I did Uship this week.
Auction ended yesterday. One bid. $8500.00. But maybe if I tried a different time of year it would be less (I asked for late November this year). I doubt it though. I have some local contacts who move
boats from the States and will check them. Would prefer to negotiate in person on this, not
internet auction in any case.
I've read about the AS 29, but it's a very different design though based on Sharpie principles. The
builder designed my one for shallow
water cruising, but also being able to bop down to the
Bahamas much like I am considering - not going too far
offshore. First I'll have to try her out.
Suijin - gotcha on
GPS. I'll just do my own
research. A bit frustrated that nowhere near where I live that I can see them in 'flesh'. I find reading small-text, abbreviated blurbs a bit confusing, but surely there are sites that give
reviews and at some point I'll spend a while reading through them and get a better idea of the features and differences.
My first priority - assuming this trip is a go - is proper
anchor, probably a
Rocna because it seems they are very good - indeed superlative - in most conditions and not so heavy to handle.
Boat comes with 100lb Fisherman and tons of chain and
rope rode, but that's a monster and not always effective, let alone needing 2-10 crew to manhandle it! I have a 30lb (?) Danforth which is enough in calm
weather and most bottoms, but definitely need something better. They are a tad expensive though! A good
anchor (or 3), esp. on this type of trip, is imo possibly the
single most important piece of
equipment after basic
sails, shrouds and
rudder. I could go without detailed
charts just dead reckoning and paying attention to buoys (though that will not be what I do), but without a good anchor(s), this couldn't
work at all.
If I can find a book with most of the
charts on the
East Coast, would prefer that to electronic, but suspect that no such thing exists. Governments publish charts so they are rarely made easily and affordably available. I am unaware of such a book existing (with charts in quarter size which you could fold out or something). They really should offer them if they don't already.
Thought came up yesterday: maybe could try to find used ones from retired sailor with a whole set in his attic? Is there a famous sailors' buy-sell zone?
The last sail I had this fall in September I was wing on wing with my little Paceship Westwind with centreboard up. She is a Ted
Hood design with a guppy
hull - no
keel shape whatsoever (so a sort of round sharpie come to think of it). Previous owner won over 50 club races in
Sydney and did so by being much faster than her handicap on the run, and this because of that guppy
hull (with board up).
I put on a preventer, used the
spinnaker pole on the working
jib (so was a tad undersailed which I prefer), and in a gentle 9-12
knot breeze (a few whitecaps but not all over) sat back and the boat self-steered most of the next 2 hours. Now this was a fairly steady
wind and a gentle sea (in a medium sized bay), but I played a little with the centreboard. With it down, the
passage of the wave under the hull from stern seems to catch the board (or would be
keel if one had one) and unless one is totally on the same line as the wave direction, the angle of the board/keel will cause the wave to push the boat as it passes, skewing it off its line and making such rudimentary self-steering set up (i.e. by
sails only) unworkable in a matter of seconds. I am sure everyone has experienced this on a run, one is continually trying to anticipate this yaw (I think that's a yaw, right?) and adjust
helm accordingly.
With board up, almost none of this happened, again because of the guppy hull bottom without any keel shape. Which is why I could be hands-off on a run for the best part of 2 hours (except when nudging her around a small rocky island which was in the way for a little while!).
I suspect the Sharpie is going to be very similar to this, albeit am not familiar with the 5-1 sharpie length to beam (cigar-shaped) profile and maybe that is different. I would suspect, though, that it's going to give her the tendency - especially on a run - to keep going forward in straight line and if
wind and wave action is steady, as it often is in gentle to moderate conditions, then without the wave 'pushing' the centre board at an angle which in turn pushes the hull of course on the downhill run of that wave cycle, that she will be rather steady.
Now if the seas are wild, choppy, conflicted, that's another story... All bets are off in terms of this boat in heavy
weather (is my
current approach in terms of planning, i.e. am not going to take her out and test her in a gale), but am confident that at least up to 6-9' 'reasonable' seas that it won't be all that dangerous getting to know how she handles. She could be terrible, but she might be nifty.
I think most of us are so used to heavy
displacement sailboats that we might not have a good feel for how light
displacement handles. Actually, I think that was part of the original post's purpose, was to see if anyone had handled Sharpies like mine
offshore or in rough weather. Once I get Parker's Sharpie book next week or so in mail, I'll try to track him down and chat, and hopefully he will fill me in fast on what I need to look for in terms of design specifics on mine to then get a better idea of her handling characteristics.
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