since the wonderful cyclone rusty dumped actual water on the WA goldfields weve been sailing ,canoeing and finally learning to windsurf on some local lakes ,and my 10/11 year old is getting cranky cos all the gear is too big . Ive gone through all my recut landyacht sails and found a 1.8m VS (neil pride?) that i cut down last year and now Im building a mast /wishbone rig to fit.
the sacrificial mast is a skinny blue original windsurfer mast that will be nice and light as Im only using the top 3m
BUT the base will be too narrow for any of my bases so Im having to build a teardrop bottom.
ive cut a small mpeice of a full diameter offcut and will glue the glass it too the new bottom of the blue wally.there is a bit of a gap so initially to hold it in place Ive glued it with a polyeurathane wood glue.
ive also started building a skinny diameter boom (25mm) that her hands can grip.
Ive bent up the wishbone on a roller then Ive cut a small piece of mast to sit against the new mast. The diameter of the mast is only 38mm at the wishbone mount so ive got to make a custom mini mount.
again Ive sat it in place and squirted in some polyeurathane wood glue
polyeurathane wood glue is a rather useless wood glue as it has little strength,is sticky and messy,and needs to have a really dry bond.
BUT if there is moisture present it foams up and makes polyeurathane foam that you can glass or epoxy to
the result is like this
once set I will sand to shape and epoxy on some glass or even some carbon to make it real, same will happen to the little wishbone.
tommorrow were off to a lake called King of the west,2.5kmx1.5km,2m deep
with schooner,sailing canoe and 2 windsurfers
Great stuff, nothing like using something Dad's made just for you!
Won't be long before she's smoking you.
back from holidays today and back into it we glassed the boom and mast today, hopefully we can file and sand it tommorrow,drill some tie holes and have a go at rigging
little stig got to get her hands dirty as it was a pupil free day
should come up real noice
PS mrs landyacht would also like to thank the doctor
and decrepit for thier bali suggestions
great week , not enough wind for the ancient windsurfers( even older than mine) but I managed to talk one of the beach operators to try and remember how they used to sail their canoes
only sail on the water that day
little boom sortedvery pleased with the finished product
for a centreboard fin I plan to build a small fin that will screw to the board like footstraps using some glued in gyprock mounting screws
for the fin I shaped some 6mm marineply which will have 2 layers of 8oz each side. If she breaks that i'll just give her my gear.when I glassed it I stuck it to a base with some double sided tape and nailed a scrap of ply perpendicular to the top . that bit was waxed and PVA'd then glass layed on to form a base to screw to the board. all this will make sense later
its all starting to come together,rigged the sail for the first time today. I will shorten the mast top and lower it all a bit more in the next rigging and it should be just nice
i worked out the positions for the centreboard and drilled a big enough hole for the gyprock plugs to screw in and glued them in with some thickened epoxy. they are flush with the bottom and sealed. with some big wind we should be able to use the board without the board
nearly there, forecast great for the weekend
lil stig has done me proud.
we got out for 2 sessions on the weekend day 1 glassed off after an hour so we ended up using the beginner boards to SUP around the lake. LS paddled her special 100l board without a fall so she is relly getting the hang of balance when sailing with the lil stig rig she stole my 105l wide board. soon got the hang of it as the rig is so light.
the wind was perfect to get the hang of gybing.
next day we went back with a few more knots of wind and a better direction.
lil stigs best session was a 20minute ride with 4 gybes without getting wet when we were packing up she burst out " I hope we have stronger wind next time"
makes a dad proud
Well done to her (and you for building the rig and taking her on the water).
Looks like you might need to lift up the boom a bit.
My son's first turn this year was also a gybe ! And the last time he didn't want to let me have a go with the big sail, we need a second board now !
the boom can lift about 150mm on that mast, thanks for the suggestion. great thing about taking pics.
the boom was made longer to also fit a 2.5 trainer sail i bought off the buy and sell. the sail in the pics was cut down for a landyacht, then reinvented for this project . im trying to stick with monofilm to keep it all light
i managed to get 3 boards all with the same base, but the big wide board I built a few years ago seems the best for learning.
but there is only 1
I had the same thought, boom should be closer to chest/shoulder height, especially when her anticipated stronger wind comes along. Gives better leverage over the rig, makes it easier to uphaul and sail.
thats the beauty of a digital camera. next weekend we are planning a big camp and sail weekend before the chill sets in.
I found a padded base today in the bits box and will raise the sail and boom and fit the pad to prevent squishy toes.
thanks for all the hints and advice
