Full keel vs fin keel for offshore?

[carstenb]

Dockhead will probably remember these waves, knocked his 54 footer down

Force 9, gusting 10 - english channel

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by carstenb

Dockhead will probably remember these waves, knocked his 54 footer down

Force 9, gusting 10 - english channel

Yes, that was something. North Sea, though, near the turn into the German Bight, not English Channel.

As always, photos can't depict what those waves looked like. They towered over us. One of them broke and fell on us, knocking us down and broaching us. It was pretty scary. Very lucky that there were no injuries and no damage other than one destroyed laptop.

[carstenb]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Yes, that was something. North Sea, though, near the turn into the German Bight, not English Channel.

As always, photos can't depict what those waves looked like. They towered over us. One of them broke and fell on us, knocking us down and broaching us. It was pretty scary. Very lucky that there were no injuries and no damage other than one destroyed laptop.

Always tough to estimate wave size but I seem to recall we thought they 6 meters or so with a few rounding 8 meters.

Big mamas at any rate

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Yes, that was something. North Sea, though, near the turn into the German Bight, not English Channel.

As always, photos can't depict what those waves looked like. They towered over us. One of them broke and fell on us, knocking us down and broaching us. It was pretty scary. Very lucky that there were no injuries and no damage other than one destroyed laptop.

Above 50 degrees N Latitude....doesn't look fun

Even the fronts here (36.6 N) seem to be stronger and the wind comes up much more than we used to get in Pensacola, FL at 30 N. (excluding hurricanes and tropical storms)

Or it's just that it's where the bay meets the ocean that causes it here.....

[Paul Elliott]

As long as we're talking about waves, here's what can happen in the protected waters of the San Juan Islands / Salish Sea:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy9VHZTfNl0

And 50 miles off the coast of Oregon:


Completely different waves in deep water, long fetch, vs shallow and confused, short-fetch. We were seeing steady 45kt winds off the Oregon coast, with 60kt gusts.

In a small boat the trick is to not be where this stuff is happening.

[rgleason]

Use of a Weather Satellite Receiver like APT-06 or weather radio and Decoding software like WxtoImg and Opencpn + Weatherfax
as described in Tweed's world notes is a reasonably inexpensive way to get weather data. Or you could do as Sean Depagnier, who picks up Noaa weatherfax's with his rtlsdr + extender and decodes them with his weatherfax_pi plugin. The image then gets overlaid onto his opencpn charts.

[rgleason]

Second pic... smaller area ... 24,48,60,72h.... 8KB... even that takes time to suck out of the sky..

A friend of mine just did Arc Canaries to St Lucia. He asked me to clear out wxfax and grib (email attachments) via satphone on his winlink account. After that he could get email. The grib was small 16kb, but way too large an area, 12 hr interval, just wind from predictwind. He swears he'll never use grib again. Ham kept downloading, choking, cutout. Then dwnld again. No way to cancel or clear the email. Weak radio signal connection.
Using KVH sat that size is a snap. The IACfleet files are the best if available. Opencpn handles those too. Wish Noaa had them!! -sorry for thread drift.

[newhaul]

Here is one for you it just popped on craigslist here
https://seattle.craigslist.org/kit/b...437048981.html
ISLANDER 44 sailboat specifications and details on sailboatdata.com
And a good price to

[markpierce]

Originally Posted by Paul Elliott

Many of us feel nervous before setting out on a long passage.

Is that not the "thrill" one's after rather than going by ship or plane? Or is it the need to be in control regardless what nature will propose?

[Paul Elliott]

Originally Posted by markpierce

Is that not the "thrill" one's after rather than going by ship or plane? Or is it the need to be in control regardless what nature will propose?

Excellent question, and I'm not sure how well I can analyze my personal feelings. But here are some thoughts:

First of all, making a multi-week passage on the open ocean is indeed a big deal. You can't know what is going to happen, but whatever comes up you will have to handle by yourself (or with your small crew). You are facing the unknown, and the stakes are high.

Some of it is the fact that you are responsible for your boat and crew. My crew, as excellent as they usually are, still rely on me to make good decisions, provide leadership under difficult circumstances, to provide a well-found vessel, and to manage the inevitable personal disagreements (etc.) that will happen when you have a number of people depending on each other. True, all on board share responsibilities, but as the skipper, the buck stops with me. This can be challenging at times, and I take my responsibility seriously. Obviously the crew dynamics are different for a solo sailor, but you still have a responsibility to friends, family, and yourself.

Going by ship or plane as a passenger, I have no real responsibility, and no control. I may feel nervous (I can tell you about some hairy airliner flights I've been on!) but it's a different kind of stress.

Don't get me wrong -- I enjoy the experience of going to sea on my boat. And you're right, the butterflies I feel are part of the thrill.

[Tidjian]

Here is one for you it just popped on craigslist here
https://seattle.craigslist.org/kit/b...437048981.html
ISLANDER 44 sailboat specifications and details on sailboatdata.com

And a good price to

Thanks Newhaul! I'll admit that is a pretty cool boat. Much bigger than I've ever been on, but I like it. I really hope some of these are still available come spring when I can get out there.

Merry Christmas all ⛄

I'm far more stressed about the preparations and getting the right boat than I am about the voyage. This is probably the worst time right now because there's two feet of snow outside and nothing to do but contemplate and read. I think once April hits and I can get out on the water again the reality of it all will start to sink in. I'm sure I'll get some butterflies as the summer approaches and I start to see the plan coming together. But in the end, nerves aside, I think I'll be fine. I'm more concerned about the boat and having what I'll need than I am about my own abilities.

Flying.. being in a tin can at 30k feet has never been my idea of a good time. I had to go out and take a few flight lessons in a single engine Cessna to feel better about flying. That and flight simulator. I think I dislike the idea of not being in control or having any control whatsoever. If things get hairy, and they have a couple times, you're literally there to watch the show.

Hope everyone has a good holiday season!

[carstenb]

Originally Posted by Tidjian

Thanks Newhaul!

Merry Christmas all ⛄

I'm far more stressed about the preparations and getting the right boat than I am about the voyage. This is probably the worst time right now because there's two feet of snow outside and nothing to do but contemplate and read. I think once April hits and I can get out on the water again the reality of it all will start to sink in. I'm sure I'll get some butterflies as the summer approaches and I start to see the plan coming together. But in the end, nerves aside, I think I'll be fine. I'm more concerned about the boat and having what I'll need than I am about my own abilities.

Flying.. being in a tin can at 30k feet has never been my idea of a good time. I had to go out and take a few flight lessons in a single engine Cessna to feel better about flying. That and flight simulator. I think I dislike the idea of not being in control or having any control whatsoever. If things get hairy, and they have a couple times, you're literally there to watch the show.

Hope everyone has a good holiday season!

Many think that bolt on keels are less than strong. This is not the case as the video below shows - don't be afraid to buy a boat with a fin keel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvxhQO4pw2E

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by carstenb

Many think that bolt on keels are less than strong. This is not the case as the video below shows - don't be afraid to buy a boat with a fin keel

That's impressive. They ran that little boat THREE TIMES onto the rocks at full speed!

And keep in mind that the little Dehler is an ultra cheap mass produced boat.

This proves that even cheap boats can have a solid keel attachment, if the engineering is done right.

For those who don't understand German -- the narrator claimed that there were not even hairline cracks in the keel-hull joint.

[Suijin]

Originally Posted by markpierce

Is that not the "thrill" one's after rather than going by ship or plane? Or is it the need to be in control regardless what nature will propose?

I think it’s the simple fact that once you leave the dock you have to live with your preparations. So you do everything you reasonably can and there is often some concern or nagging anxiety in the back of your mind that there was one more thing you could have done. Once you leave the dock, that’s done and you leave it behind because it’s a moot point. You shift into voyage management mode.

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by Tidjian

Thanks Newhaul! I'll admit that is a pretty cool boat. Much bigger than I've ever been on, but I like it. I really hope some of these are still available come spring when I can get out there.

Merry Christmas all ⛄

I'm far more stressed about the preparations and getting the right boat than I am about the voyage. This is probably the worst time right now because there's two feet of snow outside and nothing to do but contemplate and read. I think once April hits and I can get out on the water again the reality of it all will start to sink in. I'm sure I'll get some butterflies as the summer approaches and I start to see the plan coming together. But in the end, nerves aside, I think I'll be fine. I'm more concerned about the boat and having what I'll need than I am about my own abilities.

Flying.. being in a tin can at 30k feet has never been my idea of a good time. I had to go out and take a few flight lessons in a single engine Cessna to feel better about flying. That and flight simulator. I think I dislike the idea of not being in control or having any control whatsoever. If things get hairy, and they have a couple times, you're literally there to watch the show.

Hope everyone has a good holiday season!

That's right, not being in control can be uncomfortable, but it's probably better that you were watching rather than flying when any problem arose. (even though it my not seem that way stuck in the back of a fully loaded say MD80 or MD88)

Most of those pilots that are flying commercial airliners at 30,000 plus feet have 100's upon 100's of hours flying in most all conditions both in the actual aircraft and doing hops using multimillion dollar flight simulators. Many have had prior careers flying military aircraft.

The simulators of today mimic the actual aircraft so closely even the control loading of the yoke is duplicated as well as the entire cockpit matching that of the aircraft

Ever see Atlanta Airport on a busy day? You can come in and see another Delta MD88 out your window on almost the same course as you but landing on a different runway. The place is super busy

You'll probably continue to be more stressed about the preparations and the boat right up until you start cruising a bit and then you will know the stress of laying everything on the line that you have spend all the time acquiring especially when say coming into an unknown inlet or pass when conditions aren't the best, you're tired, tide is wrong and so forth which is one of the reasons some of us have low priced "practice" boats that we use for a few years and maybe for our first real cruise or two