Storm Petrel

[Bryn Weightman]

Michael and Julian,

Many thanks for your replies.  As far as the jib is concerned, I think the advantage of being able to back it far outways the advantage of a self tacker, and if you have a crew, it gives them something to do.
A strop on the yard (Gunter rig is technically a lugsail, therefore yard, not gaff) will only work with two halyards, the throat halyard raises the luff to it's maximum and the peak holds the yard up to the mast.I think the idea of two halyards, one for full sail and one for reefed is a good one and well worth investigating. 
With the amount of roach in the foot of the sail, the boom has to be loosefooted, but this is fairly common practice in a lot of dinghies these days, and I think gives a far better shape to the sail. The tack will be held down with a cunningham and the clew hauled out to a block on the boom end and cleated.
How you stow a sail is a matter of personal choice, I personally like to see a sail neatly stowed on the yard and boom, then raised out of the way with a topping lift.
As far as I can see, my rudder has been made with only one position, and that's up, I will have to see what I can do to alter it.

[Michael Rogers]

Bryn, the arrangement of the gudgeons in relation to the steel rudder pin is somewhat critical (to put it no more strongly!) to allow 'down' and 'up' positions, the idea being that the rudder rides up by itself when it grounds in shallow water. A fair amount of the rudder blade is below the line of the keel in the down position. Most people also fit a rudder uphaul so that it can be hoiked up if desired. I wonder whether the builder of your SP might have got his gudgeons 'muddled'?

I hope I'm right about gudgeons, by the way. And as one with a tendency to nautical-terms pedantry (because I think it's such a wonderful heritage, and to be preserved if possible), I stand corrected and educated re gunter yards!

I'm such an IT duffer that I don't think I can manage to include some helpful photos, but Cross pere et fils have provided some very clear pictures in their report on fitting an electric outboard, elsewhere in the forum. SP and Storm 15 are the same in this respect.

Two other points about the rudder etc. First, the Crosses have described (and illustrated) a modification to reduce play in the steering, fitting an extra gudgeon (yes, another one) to the rudder and extending the SS rod. They report that it works, and I intend to modify my SP accordingly, because the unmodified system feels a bit 'slack'.

Secondly, I wonder whether you are using push-pull or tiller steering? I started with push-pull, but had a very early 'incident' (my only capsise so far!) for which I blamed the steering. It was actually a jammed mainsheet during an early season taken-aback-gust, while I was trying to work out whether to push or pull (the water was icy cold). I switched to tiller with a fairly lengthy extension, which was OK but not brilliant. Recently I have reverted to push-pull, cranking the tiller underneath a handsome (expensive!) sheet horse from Classic Marine, and now wish I had never given up push-pull. It very quickly loses its counter-intuitive feel and becomes as instinctive as side-to-side, gives a much wider range of rudder movement (this relates to the long after deck of a SP), is wonderfully sensitive, and allows a freedom of helming position in the boat which a conventional tiller can't provide. Matt Newland, if he reads this, would be fully entitled to say "I told you so", because he sort of did, but he is much too nice a guy to score points like that.

[Bryn Weightman]

Michael,
My boat is away having a cover made and fitted at the moment, but when I get her back in a day or two, I'll experiment with the rudder.  When I bought her, I was only shown the rudder in the up position and on rigging her to sail could not see any other way of fitting it because my initial reaction was that there was not enough blade in the water.  In fact I asked Nick at Southampton boat show if my rudder was the right shape.  Maybe, gudgeons and pintles need adjusting or something.  I have the long tiller and extension, interesting to see what you say about push and pull, and can see the advantages bearing in mind the long after deck.  Is your horse mounted on the sternpost or across the deck?  A double ender I had years ago had a horse on the stern post and it was very effective.

[Michael Rogers]

The horse is mounted across the deck, screwed down to the two hardwood blocks inside the after deck coaming, to which the end of the mainsheet on one side, and the mainsheet block on the other, are made fast in the original design. Classic Marine did a fantastic job getting all the subtle angles right for the bronze end plates to be an exact fit, to be screwed down with four 1 1/4 in bronze screws each side.

The sliders offered by C M were a bit elephantine for a SP, so I made a slider out of a suitably sized D-shackle (a bit of bending required), which works well.

The push-pull tiller was made up from about 8 narrow slips of mahogany structural veneer ( 1.5 mm) laminated with epoxy, cranked by bending round a whole lot of suitably placed nails hammered into a board to make a sort of jig, so that a full range of push-pull movement is possible under the horse. Sanded smooth, it is slim but very rigid, and is an elegant dark red-brown colour.

I used a Holt SS universal joint-type tiller extension hinge to attach the tiller to the (hardwood) actuating lever, about 10 '' long, which is bolted through the rudder head, sticking out at right angles on the starboard side, and held on with a butterfly nut. One advantage of the horse is that the lead of the sheet is now always on the leeward side, instead of being fixed on one side which I found disconcerting on the previous sheeting arrangement. I also think the sail sets better.

[Terry Cross]

Michael and Bryn
   It seems that I also made a gaff over my yard and mixed up my pintle with my gudgeon.
  I find this nautical English very confusing.
  Do you gaff the roach as well as the gudgeon?
  How is that my wooden yard is 3 yards long when a timber
yard is over 500yds long?

Micheal
   Trying to teach me French idioms when I have not yet mastered English!  Anyway how is the wishbone on your Mary Carries Chicken?

Back to the serious stuff.

I find your horse arrangement very interesting.  Being used to a center mainsheet I too find using the main from one side, awkward.  I have toyed with the idea of clamping a mainsheet jammer in the center of the aft bulkhead.
  Does the tiller remain under the horse when the rudder is in the raised position?

  Re. Your rudder mod.
If you have a problem obtaining a longer pintle bar Email me on terrycross@martexmarine.com and I will see what I can do.

[Michael Rogers]

Terry

I can't reply to all that, but it made me smile. You're not a script writer, are you?

I have a photo of the horse and steering, a bit on the dark side. I'm just scared I'll make a mess of attaching it, but I'll have a go.

In answer to your query, the hinge between the after end of the tiller and the lever on the rudder head (there must be a nautical term for it, surely? - anyone know what it is?) is up-and-down as well as side-to side (and I don't know the engineering term for that, either, sorry!), which caters for my push-pull tiller. Your conventional tiller would foul the horse when the rudder is raised, at least without some special shape or articulation. Another problem to solve?!

Thanks for the link, Terry. That's very kind. We are moving house on 16th November, so you will all be relieved that this flow of blather from yours truly will cease, at least for a while. You must excuse me: Storm Petrels have hitherto not featured strongly on the forum, and Bryn's query rather got me going. You will have gathered that I love my boat, and have given her a lot of care and attention (note in the photo, for example, the rope fender to protect the hardwood sheer strake which is a feature of SPs: its thickness (1 1/4 in diameter) looks exaggerated by the camera angle). I apologise if my enthusiasm has slipped the leash somewhat.

[Michael Rogers]

Can anyone explain to me, in words of one syllable, why my attempt to attach a photo has failed? (I'm a Mac-ee, just to be irritating)

[Paul Cross]

Everyone....
Sorry about my father's strange and eosoteric sense of humour....its an aquired taste.

Michael
Difficult to say why your pic wont show but i'd be happy to post it for you if you email it to me. Paul@familycross.co.uk.

Bryn
I've seen your boat!!!!  I was admiring a beautifully built Storm Petrel last week. apparently, It was in the sail makers to have a cover fitted. so i'm guessing it was yours. I was there collecting my son's new Optimist. Yes, theres a third generation of Cross sailors coming on..he has the same sense of humour as well.

[Bryn Weightman]

Michael,

I'll investigate the horse situation, I think the horse on the sternpost that I had on an ex naval Julia dinghy back in the fifties might be more suitable, but I shall give it thought, as I am not keen on the mainsheet being on one side.  I might take it through another block on the boom more or less level with the usual steering position then down to hand. I've used that arrangement in the past.

Paul,

If it was P & B where you were collecting the Optimist, then it was mine.  I collected her this morning, they made a good job of the cover. I only live a few miles from there in Market Harborough and sail at Middle Nene S.C.  Are you local?

[Paul Cross]

It was Pinnell and Bax...They are Winner optimist main dealers. We Sail at Barnt Green and live in Worcestershire but i can often be found in your area beside one of the many northamptonshire lakes idulging my son's craving to compete in every available race.

[Michael Rogers]

The forum is a very public place to display my incompetence in matters IT, but I shall have one more attempt to show my pic. If it doesn't work again, I'll take Paul up on his kind offer

[Michael Rogers]

Fat lot of use that is. Sorry, guys, you'll have to skim round the landscape to get an impression. I shouldn't bother.

[Tony]

Fat lot of use that is. Sorry, guys, you'll have to skim round the landscape to get an impression. I shouldn't bother.

No worries, Michael.
I have no problem viewing the over-large images you get on here when you post a #.jpeg of any decent resolution.
I can just right click on the image, select "view image" from the pop-up menu and Bob is your proverbial...
Mind you, I am running FireFox on a Linux operating system. Can you do something similar in the Gatesian world?
To prevent the problem in the first place, reduce the resolution (= ppi) by running the image through something like Photoshop which has a -Save for Web- option.

[Bryn Weightman]

Michael,

I like the look of your rope fender, is it fastened in the traditional way, wired to the topstrake?

[Michael Rogers]

Well, I did draw attention to my fender, so it's my own fault that I have to try to explain how I made it. No, Bryn, there's nothing conventional about it, it took me absolutely ages to make, and nearly drove me mad. The end product, however, is handsome, serviceable, and can be removed for danish-oiling the sheerstrake. It is in two lengths, one down each side, the four ends terminating in wooden plugs a few inches short of stem and stern; I fared these in such a way as to look reasonably elegant.

I consulted the lovely chap whose name I forget, who presides over a rope museum in Ipswich, has written books, and has an MBE (I believe) for services to rope. He advocates a SS wire down the middle of a suitable size of hemp hawser, but couldn't really help with how I could fasten this securely but elegantly to a topstrake which also acts as coaming round recessed decks fore and aft, and along the sides of the cockpit; and in such a way that didn't look loopy between fastenings So ...(deep breath) I used modern plastic pipe, as used these days for plumbing, including hot water: and wound 6mm synthetic hemp round and round and round and round and round and.... nearly 150 metres (no, that's not a misprint) of the stuff, about 75 metres each side! However before doing that, I had to devise my fastenings. Holes drilled in the coaming approx every 30 cm (equidistant, except for one place dictated by the shape and structure of the coamings), reinforced on the inside by cup washers and on the outside by flat washers, all countersunk and araldited into place (you can see the inside appearance on the photo, far side of the boat), to take 4mm countersunk bolts. These screw into nuts, which are inserted and araldited into wooden plugs, which are in turn inserted at intervals into the pipe in such a way that each bolt has a hole in the pipe opposite it, through which it screws into the waiting nut-in-a-chunk-of-dowel, thus holding the fender invisibly and securely at frequent intervals along its length. It actually isn't a big job to undo all 26 bolts to remove both fenders. It's slightly more fiddly to get them back on again.

Could there possibly be a more complicated way of doing it? - I very much doubt it (there's a challenge). Is the bloke who did all that (I hear you asking each other) somewhat barmy? - very probably. Is the end result aesthetically and functionally satisfactory? - well, actually yes. Would I recommend anyone else to do the same? - don't even think about it. Apart from anything else, work out the cost of 150 metres of 6mm synthetic hemp. There are several hundred turns down each side. Plastic pipe 13 ft long doesn't behave gracefully or gratefully when you attempt to revolve it several hundred times while winding on rope as tightly as you possibly can. Then, from lack of foresight, there is the matter of several passable long splices (lots of practice needed)....... I could go on, and if the end result hadn't turned out (excuse the pun) rather well, I would have taken up golf or gardening instead.

You did ask, Bryn. But both 'Cadenza" and I are glad the fender is there. Just try to think of a simpler method, there's got to be one.....