Fish

There is so so much going on in the foiling space at the moment. I can see it totally eclipse yacht racing. I was watching a couple of moths tearing around Manly last night, and pondering my stoush with Tamure about the cost of racing sails for keel boats (sorry about that Tamure). For a bit more than the price of a black square top for a 35 fter, you can get a black square top on a boat that can go 2 or 3 times faster than the 35 fter, be $20k / yr cheaper to operate and maintain, and not have to worry about coordinating half a rugby team of crew just to go for a sail. If you really wan

Wow, looks like you got your money's worth out of that You could possibly utilise a python drive / thrust bearing with CV joint in the set up. From my investigations at the time, they cost as much or more than a new gearbox though (noted I don't know what a V drive box costs), but I did exchange a new down angle GB for another one with a different ratio with Moon Engines. If you go with a belt drive and thrust bearing would you still need a regular GB off the engine?

Foil Week at BoI has just wrapped up. Sounded really good. Lots of good coverage on the event page here: https://www.facebook.com/foilbayofislands/?__xts__[0]=68.ARCVNYnf4iyeZxdUs0oRIlDXP28PK-ZX9671o-mjHia8pzmcufZ5C500KYRHGN_2RnazVscJPKSVvcQKj2hrJ3j4KX3xEaGwjmlVViHWqMO5gFYYLuSINUp-FRoH1jz7hMVMyjiFcMB1v5cHKrQhKTh4gWLJOhTIWTt9DPa5VEgxc1gmdvDm0ZwbjjOo1fG7yKBHG_-dJj7XMsDs6btKl_1Oh1KJ-ayMydb1pk_4LTRgEb419W7j5rBAG5en_u1dDwjvwbAyqEqmL-TRyvziZ338qS5dGcsGVijK-UX-84UGpQhX7pn5lPub-5nm0IoT4GZ2tWNuhxXxieWWq0BhOa0&eid=ARBCjgc-x-QQ4zitSObXrE1Sqjkvsw9bLNl4LgG9eQ3-yx4_iCyutG-AtfAac07ZAaDogV-Qjwq9IE6s

The main business driver for a second crossing is the limited life span of the current crossing. Basic metal fatigue and cyclic loading means they need to build another one. Any hopes of improved travel times and productivity is just that, hopes... I'm loving you guys saying this should be done, or that should be done. When you see the cost estimates, and plans to fund it, regional fuel taxes, congestion charging or what ever, I think the mood will change sharply. Fully agree we need to be planning inf 50 yrs ahead. Who is bitching about the cost of City Rail Link? I am.... that one

No, the ground is worse than shithouse through there. From a geotechnical point of view, that is the worst place to put a tunnel. Nothing but mud and peaty swampy sh*t. I like the idea of coming straight out of Waterview and across the Harbour. That would work. Fair few houses to bowl on the NS side though, to join with the M way again. Could get expensive.

A distraction for you, if I may? You'd be surprised how little power you need to move a boat off the mooring / in flat water etc. If Easter cruising is important, there are several options with an outboard. Bolt a tenob bracket (spelling?) one of those lifty things on the back, and just blat around all easter. A certain nameless Commodore did this for most of the summer waiting for their new Beta to arrive on a F1020. Or, if you are game, and the weather benign, you can strap the dinghy amidships with springs, and motor the yacht around like that. Complicated fitting into marina

Easy, just shut down Tewai Pt. Screw Southland, we need our smug mobiles. Other than that, yes, infrastructure planning does need to extend past election cycles.

You'll be surprised how easy it is to move an engine, if you get a couple of good crow bars / pinch bars. Also get a wide assortment of timber blocks and plank like bits, for sitting and sliding along on, and for leveraging the crow bars in just the right spot. If you really wanted, you could slide it out to the companion way and jack it or crow bar it up onto enough blocks of wood, then slide it out through the hatch, one end at a time, one block of wood at a time. Probably easier to hoist it though. 130 kg is fairly light. The engine we pulled out was 280 kg. Easy enough to shift around by y

Yes, that is the outfit that sent me the stuff I've put on my prop shaft. Very helpful.

Where do you keep your boat chariot? I moved away from the ablatives because I would wipe all the product off cleaning for racing. BP, the Altex agent told me with the abliatives, it washing off when using the boat, i.e. first half hour it would wash off. I would imagine any wave action increases the shear stress enough to wash things off. The main concern I have is the high growth in the river. I don't think its had to reach a tipping point where growth becomes too thick, and wont wash off under use.

There has been some ads in the classified section of the Boating NZ magazine. I haven't paid attention to them, as the missus is in charge of the soft furnishing stuff. But that would be a good starting place.

Yes, because we have CC we don't haul out. The prop speed has failed on the prop and shaft, we can't re-apply prop speed between tides. I give the prop a spin regularly which keeps it largely free of barnicles etc, but I've been getting oyster build up on the shaft around the cutlass bearing, which I think blocks fluid flow and makes the bearing fail early. I've started diving on it to keep it in check. So I phoned the guys at NZMwraps or what ever - silikote agents, and they posted me a sample of the stuff. They'd never tried it on a shaft either. A bit of the vinyl wrap. We put it on th

That is the conclusion I am coming to. I've got some scuba gear, so can clean in the water fine, when that is permitted by various BS plans and rules of course... I still like to keep an eye out on the technical advances in AF's. Everyone wants a unicorn AF. Someone will make one sooner or later.

Thanks for your help... facepalm.

The marketing gumpf indicates self erroding AF's can last around 2 years (22-26 months). The million dollar question is how that lasts in practice. The river is very clearly a high growth area, this year is phenomenal. I spoke to Altex's technical support, and their rep, and paradoxially, the steered me away from their top shelf, latest tech AF that costs $600 / 4 l tin, and said that straight #5, or the commercial equivalent, Sea Barrier 3000, would be best, at about $380 / 10 l tin. Turns out it will cost me more to haul out, even at the club, than that AF. If I could get 18 months out

Hi Martin, I was more wondering why you started looking at it, was it leaking oil, not going into gear, no drive at all? We had a 35 year old PRM 220 gearbox on an Isuzu 38. Very solid, hydraulic gear box, not made any more. The output bearing was worn, so it was hard to get engine alignment, consequently we found it was leaking oil, but that wasn't apparent at the time. I had 'experts' look over the whole engine and gearbox (we ended up replacing the whole lot with a new Beta 35). And we got the gearbox upgraded from the standard spec to the modern equivalent of the old gearbox, still by

When you say your mechanic thinks it needs replacing, what problems are you actually having with it? Any marine item at 47 yrs old I would think most professionals would say it 'needs' replacing. You'd be hard pushed to find an option as solid in today's gearboxes, and would think a refurb would be least expense, esp for the quality of the gear.

Hi Wheels, do you have any more details on that Hempels slippery coat? I've put some silikone wrap on my prop shaft, so far it is the cleanest part of the boat by a country mile. We have never sanded our CC. Gave it a burnish this summer, didn't appear to make any difference at all. As far as I can tell, all of the copper has oxidised, and it doesn't really matter how much you burnish / sand. The remaining substrate is gold for sh*t to grow on though.

My copper coat has lasted 7 years, and now its stuffed. Currently deciding if we should re-apply, or go back to conventional AF. If anyone knows of a Unicorn AF, please let me know.

Its Officially un-official now, Ineo the CoR: Team UK are the next challenger of record for the America’s Cup, working alongside defender Team New Zealand. Sir Ben Ainslie’s syndicate, backed by British billionaire Sir Jim Ratcliffe, will replace Italian outfit Luna Rossa for the next cycle of the Cup. The Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron have accepted the challenge and let slip that arrangement on Wednesday night at their headquarters though no official announcement has been made. https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/americas-cup/124578312/americas-cup-team-uk-confirmed-as-challe

On the Emirates front, they left the building ages ago. No presence at all. Last time they had the dolly birds (air hostesses) standing around, plenty of corporate exposure etc. Not a jot this time, from the naming sponsor... You don't need to be too smart to understand an airline in this current pandemic environment is not going to be paying cash out for anything, least of all some sailing on the other side of the world. I think GD is between a rock and a hard place. They have no title sponsor - they don't need to even announce that, Emirates were gone about a year ago, when internationa

Are you taking the copper coat off?

I've got a scrapper and a sander you can borrow

Rudolf Shack?

Hard stand at $60/day, it's going to cost them a lot more than $1.50....