.  I have lots of other ideas to try if this is a fail.  This is the first trial fit to cut lengths of pushrods and mark for drilling mounting bolts.  

The boat is now 99% finished with only 50% to go!!

 3rd October

Done a few bits on the self steering.

All very rough. The black bracket is a locking device.  I can swivel the inner tube (which the vane is connected to)  to any position and lock it in place.  The pushrod that goes down inside the tube can swivel.  The counter balance weight  will be experimented with for weight and length of arm on the threaded rod.  Going to make a couple of vane sizes to see what works OK.  All pushrods are 6mm threaded rod (ss) to make it easy to be adjusted for testing.

Next job is to make the bottom bell crank mounting bracket on the bottom of the tube and a support post that can be bolted onto the transom.  This whole exercise is only for experimental purposes.  Not worried about neatness and a sexy look.  Half of the stainless is only A2 and stick welded to hold it together.  On a reliable self steering system you dont want nuts and bolts.  They have a habit of coming loose. 

Doing lots of thinking about quick engage and disengage system as well as easy weather helm adjustment. 

Also thinking about an emergency rudder system in case Willy gets hungry.

Hurricane Kirk skimming to the north of us in a few days and watching Lesley.

Will keep you posted - Cheers

 28th September

The start of the experimental horizontal windvane.  I have some fiberglass tubes that telescope and going to use them as the support.  I wrapped some epoxy saturated glass (after sanding and acetone prep) over the inner tube which will be on the top. (just the end where the stainless steel homemade hinge will be bolted on) to make it a bit stronger.

Also cut some 316 stainless to make support brackets. and bent them for the 17.5 degree angle.  In all my research it seems that between 15 and 20 degrees is the best angle so I picked the middle.

Im going to make the tube support and hinge bracket before actual vane hinge so I can get the exact dimensions. 

Fired up the antique lathe to make the bearings.

First go was with some mystery material which I thought was Delrin but I guess it was some type of nylon or acrylic.  Not easy to machine and very messy.  

I then turned down a big diameter piece of Annealed POM (Delrin) which was totally different.  A big waste of material but it is all I have.  What a difference!  Nice and clean and smooth.  I am no expert in lathe work , just what I see on Youtube and my lathe was salvaged from the Ark.

Delrin on the left and mystery material on the right.  Only need 2 bearings but made 3 of each so have spares. I think the mystery material should go in the rubbish bin.

I will post  an easier to understand  description of what Im trying to achieve when more bits are made.

Enjoy your weekend!

 26 September

Cockpit nonslip EVA fitted.  I was hoping to do the cockpit floor in 2 pieces but just did not have enough in a big piece.  Used 3 sheets of 90cm by 2.4m and have plenty small offcuts left over.  It is very comfortable and a good nonslip.  Just dont know how long it will last.  It is pretty soft.  I attacked a small offcut with 80 grit and nothing happened.  If it lasts for 2 years I will be happy.  

Lots of rain on the way with a tropical storm passing close to the north of us.  

Starting on the self steering tomorrow.

 25th September.

Nonslip EVA foam going on.  A bit of a mission to get it positioned well.  Once you start sticking it down the position is fixed so better be close!

Round circle on first photo is for vent which has not arrived yet.  Only got cockpit seats and floor to do then deck is finished except for guard rails.

Been doing lots of thinking and plan drawing for self steering vane system.  Prototype will be fully adjustable in all parameters to try to get it to work well in as many conditions as possible.  Epoxy, glass, welder and lathe will be in action soon.  If all fails will revert to simple vertical axis system.

 20th September

Done a few bits.

Deck getting more populated.  Sheeting fixing eyes bolted down.  Going to use low friction rings (much cheaper) instead of blocks.  Mounted a bit further foreward than on the plans.  That allows the length of the strop holding the ring to fine tune the sheeting angle.  A barber hauler can also change the sheeting angle if needed.  I didnt feel like hauling Nuts out the workshop and putting up the mast again to fine tune the sheeting position.  It should be close so good enough for me.

Also decided to fit my spare hatch.  Opening from the bow.  Will be closed for 99% of the time when sailing but gives good vision of the jib from inside and will be great on anchor in the tropics to get a breeze through the boat.  

Round paper template to the port of the mast is going to be a dome ventilator above the "galley" .  I made a dorado box with a wind scoop  but decided it would be too much hassle with fouling on jib sheets and didnt want to make deflector bars.  Did that on previous boats and it worked well but on a tiny boat got to make compromisers. 

Jib sheeting fixture from inside.  8mm through bolt eye on a small doubler made from an offcut from the cockpit floor.  8mm ply with 200g of epoxy glass on each side.  Took a long time to do these small jobs as had to wait for epoxy to cure before drilling holes which were then filled with epoxy to coat the inside of the holes and when that was hard I could paint with PU paint and wait for that to cure before fitting!!  Cut grass and went fishing between Nuts jobs.

Weather super good so off fishing with sister Nuts again tomorrow.

 16 September

Went fishing with sister Nuts over the weekend and loaded the freezer.  Grey Triggerfish - delicious.

Got deck fittings sealed and bolted down.

U bolt fixing points for safety harness and mainsheet. Put a large backing pad under the cockpit floor u- bolt.  All the others go through on the centerline on the double deck  thickness.

Still got to decide if Im going to fit the second deck hatch which will be fitted fwd of the main bulkhead on the stbd side to provide a through flow of air..  (the tropics get hot).  Also got to fit the dorado box and jib sheet block fastenings.  I will wheel Nuts out the workshop again and put the mast up to hoist the jibs and check out sheeting positions again.  At least I have all the halyards and sheets now.  Been doing whipping and splicing.  Plenty to do but not in a hurry.  

Started to think about wind vane and got a few bits to experiment with.  First prototype will be horizontal axis.

 12 th September

Nuts back in its birth space.  Dropped the mast and dragged Nuts back inside the workshop to finish off the deck.  Very easy with a simple support on big castor wheels.

Drilled the cleat holes 5.5mm for 5 mm bolts. 

Holes for my home made deck organizer.  6.5mm diameter for 6mm bolts.  I overdrill by .5mm on each hole so I can coat the inside of the hole with epoxy.

More holes drilled for safety harness and secondary mainsheet fixing u bolts.  I have made 2 possible positions for the main sheet.  One as on the plan on the cockpit floor as well as one above the companionway on the deck.  Will experiment with both options as well as a double mainsheet on the deck.  Just back from coating all the holes with epoxy to seal the plywood.  I will give it a day or 2 to cure then fit the cleats and safety harness u bolts.  

Finished the boom and got the sliders for the kicking strap, sheet and vang riveted into position.  (got several options for the sheet position)

I just want simple and easy to work with.  

Decided to put a topping lift on.  A bit of a pain with a square top main but safety aspect as a secondary main halyard overcame my reluctance.  Just going to use 3mm chyneema and hope  for the best.

Weather for fishing was a bit iffy (for where I was hoping to go) so only heading off on Saturday.  Mrs Nuts hates fishing but sister Nuts loves to fish so we will try on Saturday.

Got confirmation today that all my paperwork for MMSI has arrived in Poland and the process is  proceeding.  

 9th September

Hallelujah!! After more than 1 month my goodie box arrived.

A spaghetti of 6mm dyneema hallyards and an 8mm gennaker hallyard (not dyneema) 8mm easier to handle, and a bunch of blocks etc. D H something shipping company took longer to deliver a small box from Germany than it took for my mast and boom to arrive from Poland. 8mm sheets for main, jibs and gennaker arrived ages ago from Spain.

Been covered in cement and tile adhesive the last couple of weeks so slow progress on Nuts.

Have done a few bits and pieces over the last days.  Got my single line reefing planned and tested and did the final welding on the gooseneck.  Heath Robertson but works just fine in the garden.

Cut up some stainless steel chain to make fairleads for the reefing line and welded cut halves onto boom end fitting.  I removed the gooseneck fitting from the boom (also gave it a bit more welding inside to make it a bit stronger) and refitted it with a plastic barrier between the stainless steel and aluminum as well as Duralac on the rivets.  (hope to minimize electrolysis)  Also shortened the boom by 80mm.  The boom length was exactly what I ordered but I didnt take the gooseneck fitting into account.  It was a bit long and decided to chop off a bit.  Checked it out with the main hoisted and the foot tensioned as much as I could.  Still got space if the foot stretches a bit.

I now have 2 options.  Reef hooks for the tack of the mainsail or a single line system.  More stainless steel chain links welded onto the gooseneck fitting.  I have blocks on the reefing points on the mainsail and practiced reefing 1st -2nd and taking them out many times before final welding of  chain link fairleads.  It is not a typical system as the reefing lines exit at the bottom of the boom and have to go around a block at the base of the mast and up through the link on the boom then through the block on the sail then down through a chain link guide on the gooseneck to another block at the base of the mast and finally to the cockpit.  

Now that the mast and sail hoisting jobs are done I can drop the mast and put Nuts back in the workshop and finish the deck fittings and put on the nonslip.

Going fishing tomorrow.  Freezer getting low.

 19 th August

Hoisted mainsail without battens to check halyard routing and length.

Had a few wind gusts (from the stern) so quickly dropped the sail. 

Tried again in the early afternoon when it seemed a bit calmer. 

Fitted battens to check the shape.  Looks good to me.  Very happy.  Got some more gusts from the stbd quarter and boom was sheeted in so had a bit of a panic to drop the sail before Nuts sailed up the hill or capsized!

Was a good exercise as worked out what sheeting positions Im going to use and halyard routing.   

 18th August

Did a bit of work on the rig over the weekend. Lowered the mast and removed the dyneema shrouds and ss forestay.  Fitted the roller furling to the forestay (trial fit and cut the foil to length.) Also made up ss shrouds for testing.

Hoisted mast again with stainless rigging.  Bow chainplate not finalized yet.  Got 2 small eyebolts temporally fitted for the tack of gennaker or jib.  Still got to decide if I should use shackles or the eyes on the chainplate to connect a soft shackle to.   The orange strap on the shroud turnbuckle is just a tie down to the cradle in case we get some strong gusts of wind.

Gave the deck its first wash with a hose.

I had to spray the VHF antennae matt black as it got brightly lit up by the red port tricolor light even though it is a thin stainless rod.

Still waiting for the halyards to arrive and got some crappy rope for test hoisting sails at the moment.

Going to fit the boom and hoist the main tomorrow.  Got to plan the sheeting system.

The mast is a lot stiffer with stainless rigging as apposed to dyneema and can get much more forestay tension.  

 15 th August

No pics today.  Been working on rigging. Got (ss) forestay cut to length and "toggle" cut and drilled and fitted.  Length seems good. (no turnbuckle on forestay).  Hoisted roller furling jib (loose luff)  to get lenghts  for cutting roller furling drum fixing straps.  All cut and polished.  Hope I got it correct.  Also hoisted hanked on jib to check all is good.  It is all good!! (I hope) 

At the moment mast is held up with 6mm 7x19  forestay and 6mm dyneema shrouds.  Dyneema is pretty good and even though I pre stretched after splicing with my tractor on a big tree with lots of force it is pretty stretchy. Can wobble the mast around even after doing lots of stretching and tightening.  Got everything measured and next job is to finish off  ss shrouds (7x19) 316 that is available here and using my hydraulic crimper.  Cheap and cheerful.

Hope it gets me to Lisbon to Clube Naval de Lisboa.  There is a rigging shop next door and will order the correct 5mm 1x19 wire for the challenge as specified.

Also fiddled with electricity.  Connected 1 x 25w solar panel (have a second) through a Victron MPPT controller onto the battery.  Very tempory - just with wires running through the  hatch and panel loose on the deck.  Got up to 1.9 amps charge which was pretty good.

Did a test this evening with everything running.  Mast head tricolor, 1 inside light on, compass light, VHF on recieve  and AIS also on recieve.  0.95amp draw.  That will go up a bit with the AIS on transmit.  Pretty good. I shut everything down but left the tricolor light on for the night and will check everything in the morning.   Very happy with the masthead lights.  Using a bit more current  than on the specs but going through about 11 meters of 1.5 mm2 cable.  Very bright!  My previous yachts had 25watt bulbs in the masthead tricolor lights and ate up the battery.

Will try to take some photos for tomorrow.

Cheers

.

 14th August

Dragged Nuts out of the workshop on its trolley and jacked it up to make it level.  Had to use a water filled transparent tube to get the level as my laser level doesnt work too well in bright sunshine.

With the help of Mrs Nuts swiveled the mast up using dyneema shrouds and a temporary block and tackle  on rope as a forestay.  The stainless steel forestay was connected at the top and could be measured for accurate cutting and crimping once I got the mast positioned in what I hope is the correct position.  Cut and crimped - just got to make 2 stainless straps as a toggle to finish off.  

Now the fun starts but still waiting for some of the running rigging to arrive.

10th August

Still ticking along in slow motion.  Nice summer weather so lots of other things to do.

Did a trial fit of the mainsail on the mast and boom (on the ground) to work out the reefing system and halyard block on the masthead.  Worked out what I had to order and playing the waiting game for running rigging and fittings to arrive in the postal system.

Hand rails bolted and epoxied into position and teak plugs glued in. Marked the deck where the handrails contacted the deck and removed the paint with a Dremel Tool and taped it all up before gluing.  Gave all surfaces a good clean with acetone before gluing.  Can chisel the plugs off tomorrow and give them a sand.  Going to bolt and  seal the mast step bracket on tomorrow.  All the wires are through the deck and will be connected under the mast step (with removable connectors).  They will be waterproof (I hope).  

Thinking about wheeling Nuts out the workshop in a couple of days and stepping the mast.  After mast step is sealed the boat is waterproof and can be left out in the rain.  

 31st July

The little bird was correct.

Sails got delivered.  1 mainsail, 1jib with hanks (with reef), 1 jib without hanks (with reef), 1 roller furling jib, 1 storm jib and a gennaker (white and yellow).

Did a trial fit of masthead fittings.

All holding brackets made and fitted.  Used Duralac paste on all rivets (monel)  and tapped threads as well as isolating stainless steel from aluminum with a plastic layer.  Hope to reduce electrolysis.  Removed all the bits for final fitting.

Sealing the top few inches with spray foam after fixing the wiring and pushed in foam with PU sealant.

Got messy bolting the lid on.

Foam squishing out.  Should make a good seal.  Going to let it cure overnight and can then mount the tricolor  and solder up the wiring.  Got 30 kg of foam buoyancy inside the mast.  Getting closer to raising the mast.

 29th July

Ticking along.  Been fiddling with the mast.  Bought some conduit  and cut all 7 meters length with a hacksaw blade held in my hand to split the tube and slide up the inside of the mast.

Was a bit of a mission but managed to push all the bits through. Conduit was in 3m lengths so 2 lenghts and a bit.  I dont want the wiring inside the mast to flop about so fitted 16mm diameter tube on the internal  aluminum T.  It is just wide enough to fit the VHF coax and a 3 core cable for the tricolour and anchor light. (common negative).  Bought a Navipro Led Tricolour and Anchor light.  Was expensive but very light in weight and low consumption. 1.2 watts so easy on the battery.

It is required by the Atlantic Challenge to have the mast foam filled.  I made a template and dug out my hot wire foam cutter.

It worked well and cut lots of 50mm thick sections to push down the inside of the mast.  Each piece displaces 250ml (I measured) so 4 bits gives 1kg of buoyancy.  The problem is that I can only push these tightly fitting foam pieces down for 2 meters to the forestay fitting as there are a bunch of pop rivets in the area.  

This gives about 10kg buoyancy in the top 2 meters of the mast and I can push up about another 20kg of buoyancy of looser fitting foam from the bottom.  That should give the whole mast positive foam  buoyancy.  I will weight the mast when finished to check.

Foam has been pushed in and the wires fed through the conduit.  Next job is to make the VHF antennae and Windex mount.  I tested the VHF antennae  (an old one I had) and the SWR was 1.2 on channel 16 and 1.6 on AIS frequency (around 162MHZ) with 50 ohms impedance.  That is good for those that understand that stuff.  I was listening to marina traffic from my home on the other side of the island with the antennae on a table outside my workshop.

A little bird told me my sails are on Faial.  Fingers crossed.