Do you know where all of the ball valves on your boat are located? Are they all easy to turn? Do they seal completely? Have you ever done any maintenance to them? They’re not maintenance-free. In this post, I will dispel any mystery about how ball valves work and walk you step-by-step through how to take one apart, inspect it, and lubricate it.
Continue reading “The Complete Beginner’s Guide to Ball Valve Maintenance”
When Mrs. $tingy and I first started spending long weekends aboard Summer Dance, the deep cycle battery wouldn’t have enough charge left in it by the end of the weekend to power much of anything. At that time, Summer Dance had all incandescent navigation lights and only two cabin dome lights converted to LEDs. Besides the lights, we also have a music system onboard that runs most of the time as well as an autopilot. As I added more electrical devices (see LED strip lighting, chartplotter, and complete rewiring), it was obvious that I would have to balance the electricity budget somehow so that we weren’t broke by the end of our cruises.
Lazy jacks can be one of the most complicated rigging systems on a trailerable sailboat but they have a simple function. That is, to cradle the mainsail when it’s lowered so that it doesn’t spill onto the cabin and cockpit. If you usually have another experienced crew member aboard, that person can gather and tie down the mainsail and you don’t need lazy jacks as much. But if you often sail short-handed or are just plain lazy, lazy jacks can make coming to a dock or anchorage a smoother, more pleasant event for everyone and it helps protect your mainsail.
Continue reading “Lazy Jacks for the Trailer Sailor”
Turnbuckles are great for tuning your rig but they’re the least convenient way imaginable to loosen and detach the forestay and lower shrouds for unstepping the mast. I vowed long ago that I would quit wasting time on turnbuckles during setup and tear-down.
This post is a companion to my previous post How to step a mast single-handed with or without using the boom as a gin pole. I mentioned quick release levers in that post and you can also see them in use there, but they need more explanation together with the other topics in this post.
Continue reading “Quit Spending Setup Time on Turnbuckles”
How do you step the mast on your trailerable sailboat? With a gin pole? With the trailer winch? With the help of friends or family? With your fingers crossed? No single system works for every sailboat or for every skipper. If you’re new to mast stepping, you don’t like your current method, or you just want to simplify or speed up the process, this post is for you. I must warn you though, this is a long post, even for me. To make it as short as possible, I’ve included five YouTube videos that show how this system works. By the end of this post, you’ll know everything about how I step the mast on Summer Dance single-handed in minutes, even on the water.
Continue reading “How to Step a Mast Single-Handed With or Without Using the Boom as a Gin Pole”
In a previous article, I described how to rig a cruising spinnaker. If you don’t have a spinnaker yet, or even if you do have one but you don’t want to raise it for short runs, one of your best options when sailing dead downwind is to set your sails “wing and wing.” That is, with your mainsail eased all the way out on one side of the boat and your headsail eased all the way out on the other side of the boat. With both sails catching as much wind as possible, you’ll achieve top speed.
Continue reading “Use Your Boat Hook to Sail Faster Downwind”
Did you take your family out on your sailboat this summer for Independence Day, Memorial Day, or Labor Day? On those holidays, you probably saw more flags flying than usual. Sailboats flying flags evoke a different feeling than ones without. At least they do for me. Besides being patriotic, they add to a festive, nautical mood to the day.
Did you fly your favorite club burgee too? If you didn’t, was it because you don’t have a place to fly your burgee from? Adding a flag halyard is an inexpensive, easy project you can do in under an hour.
Continue reading “Make a Flag Halyard to Fly Your Favorite Colors”
I don’t know about you, but it’s hard for me to make the time to put away my outboard motor for the winter properly. There always seems to be a dozen other chores of higher priority at the same time. Besides winterizing Summer Dance, there’s other fair weather projects to wrap up.
It’s tempting to just store the outboard as-is and deal with it in the spring. Or to just do the minimum maintenance and turn a blind eye to the rest. Procrastinating is so easy. But I know life will be just as hectic in the spring if not more so. Either I’ll forget to do those other maintenance tasks altogether or the guilt of knowing the condition I left my motor in will haunt me. So I may as well roll up my sleeves and do it. I’ll be glad I did.
Continue reading “15 Outboard Motor Maintenance Blind Spots You Can’t Afford to Miss”
The luxury of onboard electronics and electrical devices cuts both ways. What it gives in terms of convenience, it takes in terms of a load on your battery bank that needs recharging. There are tons of good info available on the net and in books on sailboat electrical systems. I especially like Sailboat Electrics Simplified
The $tingy Sailor 