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I just bought my first sailboat, H16, dude said it was a '76, but I am pretty sure it is a '74 judging by the sail color (which is an alternating yellow-white-blue pattern) and the hulls are white on bottom and blue on the "deck". I think he got the idea from the original receipt somwhere in Michigan, the boat was bought in '76. Is there anyway to tell what year the boat is from the hull number? Anyway I have been the crew on several races on much larger boats where I was relegated to rail meat or some other menial job. So setting up and rigging a boat is pretty new to me.
My questions actually concern the tiller extension, and cheata motor mount.
First the cheata motor mount. I have never been at the helm, so I purchased a 30lb thrust trolling motor, with battery and case (craigslist $90) and was wondering where I was going to mount it because I was definately not goig to shell out ~400 bucks for the cheata. I threw the motor and battery on the tramp and shoved off (necesity is the mother of invention), as I was trying to figure out a place to mount it, I saw that the mount on the trolling motor would really only fit over the sidebar. I stuck it there and trolled for little over and hour the whole day. This seemed to work perfectly, the wind was inconsistent and when it blew was no more than 5 kts. When I needed the motor I just reattached it to the sidebar and off I went at about 3kts. Before I went out I searched for ideas on a cheap way to mount a motor such as mine, the only things I found were fabrication jobs. Since I am new to this please point out errors in this I dont want to tear up something structural because I am cheap. Otherwise I am calling the sidebar the "cheater motor mount".
Pros: does not cost an insane amount of money
is easily reachable
Cons: If the motor shaft is rotated enough the propeller starts to nick the hull
Second, these tiller extensions.
It got to be a real pain in the rear when I was tacking to swing the tiller extension behind the block as the boom came across. So I went online to look at adjustable tiller extensions, the Ariba FX3 cost $150! I am sure the guy is real nice who make them, but it seems that the reason why they are so expensive is that they do not conduct electricity. Now there are only two reasons why this would be a problem, that I can think of, corrosion and a lightning strike. I don't plan on being out on Lake Martin when there is a storm and the weather here in Central Alabama is fairly predictable. Since it is a fresh water body I am not real concerned about galvanic corrosion either. I went to Walmart and bought a SHUR-LINE painting extension, $17.95, there is a warning on it that says it conducts electricity. But I am fairly sure that it wont matter in good weather conditions unless someone informs me otherwise. It is 30inches in the fully collapsed mode and 60 inches in the ellongated mode. It is different from any other collapsible extension pole that I found in that it has push button that releases both ends, and has several fixed positions that snap into place. Also when it is fully collapsed it is covered in some sort of black foam and hard plastic, as it extends more metal is exposed.
Pros: does not cost an insane amount of money
if it breaks I can replace it up to 8 times before I am losing money
Cons: Conducts electricity and may kill me
I seem to be the only Hobie Cat on Lake Martin.
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War Damn Eagle
Branson
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