On Desire

Dan…

Stoney Bus is 231-448-3125. They are ready to do the movie, just give them a day or two advance notice. They will pick you up where you are on the island.

Beaver Island Transfer Station – approx. 2 miles from boat dock. I’ll send a photo via email. Award Winning Dougie is in charge. If he’s not at the station, he’s at the stony acre grill bar

I really want to soar on the Hobie. Let me know if you need to take her for a run before you launch. Just give me 15 min. notice.

Let me know if you need more.

That it should come to this. The dreaded pre-travel checklist, lifted from a post a few days back, except this one gets updated right up until launch. Underline items need attention. Last updated 08/30/09

1. Vision
   1. Search for sustainable civilization
      1. design and implement sustainable civilizations ASAP
      2. the project is internally consistent, an exercise in footprint reduction and measurement
      3. I have (or can acquire) the diverse competencies required
         1. fabrication
         2. sailing
         3. swimming
         4. film making
         5. stewardship
         6. open source distribution
         7. curiosity
         8. etc.
2. Budget
   1. financial requirements about $10k total, gear and expenses, assuming some collaboration
   2. excellent health and physically fit principle players
   3. other projects on standby or automatic – summer / fall schedule cleared
      1. client needs simple changes to video
         
3. Survival
   1. warmth
      
      1. shelter
         1. tent
         2. sleeping bag
         3. foam roll
         4. yoga mat
      2. sailing wetsuit / drysuit
         1. Traverse City pick-up, arrives 9-4-09
            
      3. √ clothing (link)
   2. water (Lake Michigan)
      1. 4 x nalgene bottles
      2. ceramic filter
      3. carry
         1. large righting bag
         2. collapsible jug
   3. food
      1. grains – pack
      2. cooking gear
         1. locking pot with lid
         2. big family pot
         3. 4 x bowls
         4. 4 x spoons
         5. ecover dish soap
         6. scrungy
         7. wooden spoon
         8. metal spoon
         9. alcohol stove
         10. fuel bottle small
         11. fuel bottle large
         12. grain alcohol (wisconsin)
             
         13. lighter
   4. sanitation (portable composting toilet)
      1. need sawdust bag
   5. sundries (link)
4. Safe boat
   1. checked and repaired
      1. hull
      2. frame
         1. grind new rivet heads to remove excess post
            
      3. lines, shrouds
         1. new 17 shroud as backup pickup Traverse City, arrives 09-04-09
      4. mast
         1. rivet base
         2. rivet step
      5. rudders
         1. reverse bolts and nuts on starboard
         2. lock down cams adjusted
            
      6. sails
         1. install main downhaul
         2. repair jib downhaul
         3. batten tips on main
      7. sailing gloves
      8. uphaul rope
         1. big bucket system
            1. pickup Traverse City, arrives 9-4-09
      9. ditty bag
      10. toolkit
          1. spare parts
          2. basic tools
             
      11. paddle head or new paddle
      12. epoxy uphaul schackle
          
      13. harness with back support and spreader hook
          1. pickup Traverse City, arrives 9-4-09
5. Legal
   1. registration
   2. vds (flares)
   3. sound device
   4. life preservers
      1. pickup Traverse City, arrives 9-4-09
   5. lights (for night running)
   6. anchor and chain with buoy
   7. 200 ft of line (30 ft depth)
6. Navigation
   1. gps and charts iPhone application
      1. Mike Kelly collaborator
      2. iphone 2gs GPS is broken, cost of repair = cost of new 3gs iphone. Solution? Punt.
   2. compass
7. Production Dry
   1. dry bag Seal line 115
   2. Canon Vixia kit (link)
   3. Apple Macbook Pro and Fusion hard drive (link)
   4. Applications
8. Communication
   1. submersible VHF – icom
   2. Handheld CB radio
   3. cell phone – iPhone
      1. dry case pickup Traverse City, arrives 9-4-09
   4. collaboration on key resources
   5. blog revisions
   6. press release post launch
      
   7. hull graphics
      
   8. record iphone conversations
      1. contacted Adam the Maker, maybe he can make me one of his homebrews
         
   9. web connection – Verizon mifi
9. Power
   1. extension cord – marina or house borrow
   2. Belkin surge protector (see Vixia HFS-10)
   3. tupperware container for Brunton Solo 15 with aquarium caulk
   4. Brunton Solaris 26 solar panel
      1. pickup Traverse City, arrives 9-4-09
   5. Brunton Solo 15 battery and inverter
      1. pickup Traverse City, arrives 9-4-09
10. Itinerary
    1. where am i landing in TC (labor day weekend)
    2. final schedule before launch
    3. call north manitou rangers
    4. post TC – randy mcmillian, michael the lawyer
       
11. Production Wet
    1. backpack – North Face Snow Leopard
    2. enclosure for Vixia
    3. scuba tank – hydrostated 07/09
    4. pressure gauge
    5. harness
    6. regulator – rebuilt 7/09
    7. mask
       1. suddenly leaking, try shaving
          
    8. snorkel
       1. needs new diaphrams?
          
    9. booties
    10. hood
    11. fins
    12. 2 x weight belt
    13. dive knife
    14. wetsuit
    1. rope
    2. dive weights
       
    3. flag
12. Clean and prep house
    1. garage
       1. vacuum, vacuum, vacuum
       2. clean and organize tools
    2. grounds
       1. van
          
    3. laundry
    4. refridge
    5. bedroom
       
    6. mr boy cat – arrange for care until Melonie comes to pick him up
       
    7. dishes
    8. reassemble tripod and pack
    9. recording cable for iphone
    10. isolating earphones
        
    11. composting toilet
        1. sawdust refill
13. Art
    1. Prang soft chaulk
    2. charcoal
    3. Larrivee Palor Guitar
       1. need another dry bag
14. Logistics
    1. Jim Barnes trailer
       
15. Something else
    1. miscellaneous
       1. print location and talent releases
       2. weigh and take pictures of trash
       3. move needed files to portable drive
          1. all vixia files for editing
          2. ru movies
       4. bills and such
          1. prog 9/28 $170
          2. Chinatown postmaster
          3. ATT
          4. charter cable
             
       5. press release post launch

Reassembly complete and who needs the fancy thread fixing tool when Patrick’s around? Give him a triangular file and 30 minutes – viola! Working threads.

Here’s the last geeky maker shot – a whazit I invented to keep the threads from getting smashed up again when the striker bar gets hammered and tugged through it’s holes. Lesson learned – don’t bang on exposed threads!

We’re going out for a sail now to test of the trapeze and whether I can right her by myself if she flips.

Patrick and I had a fantastic sail, out there yelling and whooping it up. Later in front of the house we did a controlled capsize and total turtle. Turns out she’s too much for me to right alone, unless I drop her sails and even then I’d need some help. We got cold while I was futzing with her alone so Patrick added his girth and we got her back up, but not before two smokers came out to offer help.

Murrray’s sells a righting bag and pulley system to give me the extra weight I’d need should I ever have to right her solo, plus tying a Baolong to the top of the mast keeps it from totally turtling. Lovely sunset after an exhilerating day.

I’m into this WordPress for the iPhone thang. Now outhouse reports can go directly to the big screen.

It’s not polite to talk poop in public, unless you’ve been liberated by Joseph Jenkin’s Humanure Handbook, a fantastic tome that’s now available in it’s entirety as PDF at humanurehandbook.com. I had my consciousness raised oh so many years ago by the paper incarnation of the HH, and when thinking about how to deal with my you know what during ALM, I yearned to once again for it’s inspiration. Let’s face it folks, we are shit machines. That’s a great thing, if we take responsibility for it. The HH is the truth to set us free! While rereading it, I imagined restructuring the whole ALM project around poop, making poop more prominent. That’s the power of poop, my friends.

Oh yeah, today’s the day to figure out how to fix the threads on the striker bar.

Just activated WordPress for the iPhone, and that’s where I’m posting from. Who needs Twitter?

A set back today in the reassembly of Hello World. I bunged the starter threads on both sides of the dolphin striker, so I’ve got to fix ‘em before I can rivet the mast step and raise the mast. I’ve tried grinding off a bit of each end and bought fresh nuts to reestablish the threads, but no dice. My plan is to find a small concave grinding stone tomorrow and round off the ends of the striker so they’ll be more likely to accept nuts. If that doesn’t work i’ll have to find a set of Murray’s thread chasers and pull the whole striker apart. Another busy day ahead.

Patrick and Luke just stopped by with cake.

Look Ma, pictures! A very handy little blogging utility, the iPhone.

This morning I pop riveted the stern/port trampoline casting that Chuck welded yesterday. I’ve got more riveting to do after I apply some adhesive to the mast base, but it’s wet out there – raining. I’ll go into town to buy the adhesive and bring the mast into the garage to dry, or most of it anyway – it’s huge.

Today’s post is a sort of thinking out loud, a rehearsal for what I am about to do.

Yesterday, I heard on NPR Science Friday that multitasking actually impairs the brain permanently – yikes! I’ve mulled that over and have since refined my approach to this project. There are scads of things to do before I go, and up until yesterday I’ve been into several of them at once. This is generally essential because the tasks are interdependent – one task can only progress so far before it begins to blend into another. The insight is that I can physically handle only one task at a time, so it’s best to try and focus on one thing exclusively until it’s time to switch, avoiding distractions. This requires developing a quality priority list showing which tasks are dependent on others. If that list is well constructed, the process of doing and switching is very effective.

I scribbled a list around mid July as a riff on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs… survival, safety, etc.

Here’s a revised hierarchy from the shamanic perspective…

Hello World hit the water Tuesday evening after a month of renovations. Wednesday saw her across Crystal Lake, ready to fly. The ALM expedition is on track for a September launch.

Curious collaborator – “Hey DK, I thought you were planning to be outta there a couple of weeks ago?” Boats launch when they are ready, and not before. The decision is not up to me, all I can do is make wild predictions. She’s raring to go though, practically sails herself.

A short list of recent renovations and fixes – welding for the rudder castings (Monday) and the mast base, mast step and the port stern trampoline corner (Friday), graphics for the hulls (in process), loads of little replacement shackles and pins, rudder rebuilds, rigging tunes and the clearing of a parking space for her. Left to do… reassemble on Saturday, preliminary pack, sail her loaded up, clean house, final pack, order additional parts to be picked up in transit, update blog, etc.

There’s catch-up posts in the queue, but we’ll have to make do for now with her press release picture. For the sailing geeks – unloaded, her helm is ever so slightly weather.

Visitors

Got a comment for On Desire? Maybe just want to write your name in the sand to say you’ve been here?

To get started, return to the home page, follow the “Register” link to the right and sign in with a fairly full name or a very imaginary alias that everyone can easily associate with your unique RL (real life) persona. Then you can post comments and more.

We love you – just do it!

Contributors

If you’re ready to contribute with actual posts, tell us a little about yourself in your biography.  Include your full name and why you are interested in On Desire projects like Around Lake Michigan.

General notes on posts

Separate major ideas into different posts. This helps keep comments relevant and facilitates linking later on.

Steer clear of generic titles like, ‘my thoughts’. Choose a descriptive title that sums up the post and is specific, eg “Big disaster at the cookie factory”.

Do choose categories and do include tags. If you don’t understand them fully, call Dan and ask!

Publishing articles / pages from other web sites

This is a two post process. First create a pubic post and add a link to the original article there. Important – Include a concise description about why you think the linked article is relevant.

Second, create a new private post and paste the entire article – text and pictures – to create a local archive. This gives us a backup in case the original link goes dead in the future.

If that’s as far as you want to go, fine.  Ideally, contributors should elaborate on how they think a link relates to ondesire / ALM with specific references to our projects’ perspective and philosophy – as you understand it. Advance the conversation by offering connections, contrasts, lessons learned, etc. Put the link and it’s contents in context. Do include short excerpts from the linked article to illustrate your points, much like quoting from an email.

Please do not use the cross posting plugin, ever.

Administrators

Unless you know what you are doing, stick to making posts. Do not make or alter pages. Don’t fool around with the settings of the blog. Stick to posts.
Administrators may change the blog’s appearance or operation occasionally. Major changes are discussed at http://holyboners.com. If you would like to make a suggestion for change, post the suggestion as private or send an email directly.

Please do not use the cross posting plugin, ever.

It’s the day before launch, or at least the day before the launch party. Putting a final coart of paint on the hulls today and perhaps a second injection on the decks. There’s a slew of parts arriving via UPS, including (theoretically) the jib from Whirlwind, just about 3 weeks late.

Work in progress images from a couple of weeks back, examples of problems solved towards getting a $400 Hobie Cat ready for the big lake. In hindsight, full documentation of the restoration would have been great, but getting the boat ready was my focus.

Simple patches and more trouble

The damaged area (blister, crack, impact) is exposed (darkish middle) along with some surrounding solid structure.  A patch of biaxial glass is cut to overlap onto the existing structure, then the patch and the solid structure are wet out with catalyzed resin. Some 406 ‘mayonnaise’ is applied to the structure, followed by the patch and finally a sheet of wax paper (brown) to facilitate removal of air bubbles and excess resin.	The wax paper is removed and voila! Note the inner oval of biaxial glass doesn’t entirely cover the exposed structure, just enough to bridge the damage.
First bow patch after the wax paper was removed. New glass is flush with the gelcoat as it overlaps the existing glass.	The compound curve was a little tough to match with one layer of glass, thus we got a tiny air gap at the aft end of the patch that had to be reopened. There was plenty of practice doing bow patches.
Late in the game, Patrick found other issues of concern on the port hull bow. Red crayon marks a suspicious crack, which turns out to be a through hull repair.	Here it is opened up. Multiple layers of biaxial glass built up the curve, followed by an icing of 406 ‘peanut butter’
Another late in the game discovery – rippling hull. We had extensively assessed the hull weeks back, but after several simple repairs our eyes became tuned in and we could spot more subtle clues.	An area of weak glass and delamination, just below the delaminated deck area. Could this have been caused by stress from the weakened deck? Deck delamination ignored can eventually result in the hull snapping in half.

A through hull repair, inner and outer skin breached

To fabricate a backing plate to heal the port breach, we needed to match the curve of the hull for a close fit. The hull provided a handy mold. First plastic is laid over a big swath of hull and stretched tight with tape.	Wax paper was laid on the plastic and the hull was rotated to bring the surface closer to horizontal. Then biaxial glass was cut and wet out. Gravity insures the patches conform to the shape of the hull.	We built two pieces because though the curve of the inner skin closely matches the outer skin, the inner has a ridge where the foam meets the keel. Rather than try to rig something super fancy to take the ridge into account, we just left a gap that could be bonded later.
Here the two plates are placed inside the hull. Of course, all surfaces were sanded and cleaned with acetone first, then wetted out and 406 mayonnaise applied.	Fishing line tied to the backing plates pulls them against the inner hull. Our innovation was to include wooden blocks so that the line is pulled at nearly right angles to the hull rather than to the sides. This really locks the patch in place until it cures.	From the other side, note the fishing line almost wrapping around the hull. That kept tension on the line while decreasing load on the tape. The fishing line was as taught as guitar strings.

More patches and deck injections with guest appearance.

The rudder breach was big enough for a light bulb, but not the right shape for a backing plate patch.	The hole had to be expanded into a more elliptical shape so the backing plate could be slipped through.	We patched most everything in two days of frenzied work.
The injection map. The outside fiberglass skin has separated from the foam core creating a void or empty space between them, compromising strength. This can cause the hull to break in half in high winds. A pattern of holes are drilled Holes are drilled and catalyzed resin is injected to fill the voids.	Unfortunately, about 30% of the holes I drilled went through the outer and inner fiberglass, both because I was a little careless and the inner skin was somewhat compromised. I drilled slightly larger inspection holes to check for cracks in the inner skin.	Finding no significant cracks, I used 404 peanut butter to seal off all the inner holes in preparation for injection.
Injecting resin into one hole forces resin out the adjacent holes. Moving from low to high points on the grid allows air to escape, theoretically filling the void.	Injection complete. Extra resin has oozed out over the tape. The tape kept the cured resin from bonding to surface of the hull.	James Kudlak, local windsurfing legend, stops by to survey the progress.

Breaches in the Hobie hulls are sealed, structural damage is remediated. At 10:00 pm UTC – 4, August 12, I completed the injections of the decks. Only cosmetic and finishing work remains. I know y’all have been starving for pictures, so a gaggle follows after this public service message.

It’s hard to imagine anyone NOT getting excited about the nitty gritty details of hull integrity and fiberglass repair, but believe it or not, a few people might actually be bored by my current favorite activity! For their sake, I’d like to explain why I’ve taken such trouble to document it.

First is the breadcrumbs. I’ve learned a lot doing the hull work that might come in handy on future projects. My swiss cheese like memory will not retain these details for very long, therefor extensive notes are a must. I use the web because the drudgery of mere note making is relieved by the potential of an audience, and that kicks in my showboating circuits. Can I make notes that will be fun to read, that will be engaging even to someone who couldn’t give a flying fuck about fiberglass minutia or even boats?

Second is the give back. To do this work, I relied heavily on community postings about Hobie Cat repair. I’ve made a few mistakes and had a couple of breakthrough’s that could help a future Hobie restorer, so it’s only just that I share the wealth.

Third is visitors. The key to getting plenty of traffic to a website is to provide relevant information that folks need, sometimes desperately. Hobie renovators checking out the content might wonder about the context, and then – they are mine! Links to random stuff like sailing around Lake Michigan, sustainability and the like will snag and beguile them. Of course, sustainability is already be on the radar screen of most Hobie sailors who, (for the most part) are highly evolved spiritual beings in contrast to say, owners of personal watercraft – Jetski, Waverunner, etc.

Now – check out that last paragraph. Because I mentioned “jetski”, that word becomes a searchable tag for this post, hooking directly into search engines like Google. Imagine some dumbass jetski dude / dudette who’s looking for new and interesting places to go around and around in circles searching for “Lake Michigan” and “around” and “jetski”. This post could easily be in the top 10 links. If a dumbass jetskiier clicked into ondesire.com they would be exposed to the concept of sustainability and small footprints for the VERY FIRST TIME! Maybe they would read this text and have an epiphany, a conversion experience, swearing off petroleum powered gluttony and coming over the side of righteousness and light! Or not. Probably not, but maybe…

Enough distractions, let’s see some pictures!

Check out the sand harvest from the starboard hull! The Viglands must have left the drain plug out with the Hobie still in the surf, how many years ago? She was last registered in 2002, and the Vigland’s were sticklers for keeping their reg up to date. Maybe 7 years of wet sand? This is why the rudder foam was saturated with water, sand doesn’t dry out very well trapped inside a fiberglass bottle.

I hosed her out through the breach for a good 15 – 20 minutes, sand was way up in there.

sand

I keep ragging on the Viglands because Alan lost my blocks! I’d also like to interview his son Todd who works for the Land Conservancy as part of Around Lake Michigan. One of the questions I plan to ask him is, do you ever lay awake nights and regret your ill treatment of my boat? It’s not fair really, my family neglected our 14 too, just ask my buddy Dave Crowley who worked on it last year. Where is Dave Crowley by the way?

Here’s the basic steps. Grind down the damaged area, removing gelcoat and broken fiberglass to expose solid fiberglass structure. Clean the area with acetone. Lay a sheet of clear plastic over the area and draw the outline of the repair on the plastic with a crayon. Cut out the shape from the plastic, this becomes a pattern for cutting glass fabric to the same shape. Do a bunch of plastic patterns first and then use them to cut a bunch of glass patches all at once, this will maximize how many patches you get from the glass and minimize the amount of glass fibers released into the air. We used biaxial glass which is tightly woven glass stitched to a layer of glass matte. This makes a very strong repair but the fabric tends to release lots of tiny fibers when cut. Which reminds me, here’s a picture of two scientists investigating a UFO crash site…

Actually, that’s Patrick and moi blessing the beloved hulls, dressed for success. Glass fibers and grinding dust are not compatible with lung operation or bare skin, eyes can be put out with flying debris, ears go deaf if subjected to endless hours of power tool noise. Isolate your work area and your clothing. This stuff sticks to cloths and will go with you, so when you are done or breaking for lunch, vacuum yourself off, strip your outer skin and wash skin with cold water. Keep children and pets far away, they don’t know better.

I did 95% of the sanding indoors and even when outside I kept my HEPA vacuum handy. Don’t even think about doing extensive renovation without a solid HEPA vacuum and plenty of replacement bags / filters. Standard vacuums and shopvacs just put the dust back into the air.

Kai was telling me that in Europe, you have to be certified to do glass work, the materials are not even available to the average Joe. The Europeans aren’t dumb, this shit is not to be trifled with. Sanding outdoors is generally a bad idea. I used a sanding tent in my garage and was able to capture most of the dust. Even so, some objects near the seams of my tent got a light dusting and had to be carefully cleaned. I am not kidding here, don’t skip the preparations. A slick boat is not worth your health. Small footprint!

Last January while attending Seattle’s annual boat show I came across the ‘Junk Raft’, a catamaran sailing vessel built out of trash and found objects by Dr. Marcus Eriksen and Joel Paschal. Over the course of 88 days they sailed this raft from Southern California to Hawaii. In the course of their journey they documented the garbage patch and took samples as they encountered it.

Since then I have scoured the web and found many articles relating to this garbage patch. While many of these articles are somewhat sensationalized they reference oceanographers and scientists who are aware of and, in varying capacities, studying this garbage patch.

www.independent.co.uk

These articles refer to the garbage patch as being ‘twice the size of Texas’ filled with a soup of garbage ‘which consists of 80% plastics and weighs some 3.5 million tons’. It collects in large quantities in several parts of the world due to major, mostly circular ocean currents, or gyres, driven by wind patterns and shaped by large land masses. These circular currents are natural in origin and like a large whirlpool tend to collect debris in their central areas.

“A gyre is any manner of particularly large-scale wind, swirling vortex and ocean currents. Gyres are caused by the Coriolis effect; planetary vorticity along with horizontal and vertical friction, which determine the circulation patterns from the wind curl (torque).”

Over the next month I will have a unique opportunity to witness this garbage patch for myself. Towards the end of August I will be delivering a 52′ motor sailer (‘Jungle’) from Hawaii to San Diego. This boat is unique in that it relies on both sails and it’s engine to traverse long distances of ocean. While I am more of a purest when it comes to voyaging and rely almost exclusively on my sails to propel me, this vessel is a hybrid of a sailing and a motoring vessel.

The major weather and wind patterns in the North Eastern Pacific move in a clockwise fashion, from West to East and from North to South. About half way between San Francisco and Hawaii there is typically a semi-stationary high pressure system which moves North and South seasonally. In order to sail ‘Desire’ back to Seattle I would need to sail her due North for about 1200 mile before I can even start to think about heading East, towards North America. If I head East too early I would risk getting stuck in the 500-800 mile area of no wind associated with this weather system. As I carry only enough fuel aboard ‘Desire’ to propel her 250 miles I would be in some level of trouble if I got stuck in this area.

With ‘Jungle’ we have the ability to motor from Hawaii directly into the North Easterly trades. But this would consume much fuel and be a stressful voyage for both to ship and crew. We could also sail due North and then arc East around the top of the high before making our way down the coast towards Southern California. We will most likely set a course which is a compromise of the two. Leaving Hawaii towards the North while closely monitoring the Northern Pacific weather patterns to pick our time and place for heading East, towards the mainland, with minimal motoring while avoiding Northern Pacific low pressure systems.

I am currently trying to figure out a way to collect useful data as to what I encounter along the way. What I am proposing is building a small collection device that I can drag through the water to sample debris along our course. I will be emptying the device at set intervals and logging the precise time and location of each sample. In the end I will have a set of samples and data points that can be added to a larger data set to help identify the position and density of the garbage patch.

The device has to be simple and as small as possible to minimize the drag on the vessel. It also has to be able to be deployed and retrieved with minimal risk to the vessel and crew. I am proposing about a 6-8 inch diameter ring opening with a 2-3 foot conical screen consisting of 1/4″ mesh. This will allow most plankton and smaller debris to pass through the collection device while still capturing enough debris to quantify the data.

I am hoping to lay the groundwork to reach out to other mariners to contribute their observations to this data set and have someone build a model of the garbage patch in the Northern Pacific and ultimately in other parts of the world.

In much the same manner as amateur astronomers have significantly contributed to our collective knowledge base of the heavens, I am proposing using the cruising community to act as amateur oceanographers to collect data on the world’s oceans. Most of these people have a highly vested interest in the health of the oceans and would gladly participate in collecting data to determine the ocean’s health to work towards solutions.

I am currently in touch with several marine based non-profit groups and scientists in order for them to advise me on the best ways to collect these samples and data.

Stay tuned…

Patrick and I patched up the sides of the hulls pretty nearly now – all that’s left is sanding, fairing and painting. There’s also epoxy injections needed for both decks a couple of feet forward of the front pylons. It’s usually a straightforward operation, except… I marked the soft spots and drilled holes for the injections, but in about 30% of the holes my bit sank right through both layers of fiberglass. That’s not good.

Hobie hulls are constructed with two layers of fiberglass with a layer of foam in between. It’s hard to imagine that foam could provide strength, but it does, as long as it contacts both the inner and outer fiberglass. If there’s a gap between the foam and the fiberglass, it’s not nearly as strong. If sailors stand on the deck the foam gets crushed, creating a gap. Design flaw, but whatever. Epoxy can be injected through the external skin to fill the void unless the internal skin is also ruptured. Injection won’t work then because the liquid epoxy will leak into the inside of the hull rather than fill the void between the two skins. That means removing the entire sandwich and repairing the breach in several stages, like like we did with the starboard rudder and port side.

Now, I was careful not to drill too deep, but maybe I was just careless on 30% of my holes. If so, I could create a thick epoxy plug for those holes and continue with the rest of the liquid injection. If the inner skin was already fractured and broken before I drilled, then plugging won’t help, I’ll just be squirting epoxy into the hull. The word for this is setback. So close… worse case scenario is opening her up tomorrow, carving out the broken inner skin and patching it – two more days. Best case scenario is a few more exploratory holes near the deep holes to see if the inner skin is totally broken, and if it’s not then continue with thick and thin injections – 1 day. For now sleep and the activation of the unconscious for problem solving.

A $400 Hobie Cat, eh? That’s what I bought it for in May, with a trailer! A week later, (after a full inventory), it turned out there were no blocks for the main and jib. The seller, Alan Vigland, had no idea what happened to the blocks when I called to inquire. Ok, so already the budget is creeping up. Preparing a 30 year old Hobie Cat for a 1000 mile voyage on a great lake has already cost more than 6 times the price of the boat, not including labor. The total budget can be useful for estimating the project footprint, like the calculations for the carbon cost of making a 747 jet – what If we spent the cost of the 747 on gasoline and burned it all up, how much carbon would that produce? This method is probably very inaccurate for estimating the carbon cost of materials, but at least it can get us thinking about the multiple costs of the things we buy. There’s the price we pay in dollars and then there’s the price the earth pays for mining, drilling, manufacturing, transport, etc.

Hull repairs and restructuring
07/15/09 Sears – vacuum cleaner bags $11.65
07/15/09 West Marine – West Systems guide books, Gel Coat and Fiberglass boat repair $11.64
07/28/09 Fiberlay – 3 yards of 38″ biaxial and matte glass knit ~$60 (2nd day air)
07/30/09 West Marine – West Systems epoxy resin, hardener and support products $235.73
08/05/09 Shop and Save – surgical gloves 30 pair and latex 1 pair $5.30
08/07/09 Shop and Save – paper towel and wax paper $2.50
08/09/09 Sears – nitril gloves, 100 pair $15.89
08/09/09 West Marine – Interlux primer and 2 quarts white, tape and collodial silica $183.85

subtotal $526.56

New sails and rigging
07/15/09 Whirlwind Sails – X2 Main and jib $1300
07/15/09 Baolong fenders x 4 $120
07/21/09 Bluewater Sails – Trampoline and hiking straps replacement $90
00/00/00 shroud set $100
00/00/00 blocks $100
00/00/00 tiller $40
00/00/00 spare rudder $200

subtotal $1950.00

total 2476.56

Even though I am not using any gasoline when I am sailing around the lake, I have produced some carbon in fixing up the boat so I could sail around the lake – and a bag of garbage too. Reduced footprint maybe, sustainability no. Dave Hart is doing some serious sustainability research. With a little luck we can get him to talk about it.

Just about the time that I was realizing that ‘Desire’ wasn’t going to be ready to sail back to Seattle and I realized Dan wasn’t going to make it to Hawaii the universe conspired for me yet again. I got a call, out of the blue, seconds after I had just posted an ad on a crew finder web page. It was Dr. Roland Sannamann calling.

'Kattitude' (click for web site)

I had met Roli and his wife Kathy years ago as I was sailing ‘Desire’ down the Northern California coast on her second epic voyage (to Hawaii). Roli and Kathy had their beautiful and stout 38′ catamaran ‘Katitude’ custom built to Roli’s specs in Durban, South Africa (where Roli had lived as a teenager and young adult). They had sailed ‘Katitude’ from Durban, around Cape Hope and across the Atlantic through the Caribbean. They wanted to return their boat to their home in San Diego but didn’t want her to get dinged up in the Panama Canal so they sailed to Fort Lauderdale, FL and loaded her onto a ship.

Kathy and Roli

Because of a quirky paragraph in the 1950′s ‘Jones Act’ (a set of laws governing foreign vessels and crews operating for commerce between US ports), although the ship stopped in San Diego, they were not allowed to offload ‘Katitude’ until Vancouver, B.C. So when I met them, Roli and Kathy were on the last leg of their own epic voyage, down the coast towards their home port. They knew that as soon as they got back to San Diego their trip would be over and they would be forced to go back to their hectic lives.

So they decided to adopt an aspiring solo sailer and his slow dinky boat. ‘Katitude’ was about three times faster than ‘Desire’ so while I would be at sea for 3-4 days at a time they usually stopped in a harbor for the night and we met up again at our next appointed harbor, usually staying in radio contact several times a day to monitor each other’s progress.

The first harbor we had left together was Euereka, CA. ‘Katitude’ jetted ahead of me as the winds began picking up. Roli and Kathy were about 12 miles ahead of me when they radioed back that they were experiencing 58 knot winds at Cape Mendicino. I had already reduced ‘Desire’s sail to two reefs in the main and a 50% jib. It was a bit bumpy but she was screaming along quite well at 6.5 knots. A full knot above her theoretical hull speed! They suggested I think about turning back but I have to admit I was having way too much fun surfing ‘Desire’ on the face of waves as she carved across them with her twin keels and spade rudder!

We kind of hopscotched down the coast, linking up ever few days. Usually with them having arrived way ahead of me and having reserved a slip next to them. We drank a lot of wine in the evenings and, as Roli would say, ‘Told a lot of lies’ (good natured of course).

Then we had a bit of an incident in the oil fields near Santa Barbara. Having worked in the Gulf of Mexico oil fields on offshore supply boats I knew that I should pass no closer than a mile to any oil platform at they have many large metal buoys around them for tying off various work ships. Usually these buoys have a flashing light and radar reflectors on them. At one point I had relaxed my guard a bit, being 5-6 miles from the nearest rig when I glanced forward to see a 5-6 foot diameter steel buoy directly in front of ‘Desire’. I yanked the tiller and just missed the buoy by inches. I noticed as I passed that it’s light and reflector were missing leaving some jagged bars sticking up.

I thought I should call to ‘Katitute’, which was 7-8 miles behind me in the dark and catching up fast. Then I thought,’What are the chances that Roli and I are on exactly the same course to a harbor that is still about 25 miles away? It’s a big ocean and the odds are astronomical that they would encounter this same buoy…’

From ‘Kattitute’s logs:

“At 2:00am, we checked our radar, charts, and chart plotter, adjusted our course slightly and headed for Santa Barbara, CA. It was a dark overcast sky, 20 knots of wind, with a choppy white-capped ocean. Boom!! We hit something! We thought we had run over a boat. We stopped the motors immediately, brought out the spot light and saw that we had “run over” a huge, spherical white uncharted steel buoy. We surveyed the damage and found it to be non-structural, no leaks or bilge pumps running. After reporting the incident to the Coast Guard, we motored into Santa Barbara Harbor at 4:00am.”

Roli came on the radio saying that they had just hit something. Not only had they hit it but they had run completely over it between the hulls of the catamaran. The top of the buoy, with the spindly bits of metal, had connected with the forward spar of their trampoline. Having been forced down in the water it bobbed up underneath the salon, bouncing along the bottom and then finally knocking their tender partially off of it’s cradle as it exited the rear of the boat.

I just bit my tongue and asked if they were alright, ready to turn around on a dime and go back for them if need be. Roli told me they were a bit shaken up but quite fine and ‘Katitude’ had only suffered a bit of cosmetic damage. Later on, over a couple glasses of wine in Santa Barbara I fessed up that I had almost hit the same buoy. I told them that I had decided the odds were so great for them to encounter the same menacing 4-5 foot sphere in the ocean that I didn’t want to bother them about it. We had a good laugh over it and thankfully Roli didn’t hold it against me. But I felt for them. It was their first dent in their new boat after all of those thousands of miles of ocean.

We all made it intact to San Diego and shortly thereafter I headed for Hawaii. We had stayed in touch over the last few years and I reconnected with Roli and Kathy when I was back in San Diego getting ‘Babalu’ ready for her recent voyage. They also bonded with my dear friends Hans and Erica and had us all over to their house for a low key bon-voyage party. I hadn’t gotten around to calling them and telling them how well our trip to the Marquesas had gone when I get this call from Roli. He wants to know if I can help him sail a 52′ Mandarin motorsailer from Hawaii to San Diego with her new owners in August. I think about it for about half a second and say sure!

Click on pic for Mandarin 52 web site

He needs to run it by the owner and the next day I get a call from Jim Fraine and we talk for about an hour and a half. Not only does he want me to help them with the delivery but he wants to hire me in my capacity as a marine electrician both in Hawaii before the trip as well as in San Diego for a couple of weeks to make the boat’s electrical systems more world compatible.

Photo from Jim Fraine

The boat is being delivered to Hawaii by it’s current owner from Australia and is currently near Samoa with an ETA for Hawaii of August 15th. As soon as I get a green light from Jim I’ll button up ‘Desire’ and tuck her back into storage in Kona. From there I’ll fly to Oahu and start helping get “Jungle’ ready for her passage. Roli flies in on the 20th and we are planning to leave around the 22nd for about a 20 day passage. The course back is bit tricky as we need to decide how much we want to motor (across the mid Pacific High) and how much we want to sail (into the trade winds).

Stay tuned….

Circumnavigations that come to mind… Remember that book by Holling C. Holling entitled Paddle to the Sea? A young Canadian boy carves a paddle person in a canoe and releases him in Nipigon country just north of Lake Superior during the spring thaw. The book documents Paddle-to-the-Sea as he ventures through the Great Lakes making his way out the St. Lawrence, across the Atlantic to France. Wild journey.

A father and daughter circumnavigated Lake Superior in a HOBIE! Is Dan the first circumnavigator in a Hobie of Lake Michigan? We’ve got several kayakers, bikers, walkers, runners, canoeists, but no Hobie in our beloved squash-shaped Lake of Lakes.

Our Great Lakes is under siege with non-native species – what does your sail look like?

There was a bon voyage party for me last night that I missed because I was scatter brained over these repairs and couldn’t remember where Gretchen said it was. I almost sprained my ass riding 11 miles at top speed on Steve Z’s road bike to get to Jim and Gretchen’s, only to find nobody there but their dog Doris, barking, barking, barking. They were all at Elberta beach but even though Patrick showed up and we drove down there, I didn’t recognize any cars. Shite. I’ll have another party at the house after the jib arrives next week.

Here’s a done list on the glass work. Pix coming.

√ build backing plate for new enlarged hull breach by starboard rudder
√ epoxy exposed wood near rudder, three coats
√ sand interior of midsection hull breach in preparation for backing plate and out facing side of backing plate
√ install backing plates in port hull midsection breach using fishing line technique, add peanut butter to half level
√ wet out areas with partially filled excavations
√ use rest of peanut butter to top off partially filled excavations
√ wet out patches for now completely filled excavations and install
√ sand and wet out rudder breach backing plate and interior, install using fishing line technique, fill half with peanut butter

wet out all excavations excluding rudder and midsection breaches (3 remain)
wet out patches for all excavations except excluded and install (3 remain)
wet out bottom jobs and install armor patches
top off midsection breach backing plate patch with peanut butter, install outer patch
sand midsection breach, fair with peanut butter
sand and wet out rudder breach backing plate, top off with peanut butter and install patch
sand, wet out and fair all repairs, minor gouges, bottom scratches
rebuild ridge by rudder
inject soft areas fore of front pilons
UV paint

Though I had thought the grinding was completely finished at 2:00 pm today, it wasn’t. I was prep sanding on the port hull’s bow when I broke through to a big void under the glass. That meant more grinding and eventually breaking though into the interior of the hull. This is the smallest hull breach of the three, perhaps 1 and 1/2 inches long. After prep sanding all the excavations and washing them down with acetone, Patrick and I were finally ready to handle the smallest dings and divots. I mixed up some peanut butter (structural epoxy paste) and following Kai’s recommendations filled to a max depth of 3/16 – 1/4 depth. Most of the repairs were nowhere near that deep and were topped off immediately. We are ready to put in a full day tomorrow, breaking in time for Gretchen and Jim’s evening bonfire up at the cottage art installation.

Here’s tomorrow’s list…

build backing plate for new enlarged hull breach by starboard rudder
epoxy exposed wood near rudder, three coats
sand interior of midsection hull breach in preparation for backing plate and out facing side of backing plate
sand peanut butter in all holes repaired on Wednesday
install backing plates in port hull midsection breach using fishing line technique, add peanut butter to half level
wet out areas with partially filled excavations
use rest of peanut butter to top off partially filled excavations
wet out patches for now completely filled excavations and install
wet out all excavations excluding rudder and midsection breaches
wet out patches for all excavations except excluded and install
wet out bottom jobs and install armor patches

next day

sand and wet out rudder breach backing plate and interior, install using fishing line technique, fill half with peanut butter
sand all repairs
wet out and fair sanded repairs with peanut butter
top off midsection breach backing plate patch with peanut butter, install outer patch

next day

sand midsection breach, fair with peanut butter
sand and wet out rudder breach backing plate, top off with peanut butter and install patch
inject soft areas fore of front pilons

next day

UV paint

next day

reassemble hobie

I decided to skip foam replacement all together. It’s such a minor component of the repair, structural epoxy paste is perfectly adequate, IMHO. With luck will be able to finish closing the hulls up on Sunday.

This discussion is half of the primary focus of the On Desire expedition. The other half being the real world implementation of sustainably practices. I believe that there are two main aspects of determining sustainability. First is understanding the precise actual foot print of a person, a company or any endeavor. Once the actual air mass, land volume, resources (and their life cycles) are understood, educated assessments can be implemented to ensure no net decrease in the world’s quality and resources.

Some Footprint Calculators

I’ve got voids in the foam sandwich and rather than cut little pieces of new foam I thought it made more sense to pour in foam that would expand to fill the voids and joints completely. There’s product by uscomposites.com based on recommendation from a Hobie Cat forum post.

Kurt Hughes says urethane foams are friable which means they crumble under repeat load. I had already placed the urethane order but was able to cancel it. I looked into divinycell which is supposedly what they use in Hobie’s now. Then I saw a post that said in 1977 the foam core was urethane, (my cat is 1979). Jeez, round and round.

Since my jib won’t be here until next week I’ve got a bit more time for the hull repairs. Even so, I want the hulls to be finished by Friday, (my targeted launch date). Then I can reassemble this weekend and sail her with the old sails to be sure everything is working.

Grind 2 small areas that I missed yesterday
Clean the exposed fiberglass with acetone
Fill small voids first or glass first? Which is stronger?

Today I’ll start actually closing some of it up, probably starting with the bottom jobs and small patches where the foam sandwich construction isn’t an issue.

Even laid up in the intensive care unit, the hobie hulls are still things of beauty. Touching them you can almost feel the physics, they are hydro dynamic sonnets. They long for the water, they sing to me with their shape. These pictures are hardly worth the electrons they’re posted with, you need to run your hands along the profiles…

The reason the starboard rudder excavation was not drying out was because the interior was full of sand! There’s a reason this Hobie Cat only cost me $400 (with trailer). No matter, I cut a hole big enough for a hose to rinse her out and then later a light bulb to dry her. In a few days, good as new! Crosses fingers… Here’s a message from Chip of Whirlwind Sails. He’s making a new main and jib for the Hobie. Looks like there’s going to be slight delay in delivery… The original sails have been hanging in my improvised loft since we cleaned them. They need minor repairs and I was going to hand sew them as a project along the way. It seems like a good idea to have a spare set, I’d also like to carry a spare rudder and a second set of shroud lines.

The originals have been cleaned but need minor repairs

Another day of prepping the hulls for repair. Here’s the latest pix.

Why document the mundane and tedious?

Unless I struggle, you just won’t care what I want. Five days until launch and there are big holes in my boat. Do you care yet?

I like this work, the problem solving and visualizing the steps needed for an effective repair. To remember the techniques I am learning, I’ve got to leave a trail of breadcrumbs.

before	after
Mystery impact with drip	Upside down, "drip" is on the right with stain running up

more…

before	after
1 Starboard rudder damage	2 Still not quite ready

still more…

before	after
Delamination...	Becomes a port hole

fun…

Twice as much fun	Delamination just under the deck	Port hull outside bottom job
Blister constellations are now very lovely	Port hull inside bottom job	Gelcoat ding goes a little further

Dan and I had a great discussion yesterday about twin keels/hulls verses mono keel/hulls. I was noticing that the amas (pontoons) on his Hobie Cat are asymmetrical. When attached to the trampoline as designed, the outer faces are flatter than the curved inner faces. Desire’s keels are shaped in a similar way. The reason for this is that a twin hulled or twin keeled boat usually has the wind hitting it from one side or the other. The upwind side wants to lift up and the downwind side wants to bite into the water as it becomes the fulcrum for a lever. Not only does the downwind keel/hull bite into the water, but because it is curved on the side towards the center line of the boat it behaves like an airplane wing (oriented straight down in the water) and wants to ‘lift’ towards weather (wind). This allows the hulls to more efficiently track in a straight line rather than being pushed sideways by the wind.

After running a few errands today in the BF2 (big fricken ford) I came home to find ‘Desire’s older brother nearby. ‘Good Measure’ is owned by a good friend of mine, Larry Casidy, and was built in the same yard by the same designer as Desire, Lauret Giles. After building several hundred ‘Snapdragon’ boats (Larry’s style), Giles was awarded a grant by the British Royal Navy to do some tank testing and refine the hydrodynamic properties of his twin keeled concept. He came up with the Westerly ‘Centaur’ and built about 2,500 of them between the late ’60′s and mid-late ’70′s.

Good Measure's keels

Desire's keels

When you look at the two boats side by side you can immediately see how Giles refined the hull shape and keel configurations. Larry added two feet to the transom and a 3 foot bow sprit, but other than that they were both 26 foot boats. The older Snapdragon design has straight down relatively flat keels and a more rounded hull. The Centaur hull has a flatter bottom between the splayed keels. It’s hard to see but the Centaur keels are flatter on the outside and more curved toward the centerline of the boat. The new design made the boat much more stable in heavy rolling seas as well as allowed her to point (track) closer to the wind.

I constantly exceed “Desire’s theoretical limit of around 5.4 knots. I think this is is largely due to the flat area between her keels. She is a semi-planning displacement hull! With engine alone she normally cruises at 6.5 knots. Surfing in heavy seas I’ve gotten her as high as 9.3 knots for short periods!

WARNING/Disclaimer!!! Aug 3, 2009: I re-read this post today and realized I need to point out how absolutely foolish it is to surf any boat in heavy seas! …unless you really know what you and your boat are doing and you want to while away a boring storm with some entertaining fun on the ocean…

Here are some things that have worked for me(but may not necessarily work for you, your boat or your sensibilities:

First: (and foremost): Never ever ever go into the trough of a wave 90 degrees to the wave! Several things will surely happen (some simultaneously), the wind will stop, the boat will slow down, the nose may dig in, the following wave can flip you end over end (pitchpole), if you make it home, you will surly be crying…

Second: You have to sense and hand steer every wave differently. Never ever ever use an autopilot or wind vane while surfing. If you absolutely have to sail/motor downwind/downwave in these conditions use drogues, anchors, warps, anything you can think of to hang over the stern to slow the boat down. The safest tack to make it through these kind of conditions is to stear 30-50 degrees off the prevailing (largest) wave sets.

Third: If you screw up or something unexpected happens stear into the wave. The strongest, most hydrodynamic area of the boat is the nose and it’s designed to bust into waves. Use it if you have too but try not to jibe unless you can control it.

Fourth: Learn how to make your boat heave too, with the jib/rudder in light winds and with just the main/rudder in heavier winds. Along with learning how to heave too you will have to learn how to get out of heaving too, preferably without doing a hard jibe. Heaving too will save your life, lunch and/or relationship one day, trust me…