The Maiden Voyage 

The Maiden Voyage

So, the boat was retrieved from Deepest Wiltshire on a couple of weeks ago. Since then it has sat in my works car park under a tarpaulin whilst I have (fruitlessly) searched for a suitable trailer - at the moment it is still sat on the one loaned by Jem at work. I ordered some replacement rigging in the form of sheets and control lines and this arrived at the end of last week. It was approaching maiden voyage time!

I went over to the boat on Sunday lunch time and fitted all the lines with the assistance of a kitchen knife, a lighter and some insulation tape. I had this fitted by 12:30 when Scott (crew) turned up with his car (and more to the point his towing hitch). We hooked up and drove down to Shoreham harbour. There is a rough and ready slipway there, right near the lock gates and about 100 metres from the Spanish Tapas bar. I then took about 30 minutes to get my dry suit and boots on (really must get some new boots in a bigger size). We rigged the boat, and then launched her for the first time.

Scott jumped on to get the main up, and had no problems until he got to about the last 6 inches when the sail started to get tricky. Eventually it mae it to the top, and we got the boom set up. Scott then balanced the boat as I got on board and we were away!

Initial impressions are of a reasonable amount of instability, extreme sensitivity to crew position, and a surprising turn of speed for such an old boat! We were soon running down the harbour past the new power station, rolling slightly as we went (bought back memories of sailing downwind in the Bobbin). When we came to beat up we were struggling initially with the fluky winds - I really think we need to get out on a more open stretch of water.

We sailed up and down for an hour or so. A weather front approached and the wind got gustier and the next thing we knew we were suddenly in the drink! My memory of it is slightly fuzzy, but I think we actually ended up capsizing to windward when the gust dropped off. Neither of us was fast enough to catch her, or even get over the side so we were both swimming! Scott was not impressed as he was wearing a wet suit and felt the full effect of the cold. I was ok, snug in my dry suit with my wooly bear suit underneath - that will teach Scott for laughing at me! Anyway, I swam round and climbed on the centreplate. Scott positioned himself inside the hull and I slowly brought her upright. No problem, except the boat was now full to within an inch of the decks with water!

We started to sail again and opened up the bailers in the floor. This reduced the water level in the boat to about 25 cms, but it wouldn't go down any more! Looking back, we should have experimented at that point with opening the transom flaps, but we instead gave up and went to head for the bar. It was at this point (with main down and trailer in water) that Laura turned up with Maika and Eduardo. Of course, they wanted a demo, and of course, I was only too happy to go out again!

Now we had spectators things were bound to go wrong. We started trying to sail out without the plate down and nearly went into the exposed prop of an outboard attached to a speedboat, then I couldn't get the rudder down either and it all looked rather messy! Sill, made it out, had a good sail and got our pictures taken by the Spanish contingent - will post them here once I get a copy.

Lessons learned from the sail:

1. Need more purchase on the mainsheet - it was a real handful in the gusts. At the moment it is a 2:1 arrangement. This seems to create high loads and makes it more difficult to trim by small amounts. Some new blocks needed.

2. The current jib sheet system does not appear to work well. The sheet is taken through a ratchet block which is attached to a control line which should allow it to be controlled. However, there is way too much stiction in the system, and too little control of the position. I think some jib cars may be needed, but I will wait for the next sail to see if they could be positioned ok on the side deck

3. A dangly pole should help with stability (and speed) downwind - might try and make one if I can dig out the notes on the N12 website.

4. Easy shroud adjustment would have allowed us to depower when the wind picked up by flattening the sail (more tension), and would improve downwind performance by allowing the main to go out to 90 degrees.

5. Some of the jammers need updating to current specs as they are tapered slot type which seem to chew ropes in no time.

ED: Probably easier to sail than the Minisprint in some ways, but seems a lot less stable (maybe it is just that I am out of practice). You must come along next time I get it out (probably going to be a couple of weeks at least).

Tomorrow I am going to see Geoff and Amelia's boats (they are NTOA members who live in Shoreham). They have two modern twelves with self draining cockpits and all the latest toys. Will be interesting to see how they are rigged. Will update on this soon.