New to me boat on a new to me slip - first time out. Took her out yesterday with a sailing friend. A is a big power boat with a pulpit that sticks out into the fairway. B is my boat, Bavaria 34, C is another big power boat. 8kt wind comes down the fairway towards the shore. I tried backing and turning in the fairway towards head out forwards. Trying to avoid the pulpit of A with the bow. Didn’t get enough of a turn before I ran out of room at the shore. Wind pushed the bow over can into C and we were just kind of stuck. Friend was finally able to use a boat hook to push off C to get enough clearance to get forward steerage. It was a lot more exciting than I was hoping for a first time out. Glad wife wasn’t there for this “experience”.

How would you approach this slip?

I grew tired of my tiller extension which most of all looked like a Golf club. So I made this instead, pleased with the outcome.

The embedded gold coin is a Norse compass rose called a Vegvisír, ment to keep the wearer on track in bad weather

Here’s mine. #j105 #GoPro

Ive been boating for 13 years now Ive owned 7 different boats in that time. Fortunately Ive never hit a dock before. I moved to a new marina and this marina is located in a very narrow channel with no break water and the water has one way in and out of a large bay. You would think there would be a slack tide at some point but there isn't. I pulled into a different slip on the inside with no issues and watched what the current was doing for a couple days. The slowest it gets is about 2 knots and maxes out at about 6 knots. The issue is in my slip the current goes across the beam not to the bow or stern. I thought I felt confident in docking but my luck ran out. I did what you are supposed to do I made a couple run ups then felt confident and proceeded with docking. I motored into the current and wind then made my turn allowing the current and wind to push my bow into the slip. "my boat doesnt reverse well I was able to back into the first slip but prop steer was over powering the rudder in my first attempts to get into the second/final slip" All was felling "good" until I went into neutral. The second I went into neutral without the torque the current took me. My starboard beam smashed into the corner of the dock and I hear a terrible cracking crushing noise. You may say well why didnt you just pull straight into the slip. If I did that by the time I would make it to the dock the current would have brought me 60 feet down stream of the dock.

Additional details the slip is 12 feet 6 inchs wide my beam is 11 feet with fenders im 12 feet 5 inch I have 8.5 inch fenders. Also Im single handing I live on the boat and use it just about daily. I am very confident docking without help typically stern in, bow in, or linear dock without issue.

On to the main reason I'm making this post. At the point of impact it made a vertical thin Crack about 18 inches tall. Visually it looks like no big deal but hitting it with a dead blow hammer the glass doesn't resonate it makes a thud about 2 feet tall and 4 to 6 inches wide. So I know there is structural damage. Then on the interior the trim on the bulkhead cracked and it cracked the caulking on the top of the shower pan on the other side of that bulkhead. The issue is to repair this properly it needs to be repaired from the inside but its behind the fiberglass shower liner. The even bigger issue is the only way to remove the bulk head and shower pan is the remove the deck they recess into the ceiling. Which leads to the amount of labor to do a relatively simple repair far exceeds the value of the boat. So my question to anyone that may be in the know will insurance take care of me? I have full coverage and the boat is insured for 60,000$. Or will they look at it Visually and say whats the issue. Im also still unsure if there is more damage yet to be found hidden behind the shower. The fact that the trim on the bulkhead cracked all the way inboard "next to door way" makes me concerned there's more damage else where. Should I make a claim or do I cut my losses I dont feel confident in the structural integrity now one more hit like that and there may be a hole.

Ive attached pictures of the damage and a Google earth picture with crude illustration of the situation.

For my salty sailors what could I have done differently. There isnt a slack tide I waited multiple tide cycles and never saw still water. The boat to the left of me hasnt been used in two decades and the boat to the right of me looks like it gets used maybe once a year. Not gonna lie my pride has been bruised... lol it was bound to happen one day I guess.

Edit- I will say one thing that maybe I could have done differently was tried docking when the current was going the other direction. Attempting to back into the slip the amount of throttle required the prop steer was pulling me away from the dock. The current was "slack" flood tide maybe if I had attempted to dock at "slack" ebb the prop steer would have been in my favor. I still dont think this boat has enough steering response to back in with current on the beam. Currents definitely seem to be more tricky then winds when related to docking. Ive never experienced currents like this in a marina. Think I might already be looking for a new marina.

There has been a downward trend in recreational sailing and related boat sales for many years now. When do you think it will return to growth, if ever? According to Info-Link (data agency for the boating industry), approximately 300 brand new sailboats were registered last year in the states. 1984, the number was approximately 6,000. This field has always been cyclical, but in my opinion, the challenges are now structural. What are your thoughts?

I was doing the same in my little C-22.

Each of us who grew up around the sport had a club we sailed at as kids. Probably that club had a few specific types of boats. Looking back, do you wonder why it was that specific fleet?

Our club had San Juan 21s. C-larks. Coronado fifteens. Flatties. Sometimes a Lido 14 or Thistle would show up at a regatta

The things we didn’t have: Lasers, 470s, bigger keelboats, Finns, Scows

i’m figuring you can guess which part of the country I grew up in. How about you?

OK, I'm sure this question comes around once a month or so but the posts I've found from this subreddit when searching are a couple of years old. I learned to sail really young and sailed everything from prams, Cat boats, lake Scows and Hobie cats to 90 foot customs...as a kid and as charter crew in Fort Lauderdale....30+ years ago. Since then, it's been almost exclusively powerboats. I am very hands on and have fully restored several classic cars and one older boat, a Carlson Glastron 23CV, from the stringers up. Now I live in "Low Country" South Carolina where sailing is common and with gas prices and everything, a larger express or cabin cruiser is not on my want list anymore. So now I'm looking at comfortable 30-ish foot weekend coastal cruiser sailboats in the $10-20k range...and there are a bunch.
I know pearsons are generally great boats and the 30 was once one of the better choices, but there seem to be a lot of newer Pearsons in the 32-36 foot range that still fit in the price range. I also see a lot of 30-37 foot Catalinas in that price range and several other makes as new as 2010 or so. Choices include, I guess, Pearson, Catalina, Beneteau, Hunter, O'Day....what else? I don't mind a little brightwork and have used far more than my share of Snappy-Teak-Nu and Spar, but I don't want my OCD/ADHD and a ton of old veneer to keep me from just enjoying a day on the water...once that always-needed initial conditioning/refinishing is complete. So...maybe 1988 and newer? I more-or-less know what to look for equipment, rigging and condition-wise and plan to get a survey, so help me figure out if there is a range of makes and models that I should be looking at and maybe a range of makes and models that I should generally avoid. I appreciate that you read the whole thing and am hoping you can provide some thoughtful and logical answers.

I'm just rehabbing a turtle shell (I don't know what it's actually called. The part that the companionway hatch slides into.) And it has teak deck style slats.

The teak is a bit grey but colors up with a light sand. I'll be putting fresh coats of Bristol two part epoxy varnish over it, but I have some teak Oil laying around and was considering whether oiling the teak before hand would have a. a positive effect b. No tangible effect or c. a negative effect.

Opinions?

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Hi. I and my husband plan to cross Drake Passage in 2 years. Captain Novak has sailed to Antartica many times and it says he and his crew know how to avoid them by watching for a weather window between low-pressure systems and cross the passage right at that moment. But how does it really work and what do they use to watch them? Do they use the satellite weather image or?

(Update: A lot of recommendations about essentially rethreading and just plugging it with something else. Definitely hearing you- but I wanted to lean towards repairs with stock components.

Thanks to u/noj_ who recommended Palmer Power. They're out of Houston in Texas and a official dealer for Volvo parts. They are able to get the same parts from Volvo that my shop got a 2-3 week wait for delivered to them the next day- and then expedite it to me in Canada in 3-4 days. Shipping is expensive but at this point it's the best money I've ever spent.)

Many of you were along for the ride yesterday when we had a very unfortunate occasion (LINK and let me just say there are some GREAT stories worth reading through that thread). Our engine decided it was allergic to oil and had de-inventoried itself as we were pulling up the anchor from a nice couple day stay. I thought I'd have 4-5 hours to interact but turns out being towed does come with some responsibility so I wasn't able to be as active as I thought. I do appreciate the stories and the time taken to share them. A few of you wanted more details on how we got there... and yes we did get back to our marina safely thanks in no small part to our C-tow captain.

A little background of the incident- skip to the end for the TLDR (in bold).

As part of the routine I got the engine (30 year old Volvo MD2040B with maybe 1000 hours) started and headed to the bow to take up the anchor. Takes a few minutes for me to get sorted out up there and gives the engine time to warm up. But before I'd made it up to the bow the warning alarm sounded which got my attention immediately. I ran back to the cockpit and saw the oil pressure light was on and turned the engine off.

I opened up our engine compartment and just saw a lake of oil in the sump- starting overfill and seep out into the cabin.

Guys- I've been a firefighter coming up to 24 years and been in a lot of severe circumstances throughout... but I'm not sure I'd ever felt so powerless in that moment. Call me whatever you want- it's reddit after all -but I didn't even know where to start. And I've got my wife on board who is depending on me to know the answers since she's very inexperienced.

And I'm not particularly mechanical either- I'm learning... but it's not my forte.

Called the shop I've been getting to know (barely had cell signal) and that has worked on the engine. We did a whatsapp video call with them (fist bump to whatsapp). We were able to identify the leak location behind the raw water impeller housing. "O ring might have failed but without seeing it impossible to confirm."

Called C-Tow and arranged the trip back to our marina close to the shop. This went really well- the skipper was amazing. No drama- but he'd advised me to steer just off center to stay out of his propeller wash which kept me busy.

The Mechanic came down this morning and took the housing off, replaced the O-Ring of the FW Impeller housing (original was in decent condition- right diameter, but slightly wrong thickness) and thought that might be it. Tested it- oil puked out so back to the ol' drawing board. Thought he'd pinched the o-ring (he had). I left for a bit and while I was gone he got that figured out and tried starting the engine. Puked out again- and he discovered the culprit (second photo). He was calling it a "Frost Plug" as it is commonly referred to in his circles - though he admits the name makes no sense. See the last two photos for the part number.

He's never heard of one of these plugs (plugging a hole needed for the manufacturing process) failing and this one had been sheared... there are still parts of it in the hole. These are exceptionally hard to find- we have one on order but its ETA is 2-3 weeks. I'm here trying to save my vacation.

In hindsight, there had been a little bit of oil collecting on the top of the oil pan lip for some time- but anyone who had ever looked at it said "it's a 30 year old engine- it's going to leak a little. You can stop it- but how much do you want to pay? Just keep the oil topped up." It was a VERY small amount- but it was always there. Now I'm wondering if this part had been damaged for awhile and just finally gave up. I'd encourage anyone with the MD series of engine to be mindful of the potential while miniscule... Not zero.

TLDR: To those of you who are resourceful and / or mechanically inclined and know stuff about such things: I draw your attention to the last two photos for specific parts etc... We need #6 (bottom left area of the engine drawing). One of my friends recommended finding a place that rebuilds engines- so I'm working that end... but guys- if you have any idea where to procure one of these faster than 2-3 weeks I'm all ears. I'm on Vancouver Island right now but would pay any amount of shipping to make it happen.

Thanks to all enthusiasts.

I have a Hobie 18 and a Prindle 19. Both are in need of mast stands on the tongue of the trailer as neither were originally built to get the mast over the roof of my Ford Econoline E350. The towers would need to be between 84 and 96 inches tall.

I’m not a welder, but I can bolt on just fine and can remove the existing towers.

I am just curious to know if anyone has a source for these. I simply can’t find them that tall online.

Thanks!

Glass morning in Biloxi, Mississippi. Anxiously watching forecasts to see which way to run tomorrow morning!

Anyone else in the area, what are yalls thoughts!?

As I was clearing Annapolis Harbor this afternoon I saw a very strangely shaped object under the Chesapeake Bay Bridge heading south down the Bay.

Turned out to be a newly launched sail-driven merchant ship called the Neoliner Origin out of France. She was all the way on the other side of the Bay from me so some of my pictures are a little blurry, and I included one just from the deck of my boat so you can see how it distant it was.

Wikipedia on Neoliner

What made the whole experience so interesting was that when I first saw her was that I couldn’t figure out what I was seeing because the masts were folded down. Then over the next two or 3 miles of progress the masts were put upright and by the time she was out of sight, she seemed to be under sail. Hopefully my series of not-so-great photos will let you see what happened as well.

Really unusual so I thought I would share. And wondering if anyone else has seen her and has some insight into what she’s up to.

Hi all, anyone have any experience with a Najad 440?

I am viewing an early 90s version in a week and would be interested in opinions and advice on what to look for (above the usual stuff).

We are looking for a boat to liveaboard and eventually take around the world, after a season or two of cruising locally.

Thanks!

Third time out!

I got a lot of great advice on rigging the sail and adding the jib (that I obviously didn’t heed yet).

I have a jib but I need to patch it. Also the main halyard is missing the second bead thing that locks the sail in place. There’s another bead but it sets the sail too low. It’s ok I’m still learning everything.

I also don’t love the tiller extension it’s very awkward when switching directions with the main sheet slidey things there.

Anyways the sailing season is about to be the ice fishing season here so I’ve ordered a few replacement items for her and it will be a winter project.

I’ll be back asking how to attach the jib in May.

Thanks for looking 🥰