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December 3rd, 2009 – At Sea, 02º 35′S, 040º 04′W
by Mark Schrader, Dave Logan and Herb McCormick
On Thursday, the crew of Ocean Watch continued their ongoing quest to reach Rio de Janeiro and points farther south. This week, we’ve been looking back at the refit of Ocean Watch for the Around the Americas expedition in a multiple series of reports called “The Boat that Ballard Built.” Today’s third and final installment completes the series. See the end of the story for a voyage update from skipper Mark Schrader.
The Boat that Ballard Built (Part 3)
by Dave Logan and Herb McCormick
The talented and tight seaside community of Ballard, Washington accomplished the transformation of Ocean Watch from a 20-year-old cruising boat to a state-of-the-art expedition-style yacht for high-latitude adventuring. Spearheaded by project manager Dave Logan, skipper Mark Schrader and engineer Paul LaRussa, their immediate team consisted of a dedicated crew including boat captain Andy Gregory (who joined the boat on the first leg of the journey from Seattle to Alaska); rigging specialist and all-around boat wizard Jon Sebaska; and Joanna Wehrwein of Joanna’s Plumbing, who applied her specific expertise to the boat’s heating system but contributed to the project in countless ways by devoting countless hours.
In the first two parts of this series, we addressed the power plant, plumbing and all the below-decks systems aboard Ocean Watch. In this concluding piece, we’ll discuss the “topside” power plant – the rig and sails – and the related fittings and hardware.
On the original delivery of the boat from Mexico to Seattle after it was purchased in the spring of 2008, Mark and Dave discovered that the boat not only performed poorly under power, but that she also struggled to make steady progress under sail. “It had a 20-year-old in-mast mainsail furling system that probably worked okay as long as the wind was on the beam or aft of the beam,” said Dave. “But you couldn’t go to weather with it at all.”
The very first thing that had to happen was the removal of the rig from the boat. Measuring 78-feet, and weighing in the neighborhood of 1,700-pounds, it was “a bit of a heart-stopper getting the spar out of the boat and onto sawhorses to work on it,” said Dave. But the crew managed to do so without incident.
Because the cost of an entire new mast and rigging was prohibitively expensive, the idea was to change the existing rig from one with a furling mainsail to one with a conventional main, complete with its own track for hoisting and reefing. But first, once the rig was pulled, all the standing rigging – the shrouds and wires that support the mast in the boat – was stripped and replaced.
“It was hard to find replacements, as the old rigging was quite large diameter and hard to find,” said Dave, adding, “and never mind the fittings. But all that was done and in the nick of time, as we discovered that all the old fittings that held it all together were corroded.”
Though the goal was to “dress” Ocean Watch with a conventional mainsail, the plan to do so – adding a track to a furling spar – is a bold and unusual option. “Our good friends at Antal designed an extrusion that would fit in the existing slot/track for the roller-furling main,” said Dave. “We were able to bolt the extrusion onto it for the traditional mainsail, car and track system with a few reinforcing tabs strategically placed in the mast.
“We added a filler where the old sail went in and out of the mast,” Dave continued. “We stripped out the old roller-furler unit – it was on its last legs – and installed the new track that filled up the gap where the sail went in and out with a series of fiberglass laminates. The mast is really quite strong now. In fact, it would probably stand up without the shrouds, though I wouldn’t want to try it!”
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While the mast was out of the boat it was completely rewired, including a wiring array to accommodate the 25-pound meteorological package designed by oceanographer Michael Reynolds that was affixed to the masthead before the spar was again stepped aboard Ocean Watch. All that meant dedicated new conduit in the mast. The running lights and radio antennas were all replaced, as was all the running rigging, with Spectra cordage donated from Samson Rope. New Lewmar winches for the mast were added, and new rope clutches and attendant hardware; the Newport, Rhode Island-based company, Euro Marine Trading/Antal Marine Equipment, played a key role in fashioning the entire new rig assembly. When all was said and done, Ocean Watch was sporting a new cutter rig with a modern mainsail set-up employing three slab reef points, outhaul, topping lift and downhauls.
For the new sail inventory, a longtime friend of the Ocean Watch crew – Carol Hasse and her talented team of sail-makers from Port Townsend Sails – was behind the project from the outset. Carol arranged to purchase sailcloth from Bainbridge at a huge discount, then went to work fashioning a new suite of sails.
“We chose Carol for a number of reasons,” said Dave. “She has a reputation for making excellent cruising sails that perform really well. She’s one of a handful of small, hands-on sail lofts left in this country, and the more local things we could purchase, the better we felt. So we have American-built sails with American-made cloth. Finally, and most importantly, was the incredible amount of service she provided, including three days of sailing to tweak things and whip all the rope ends with tidy little seizing, and install chafe protection where necessary. Then she even gave us a complete sail-repair kit and lessons on how to use it. It was just endless service, and I’m convinced she’d come anywhere in the world to fix anything that broke.”
The 2,300 square foot sailing plan now includes the mainsail with three reefs, including a deep third reef that takes up about a quarter of the sail area (and which negates the need for a dedicated storm trysail); a working roller-furling jib/yankee that’s about 115% of the foretriangle, and which can be reefed down to about 85-90%; a working staysail that’s rated up to 30-35 knots of apparent wind; and a storm staysail that’s what Dave calls “a teeny little handkerchief with an orange top for visibility in extreme conditions.”
A nifty cruising gennaker from North Sails, complete with a logo of North and South America, rounds out the sail
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inventory. To handle it all, the deck layout was completely revamped. Several new Lewmar winches (along with all new Lewmar deck hatches) were added, and the old winches were re-serviced and upgraded to accept modern line. The main halyard and all the reef lines were led aft to the cockpit where they could be controlled easily with a new electric winch and a console of clutches. A donated 10-man Winslow life raft was mounted on deck just forward of the cockpit.
In its former incarnation, Danzante was set up with a self-tending staysail forward of the mast. For safety and efficiency, the replacement staysail is a hanked-on sail. That presented a challenge: what to do with the former, substantial base for the self-tending sail. The answer was a unique “wave-discouraging” feature incorporating the old base. The crew calls the stainless-steel unit the “wave-breaker.”
“It looked like the perfect opportunity to do something to hold the halyards that weren’t being used and to discourage waves that broke over the bow from slamming into the cockpit windshield,” said Dave, “and it’s worked quite nicely in that regards. It’s a stainless piece with a nice fair profile that sort of suits the boat, it has some cut-outs in it, and is robust enough to secure loose halyards. We haven’t had any full waves slamming into the windshield yet, where we had a quite a few delivering the boat from Mexico before it was installed.”
Finally, all new lifelines were added; the anchor roller was rebuilt and the anchor windlass was rewired with new switches and relays; the stern antenna arch was modified for better launching and retrieval of the hard-bottomed inflatable dinghy, and davits were added for convenience when in port or on coastal hops; and the cockpit enclosure was rebuilt with modern materials to provide compete protection in cold climates and shade covering in tropical locales. Dave calls it “our little greenhouse.” With all that work completed, the team at Seaview East Boatyard blasted the boat back to bare metal, barrier coated it with epoxy, primed it and then applied several coats of Sealife bottom paint.
When he’s not aboard Ocean Watch, project manager Dave Logan is a cabinetmaker who’s earned his reputation by building exquisite “green cabinets” that are as environmentally friendly, and as low-impact on the environment, as possible. He uses wood that is FSC-certified, which means it’s grown on a plantation and cut from sustainable resources, not rainforests or similar sources. The plywood he employs is glued together with soy, not formaldehyde. He brought this same philosophy to the refit of Ocean Watch.
“I tried to do things on this boat in the same way I’ve guided my professional life: source things from American companies, as locally as possible, and from sustainable materials whenever I can,” he says. “We strived to do the same thing with Ocean Watch. Given it’s a boat, and there are a lot of requirements for robustness and longevity, it’s a little more difficult to do than making cabinets but that was always my focus.
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“When we did this job that seemed to make the most sense for the whole project, as well, because we’re trying to bring the subject of ocean awareness to as many people as will listen,” he added. “It would’ve been hypocritical to do it any other way. A lot of times I had to fight for a bigger piece of the budget to accomplish this but I thought it was important and I was willing to fight for it.”
Along the way, many local businesses and individuals joined the effort, and Ocean Watch became “the boat that Ballard built.” Dave says, “The reason people volunteered is because of what we were doing. They wouldn’t have become involved if it was just a bunch of guys sailing around the planet. They volunteered because they thought it was cool, and we weren’t pushing an agenda.”
Now, as the voyage around the Americas nears the halfway point, Dave’s had the opportunity to assess all the hard work that went into the refit in the real world. Has he come to any conclusions?
“I think things are working really well,” he says. “It’s a boat, so things are going to wear out and break and need repair, just because of the harsh environment it’s in. But so far it’s stood the test. Actually, it’s exceeding what I hoped it would do.”
That said, would he do anything differently?
“There are a few things that Mark and I would have liked to scratch off the to-do list if time and budget would have allowed, but I think we’re pretty pleased that our efforts and the effort of the Ballard community paid off with such a well-prepared boat.” With that, we conclude the three-part series on the refit of Ocean Watch. The AtA crew and team would like to thank the following companies for their generous support, without which the voyage “around the Americas” would not be possible.
Around the Americas
Marine Industry & Communication Partners
Euro Marine Trading/Antal Marine Equipment/Lopo Light
Fisheries Supply Company
Iridium Satellite LLC
Northern Lights/Lugger Marine
Raymarine Instruments
Samson Rope
Seaview Boatyards
Stratos Satellite Communications
Sure Marine Service
Winslow Life Raft
Around the Americas
In-kind Supporters
Bainbridge Sailcloth
Blue Sea Systems
Chihuly Glass
Freeborn Concepts LLC
Hatton Marine
Helly Hanson
iBoatTrack
International SeaKeepers Society
Jeppesen Marine
Lewmar
Logan Services
Miller & Miller Marine
Navionics
Northwest Rigging
O’Mega Graphics
Outdoor Research
Pacific Maritime Institute
Pinnacle Painting
Port Townsend Sails
Remote Satellite Systems
Scanmar International
SSI Shredding Systems
Swedish Hospital – Ballard
Vi Reno, Reno Law Marine Attorney
Warren Light Craft
Ninety-Two in the Shade
by Skipper Mark Schrader
I seriously considered doing a cut and paste of yesterday’s story, or the day before that, or even the day before that for today’s summary of conditions around and aboard Ocean Watch. No moral high ground here, I might have proceeded with that plan until I realized it could make the catch-up story for tomorrow a little complicated. Don’t worry if you are having difficulty following this, so am I. Maybe the heat in this cabin has finally popped my internal thermostat. Seriously, if I were a pot roast right now I’d be perfectly simmered and wearing a fork on a plate next to potatoes, gravy and green beans.
The good news, Ocean Watch has proven herself to be well suited to high-latitude conditions and climate. No matter what outside temperature Dr. Reynold’s array of instruments may measure, the thermostat on the wall just behind the navigation station (my writing desk) reads nothing lower than 92°, day or night. We were very warm in the arctic so why shouldn’t we be in the tropics as well. Hal seems to be in control of the systems. Enough already.
Right now we’re inching our way around the corner for an eventual tack toward Natal. We’ve “rounded” Pta Jericoacoara and are approximately 10 miles offshore of something called Enseada de Timbauba. Depth is becoming an issue, I’m reading just less than 40-feet on the depthsounder. We’ll have to take another short tack offshore to clear the next point. Then, with any luck and a little help from the wind we should have a 200 nautical mile tack mostly in the right direction along the shore toward Natal, approximately 400 nautical miles from our current position.
We’ve all been a little surprised at the absence of sea life. Birds, flying-fish, dolphins all seem to be elsewhere. This close to a shore dotted with lots of small and medium-sized communities you would expect to see boats from local fishing fleets doing their work along the coast. We’ve seen half a dozen small boats in three days. The current offshore is still in the two- to three-knot range but where we are a half-knot is about the average. Maybe the fishing is better at the edge of the faster current. Even so, we’ve seen very little commercial activity anywhere all the way back to Cayenne.
Onboard the “economy of effort and movement” is still very much in evidence as we all choose our positions and measure our steps pretty carefully, conserving energy for a cooler day and smoother ocean. Maybe tomorrow, maybe the next day – we’ll see.
For now, it is good to report we’re all okay.
- Mark Schrader, Dave Logan and Herb McCormick with photographs by David Thoreson
This crew log submitted by Iridium OpenPort and Stratos
To add a comment to this story click on the comment link below the post title. Please direct your messages for the crew to crew@aroundtheamericas.org instead of submitting them here. Thanks for following the Around the Americas Expedition.
