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As a general note, West Marine's advice appears to be quite sound (which is to say, I've not found anything I disagree with). It tends to be a bit spare-no-expense but that's a more sensible starting point than suggesting that, for instance, you can wire your boat with household or automotive gear and achieve perfect safety and reliability.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Since no one has offered specific advice, let me just offer a couple of general observations. First, this is not a trivial addition. Technically adept friends added a windlass to their 44-footer - which you would think had lots of room for the addition - and planning runs of chain and electrical cable had them tearing their hair for months.
Second, the windlass appears to be the tip of a very costly iceberg. See this page of general advice: http://www.westmarine.com/WestAdvisor/DIY-Installing-An-Anchor-Windlass
Finally, I too have a bad back and one trick that alleviates the strain is to power up to the anchor's position, then raise it. Pulling the boat up to the anchor in anything more than zero wind, then raising the anchor, is a two-Advil manoeuvre.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Until I was 16, I belonged to a club for kids like me and for adults who build flying model gliders and powered planes. We kids built gliders with a relatively thin wing section of low aspect ratio with the greatest depth of camber at about 45% of the chord (translation: short, wide wings whose thickest part was about 45% aft). Our gliders were relatively heavy and robust, and not terribly aerodynamic.
We had a few hotshots in the club who built FAI competition gliders - superlight, highly optimized craft that flew so efficiently that they had timed de-powering devices to prevent them from disappearing over the horizon. Their wings were very high aspect ratio, usually negative camber on the underside, with the maximum upper camber a bit farther forward than the "recreational" craft we kids flew.
I see our 27's (and most contemporary racer/cruisers) as roughly paralleling the recreational gliders: a moderate-drag, moderate-lift wing supporting a fuselage that is relatively high-drag (not easily driven), whereas the competition gliders parallel the Volvo boats and others in the rocket-ship class: higher-drag but much higher-lift sails (which is what I think you get draft-forward) on a very low-drag hull.
The Volvo boats sail very much closer to the speed of the wind, but I don't know enough aerodynamics to conjecture about the impact on desired sail shape.
And speaking of conjecture, this is all conjecture (a nice word for guessing) based on long-ago observation, so if anyone has any better info, I like Clare would be glad to hear it.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Most people seem happy with their Tacktick instruments, but then most are only a couple of years old.
Bear in mind that most of these devices rely to some extent on a battery and that battery will have a finite life. My first Tacktick Racemaster died in three years; the current one stands at about five. Throwing out a $1500 wind system after five years is too painful to contemplate. As a point of contrast, a friend's B&G is over thirty years old and still going strong with one display head replaced.
So... balance the convenience of wireless with the cost. Can the battery be replaced by you or does it have to go back to the maker for a rebuild (which is 120 pounds UK for a Racemaster).
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
PS - This shouldn't be construed as a specific recommendation for Tacktick; rather, I'm using them as a way of saying that a) the first entrant has proved it's a viable and as far as I know, reliable, technology and b) there's a variable here - battery replacement) that doesn't seem to get a lot of awareness.
We use our number 2, which is approximately 130%, with the clew cut to about 18" off the deck when tacked right down to the bow. As you're a cruiser who sails in an area of higher winds than the Lakes, you might want to look at 125% and 24" off the deck. The length is also set so we can use it as a furling sail, if we're going to use it for a weekend or more (I realize this is irrelevant to you but I might as well tell the whole story).
At 130%, it's large enough to pull well in medium air, and since it's dacron, we get some flexibility by adjusting the draught with the halliard.
The sail was made by Bay Sails in Hamilton, ON, which is a Haarstick affiliate. I chose them because they test the quality of their cloth before using it. Consequently, the sails I've had from them have stood up well.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Note that the captions above the circuit diagrams ("Batteries isolated", "Batteries combined through ACR", "Batteries combined through Battery Switch") are mouse-rollover controls that show the effects of different switch positions. They should be better identified, but once you find them, they give you a lot more information than it initially seems.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Yes the leak is common and yes it can be fixed by removing the cover plate on deck, cleaning out the existing bedding compound and replacing it. If the bedding is original, it's butyl tape, which many people prefer as it doesn't harden.
The area should be monitored, though, as the loads from the mast tend to move the chainplates constantly.
The deck surrounding the chainplates on this boat should be checked carefully for water entry and delamination as the water that rotted the bulkhead could easily have also entered the balsa of the deck laminate. It's messy but not a huge job to pull all the chainplates, clean the area, then scoop out the balsa at the edges of the chainplate holes and replace that balsa with thickened epoxy.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Since the subject of safety has been raised, let me add that when I questioned a friend who sells propane appliances about installation, he warned me to take all precautions, as propane is highly dangerous. Shortly after that warning, several people were killed in an explosion on a British armed-services adventure-training yacht (I find this remarkable, as I know a fellow who is responsible for the Canadian Forces' adventure-training yacht and he is incredibly safety-conscious, but perhaps this explosion was either a case of tunnel vision or just really bad luck). We consequently fitted a propane alarm with two sensors with our on-off solenoid.
As everyone enjoys expositions of others' foolishness, I thought I would pass on this rogue's gallery of bad setups at http://www.pcmarinesurveys.com/Safe%20Boat%20propane%20Installation.htm
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
I think it's probably impossible to satisfy all the requirements. If you have a sliding tray, how do you make its lid as high as the lid of the locker that contains it? For that matter, if you have a locker within the cockpit, how can you ensure that escaping gas goes overboard rather than down the companion, as the coaming is higher than the bridgedeck? The best solution is an open transom, but I'm not sure I want to take a chainsaw to Towser's stern.
The best <img src="emoticons/icon_question.gif"> idea I could come up with is to put the gas bottle in the anchor locker (deck-level lid, protected, vents overboard - but then you've got to find a route for 20-odd feet of gas line through the boat - and you've lost half of your anchor locker.
I reckon I'm grandfathered, as both a licensed installer and my insurance company approved the installation, but if push came to shove, I'd argue that I have a measure of mechanical protection by virtue of mounting the tank inside the pushpit. I really should have a Sunbrella cover made for protection from weather, though, even though the tank is mounted only on the rare occasions when we cruise.
A small point – I wouldn't worry too much about gas being sucked in by the bilge blower. It's a bilge exhaust (or should be), not a positive ventilator, plus any gas floating about in the vicinity of the cowl vents is likely to be quite diffuse.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
For what it's worth, there was a fellow at our club, now departed, who had the job done and he was appalled at the time and cost involved. The locker was at the aft end of the Mk III's starboard seat and I think they started with a commercially available form, then modified it to fit.
I have an L-shaped bracket on the pushpit that I mount the tank on when I need it. Not attractive, but it works and the cost was reasonable.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
As built, neither boat had a tank vent on the transom. Kat's Paw (with A4) had the original vent below the toe rail adjacent the tank, as Towser does now. After the water problem manifested itself, KP's vent was moved to the stern, as Towser's will be.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Someone who knows the boats correct me if I'm wrong, but there wouldn't be a shaft in a Mk V rudder, would there? It's hung outboard with an externally mounted tiller. There are probably blocks inside to prevent the mounting bolts from crushing the interior foam, but that's it.
Sourcing material might be an issue, but if you still have the original bits, copying shouldn't be hard - shape the structural foam with overall shape and foil cross-section templates (with an extra shallow "trench" for a few tows of Lyasil or even carbon for stiffness) then wrap the whole business with good quality glass and epoxy.
If you're not too concerned about weight, consider a traditional wooden rudder - see Black Arts for one man's response to a storm that destroyed Hyperion's rudder.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
This has now happened twice, to two different boats, so it's time to flag the issue.
Some years ago, Kat's Paw found itself becalmed on the far side of Humber Bay, engine kaput. Fortunately another competitor towed her back to the club. The mechanics found around 12 liters of water in the 55-liter tank. The theory was that, when racing rail-down, the tank vent had siphoned masses of water back into the tank. The original vent was blocked and a new one installed on the transom.
I thought this was an isolated incident but I recently had the dubious pleasure of pumping the fuel out of my tank and replacing the Racor filter cartridge. About half of the fuel pumped out looked like emulsified oil, so clearly there was a lot of water in the tank. Vent to be moved toot sweet.
Your mileage may vary, as they say, but if you're in the habit of sailing rail-down as we are (Toronto harbour can be quite gusty), this inexpensive precaution might be in order.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Pink - no zinc, so your brass has turned to the corroded remnants of copper. V. bad.
There is an extended discussion of the virtues and vices of bronze vs Marelon seacocks (cost, difficulty of fitting, etc.) called "Plastic vs Brass-through hulls". Search will find it. The interesting part of the thread is that while several of the people were convinced of the practical value of Marelon (and its price), the principal author of the thread was deterred by the time-cost of adapting the opening for the Marelon seacock and opted for bronze as an effectively drop-in replacement.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
With respect to handrails, if you want to duplicate the originals, I would ring Noah's in Toronto. They offer a house-standard handrail, but they do custom work, so if you were to send in your old rails, they could duplicate them (but tell them you'd like the dimensions increased by 1/16" all round to compensate for the sanding).
Taping and varnishing my handrails has always been the least-liked job on my boat (I don't mind varnishing the companion surround or coaming), so I have always said that if the wretched things ever have to come off again, they will be replaced with stainless steel. No varnishing and I won't cringe every time I see someone put his full weight on the middle of the unsupported portion. Klacko (http://www.klackospars.com) is an obvious choice for a fabricator, but this is probably something any good s/s shop could do, given a rail to copy functionally.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
In another thread on the topic of drain holes, I recall a Mk V owner rather vehemently saying that a V rudder should have no water in it, hence no need for drain holes, because the holes that should be there (the pintle brackets) are above the waterline. If there's water in the rudder, the rudder should be taken to a warm place and drained over winter, stripped, the crack or hole located and carefully repaired.
The foam inside C&C rudders (at least those I've seen) is closed-cell; water will migrate between the glass skin and foam core, not through it. There is no point in drilling farther than just through the fibreglass.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
There are a number of ways of looking at the issue of replacing an engine. One is the approach adopted by the owner of Hyperion (see The Fleet), who spent more than the price of the boat (new engine, Max-Prop) to get the boat he was happy with (and he was very happy). We also have spent a fair bit on Towser, but again, we're very happy with her - particularly after the endless struggles to deal with the original A4.
Others have had success rebuilding the original. Whether they are starting with better material or they are just better mechanics, I can't tell.
There is another route, touched on in the keithford site linked above - to troll the web for an engine bought for a project abandoned by the owner. There used to be a couple of places around Toronto where people were building Arks or ferrocement trimarans or God knows what and I'd be surprised if half of them ever launch a boat (this isn't to mock all home builders, but there a fair number of strange people and stranger boats out there). Just as there are probably a good number of A4's for sale out there, there are probably a goodly number of Volvos, Yanmars and so on, still in their crates. Worth a try.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
This is a followup to a comment on another thread, referring to severe corrosion at Burlington. I don't want to hijack a re-powering thread so I'm starting this. Bear in mind that I'm not an expert, but I've heard this story fairly consistently, so I put some credence in it.
Background: http://www.boatus.com/boattech/articles/marine-corrosion.asp
Stray current corrosion was much less of a problem until the CE certification changed the way boats are wired. In the past, boats with AC power ran all three wires, black, white and green, back to the receptacle on the dock. If the receptacle was correctly wired (see the little yellow gizmo at the bottom of <http://www.cc27association.com/fixes/sparestools.html > for a cheap way to find out), power was completely isolated from the boat, even if there was a fault and power flowed to the green wire. CE now demands that the boat's DC and AC circuits share their ground, so any leakage to ground (green) on the AC side can flow to the boat side, which also can flow to the surrounding water. All of a sudden, the water is a little bit, or a lot, hot.
Current flowing to ground, if sufficient, will paralyze a swimmer, who will then drown. Small amounts cause corrosion to less noble metals that act as a ground (which could be sail drives, through-hulls, props, magnesium or zinc anodes, etc.) Somewhat counter-intuitively, the problem is worse in fresh water than salt, as current is more likely to dissipate in the good conductive medium of salt water.
Some boats are made 'hot' by the owner's or a dumb tech's fiddling, but the addition of a badly wired appliance can do the trick - a good boat can suddenly become hot, either kill-a-swimmer hot or corrode-the-neighbouring-boat hot depends on how defective.
My club has had a bad stray current problem - people were spending thousands getting parts fixed or replaced that clearly had been damaged by stray current corrosion. Also some of the sources were well known - boats that constantly tripped their GFI's. Nevertheless, the club elected to rewire the docks entirely. We'll see if that fixes it, but I suspect that the club will have to be vigilant about people making unwise or unauthorized changes.
All this is leading up to the suggestion that if you find that your zincs or magnesium anode(s) are eroding faster than you remember, you probably have a stray current problem. I won't tell you how to fix it, because 1) I'm not an expert; and 2) a lot depends on the politics and general responsiveness of your club or marina. I will suggest, though, that your neighbours may be having the same problem and not really noticed it. A bit of education followed by group grousing might help.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Saildrives are an installer's dream, and a warranty administrator's and owner's nightmare, particularly now that many clubs and marinas are having problems with stray-current corrosion (check out this old favourite for an example of extreme corrosion - <http://www.keithford.net/boatstuff/repower/repower.htm >). As George Hinterhoeller said, "Why put $3,000 worth of gear in the water, particularly salt water, if you can get away with a $500 prop and shaft?"
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Saildrives are an installer's dream, and a warranty administrator's and owner's nightmare, particularly now that many clubs and marinas are having problems with stray-current corrosion (check out this old favourite for an example of extreme corrosion - <http://www.keithford.net/boatstuff/repower/repower.htm>). As George Hinterhoeller said, "Why put $3,000 worth of gear in the water, particularly salt water, if you can get away with a $500 prop and shaft?"
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Get out your measuring tape. Volvo almost certainly publishes a dimensioned diagram of the engine, from which you can determine if it will fit. Compare
- the overall length, width and height of the engine - you'll want to know how much engine is below the line of the engine's mounting brackets and how much is above; pay particular attention to the height of the exhaust elbow above the brackets as this will probably be the tightest fit to the bulkhead above the engine;
- the distance between the mounting hole centres for both engines. Chances are, they won't be precisely the same, but are they close enough to use the existing fibreglass bearers because you don't even want to think about replacing them (don't worry too much about the steel top parts as they are easy to replace)?
- are the service parts on the port side of the engine where you can get at them? Yanmar moved the oil filter to starboard for my 2YM15 and getting at it through the cupboard is a real hassle.
Can't think of anything else. Maybe someone else will chime in.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
It takes 1.5 to 1.75 litters of VC-17 to paint Towser's bottom. You should be able to calculate the area of the deck and topsides from the plan and deck views in Evolution. You'll have to do a bit of guesstimating for the cockpit sides plus an allowance for the curvature of the deck and topsides, but it should be close enough, particularly if you add a ten or fifteen per cent fudge factor.
Alternatively, factor deliberately short and re-calculate what you'll need to finish the job once the second coat is on.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
It was wire-wound USCG-certified exhaust hose. Can't be more specific than that. Got it from a marine supplier in Toronto. tough as nails, a bitch to put on but should be good for 20-25 years.
Ages ago, someone who was renovating a boat spoke of spec'ing and measuring all the hose on his boat and getting an incredible deal (all cut to precise size) from Defender Industries. Give it a shot.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV