The Cape Dory Board

I love your reports, very descriptive and terrific photos. Here in Saint Louis the sailing season has not yet started, freezing temps over night and 40-50º in the daytime with winds gusting into the 50's.

I wish that I had room for another boat. My first love was a Typhoon that I saw at a boat show in 1971, I still love the typhoon. That is a great price, the trailer alone is worth your skin price.

If the hole is too worn to drill for an oversized bolt, perhaps you could move the strut to the other side of the hatch.

Please do keep the posts coming Jim. This is the only "sailing" that we get to do when it is 17º outside.

I think that if you can keep it a 3/4" or more you will be okay, Sapele is plenty strong enough. Many of the coming boards on today's Cape Dorys have been sanded so much that they are less than 3/4" of an inch in thickness

Do you find yourself kicking that electrical panel? The photo makes it look as though the panel is pretty close.

Is home Key Biscayne or Dutch Harbor? If home is Key Biscayne I'd say let it go for awhile, but be careful, you don't want to ruin the prop shaft. There should be room enough to put a zinc between the prop and the bearing, that would keep the bearing in place, BUT it would not keep a loose bearing f...

John,
Those bulkheads are looking real nice. Good work. I notice the bike lashed to the starboard rail, is that going to be there for your voyage? If so, I don't think the jerry cans will create any more of an obstruction than the bike.

Tom, Come to the Great Mid-West where we not only use email, we also use "snail mail". We have never had the consignment shops that once were prevalent on the three coasts, so we often come to this forum and look for items that are being offered for sale. I, for one, will not be using Face...

I have only kept one of my earlier boats on a trail and used the dry storage method. I am all for it but, I am trying to imagine the problems with a deep keel boat It sounds as though you have plenty of experience doing this with other boats. I am trying to envision sinking the trailer far enough to...

On our 27 when we first had her we could not get the YSM8 up to speed, I was new to the game and just assumed that a thirty year old engine might just be a little tired. The second season I figured out that the only problem with that YSM8 was the throttle linkage, it would not move the throttle to f...

Chris, What Cape Dory do you have? We had a 27 and I would wash the sails every year on my driveway. Luckily our driveway slopes quite well for draining and it faces south for drying in the sun. A scrub brush on a long handle and some mild soap (we use simply green) does the job very well. I don't k...

You can send oil samples to a lab, such as Blackstone, and they will analyze the oil, looking for metal deposits, oil contamination, higher than normal temperatures, etc. the first analysis is often revealing, but annual analysis will pick up trends and help with predictions. When I was flying we us...

Fritz3000g, What engine do you have in the 25D? Our 27 had the Yammer YSM8 with 1200 hours. Our surveyor told us that the YSM8 is good for at least 10,000 hours if we change the oil and filters on a regular basis. The YSM8 is an industrial engine that is often credited with running 100,000 in Japan....

All valid reasons, but . . . you can't imagine how nice it is to be able to step into your own back yard and do an hours work when ever you have the time, while the BBQ heats up, while the kids are taking a bath, while the paint dries, whenever. I assume that you have seen this link: http://www.cape...