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While you've got all apart, you might want to consider replacing the foam. Our original foam (1982) had the resilience of a wet sponge, so you effectively ended up sitting or lying directly on the boards below. The new material is comfortably firm.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
My diesel is a 2YM15. It's a nice unit, but they moved all the service locations to the "wrong" side for a 27. And it has electrical shutoff, which aside from guests, I don't think is a good idea. (Not as idiotic and showy as dashboard 'start' buttons, but getting there.)
You can start on 1 or 2 or both with a combiner, but if you're in NL, you will start half an hour earlier (an hour, if there's fog).
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Well, Alan, my shut-off is electrical, so there. Actually, this is probably a step backward, as I'm forever telling helpful guests, "No, turning the key is not the way to shut off the engine." But you're right about the gauges and so on.
Marcus' battery management trick is nice, but the requirement to know whether the date is even or odd is way too complicated for me. Other than knowing that it's race-night, I'm pretty much lost as to esoteric details like dates (and I can't read the date on my watch without my glasses, the finding of which is another fire-drill). The great virtue of the combiner is that you can install it and forget about batteries. Period. This has great value to someone like me who would forget about them anyway.
Note that the combiner I have is no longer sold by West. They now have a more expensive one with more operating options. The one I have is sold direct at http://www.yandina.com or by Defender.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Bay Sails Haarstick in Hamilton. http://www.haarsticksailmakers.com/loftinfo.asp?ID=3
Good on shape, plus Haarstick tests their cloth before they use it. Sailcloth is a highly variable product, roll to roll, and Haarstick selects the best of it.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
There is almost certainly a flexible hose that passes through the enclosure, to connect with a line to a tank that is housed on deck or in a locker that vents and drains overboard. Having an integral tank would never be countenanced by UL.
Having a tank below-decks may be okay for one of those little single-burner swing-stoves, but even the little propane-torch 1-lb tanks they use should be stored in a draining anchor locker when not in use.
People fret about gasoline engines, but when I started researching propane for our boat, a friend who makes propane appliances impressed on us that propane is a gazillion times more dangerous. A safe installation is neither cheap nor easy; cutting corners will void your insurance and may even kill you.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
The change from the original hull and deck to what C&C called the Mk II hull and deck (which we call the Mk III and IV) primarily involved stretching the cockpit and bumping the hull at the waterline. However, if you crawl over the two boats, you'll see a myriad of small changes that could affect how the bulkheads fit, etc., where the chain-plates attach, how the bow is finished and so on. I'd want to take very careful measurements before even thinking about such a project.
If you don't mind, can you tell us why this project is gestating and how you come to have two boats to work with? And as usual, if the project does advance, we must have photos for Black Arts.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Leave it on. A diesel, unlike a gas engine, will continue to run without electrical power, but your battery will not charge and the engine-stop control will not function.
The problem with switching batteries is that the current from the alternator must have somewhere to go, or the regulator will suffer. If you have the standard rotary switch, however, the second battery is added to the circuit in the intervening 'Both' setting without disconnecting the first until you go to the Battery 2 setting. Therefore the alternator always has a target battery and there is no risk to the regulator unless you accidentally turn the battery switch off.
The West Marine site has a lot of information on batteries and battery switch setups, but much of it is aimed at long-distance cruisers, not relatively short-term cruisers like most 27 owners; you may find it interesting, though.
If you are changing your battery setting to ensure a charge to both batteries, I suggest a battery combiner. You will never even have to think about your switch while the engine is on again. Search "battery combiner" or "combiner" to see a discussion with links. I've now have a Yandina combiner (once sold by West) for over ten years and I think it's an unsung essential.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
I have been given to understand that many types of gauges are paired, even if not sold together, and it's good practice to replace the sender and the receiver/dial together, both from the same manufacturer. The sender has a particular pattern of screw holes for attaching it to the tank; if the holes don't match, don't assume you have the wrong model - just turn the unit 180 degrees.
Spiders, like "the poor" will be with you always. One way of eliminating them (and wasps) from your boat is to hang a Vapona strip (a dichlorvos insecticidal strip that looks like a 9 x 3 inch piece of rubbery plastic) in the boat. This at least ensures that there aren't any bugs in the boat for spiders to catch, so they won't stay there. Put the strip in a ziplock back before spending more than five or ten minutes below - it's not really toxic, but it's not good to breathe too much of it.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
This sounds like an issue you might want to speak to a boatbuilder or another surveyor about. You don't give an indication of the severity, and that might help - as in, is it a cosmetic issue that you can see when the light is just right, or is it really obvious, as in, it might affect the boat's performance tack to tack?
Part of the response has to be personal. Is this something you can say, 'okay,' about right now but it's going to drive you nuts later? Or are you the sort who can say, 'that gave me leverage to knock a thousand off the asking price,' then totally forget about the issue?
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Once you rig a spinnaker halyard, you will need to be careful that it doesn't foul itself in the furling genoa. Inattention to this detail once cost me about two hours at the masthead, shorting out a seriously intractable tangle.
No personal experience with a chute snuffer/scoop/whatever, but a friend had one for a while and said it might be nice for cruising with a small crew, but his was on the heavy side, and he didn't like it banging around at the masthead, plus the additional lines created their own problems and so required careful handling.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
I measured a 27 Mk III on fairly level ground, stored in a Marine Cradle shop cradle on 6" blocking; the combination of cradle and blocking puts the bottom of the keel 14.5" off the ground. From the ground to the top of the toerail at the aft end of the coachroof is 98". From the top of the toerail to a line extending from the top of the spray hood is 28".
From the ground to the top of the bow pulpit (highest point), is exactly 12 feet.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
There is a thread about one page back called "Cleaning gelcoat" with many suggestions for the topsides and the deck. Alan Ford recommended a product called Zep Industrial Cleaner. I can attest that this does a remarkable job of removing dirt and dead wax and may be a good precursor to the Aquabuff that Steve Reid recommends.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
This may not be be quite the answer you're looking for but here's a value calculated by measuring a high-res copy of the photo at http://www.cc27association.com/guide/source/mk4cradle.html
The photo is shot square on to the boat, so the measurements ought to be fairly accurate.
Length is 1513 pixels (length of hull only) and the height is 580 pixels; the length given for the boat is 27.9' (approx), so 580/1513 x 27.9 equals 10.7 ft. (approx). This value includes an additional approx. 6 inches for the "feet" that the club attaches to our cradles to simplify handling.
If a 27 gets hauled in the next little while, I will try to measure it.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Be careful when cleaning contacts. If the connector is bare brass, you can rub away with emery paper all you like, but if the contact area is plated, it's best to go easy - the plating is there for a reason.
Also, if you have the time to hit a car-parts shop, you might ask what they recommend as a conductor-enhancer goo. The big name seems to be Stabilant.
The best description I could find is this, from an Audi-enthusiast site (and I should offer here that I haven't used the stuff, but have heard good of it). Google turns up lots of hits for people who sell the stuff. It may be overkill in this application, but if you have a recurrent problem...
"Use an electrical contact enhancer like Stabilant 22 or Stabilant 22A. Initially it is non-conductive and then switches to a conductor in the presence of electricity. This switching ability is set so that the material will remain non-conductive between adjacent contacts in a multiple connector, and yet enhance the conductivity of each connector. It's as if it had its own brain, and it provides a tenfold to a hundredfold increase in connector reliability."
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
I have to disagree with the previous post - no matter what the price, it's very easy to go wrong and end up with a boat that will drive you crazy because you don't know how to prioritize or address its problems - then you've got a white elephant. The photos look okay - even the engine looks reasonable for a saltwater boat, but read http://www.cc27association.com/fixes/buying.html on some of the obvious issues, decide if you still like the boat, and if so, engage a credentialed surveyor to look at it in depth. There is no way you can get a dependable idea of whether a deck is sound just by looking at it and using a moisture meter takes some practice. A surveyor will identify the issues you could not possibly see, which will either set your mind at rest if they are minimal or give you a bargaining edge that may more than repay his fee.
I do, however, agree with the previous post's sentiment - good luck.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
This is an echo of a preceding post. Why bother?
Yes, there is a nice spot for the muffler just aft of the shaft log and in front of the half-bulkhead that supports the sole, but consider that moving your muffler there will probably require new exhaust hose. That will cost you three or four hundred dollars, if I recall my replacement. Unless you need to replace the hoses, it's a lot of money for a less-than-zero benefit.
Yes, there is a nice spot for a battery platform at the forward end of the port locker, which enables you to move your batteries closer to the stern, where you least want the weight. As an added bonus, you create a storage space beside the engine, which is utterly useless.
Your batteries don't spark unless you make them do it deliberately. Moreover, your engine has a flame arrestor on the carb mouth to prevent outside sparks from igniting gas in the carb, or a backfire spurting out of the carb into the boat. As I've said elsewhere, gasoline on boats is a lot safer than people give it credit for (propane is another matter).
Relax. Enjoy your boat and the summer.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
I feel like you're still toying in your mind with the short-cut of CPES and would like to give it a shot. I think Scott is saying, "Don't go there, do it right the first time", and I agree with him.
CPES is just a fancy way of saying "GitRot", which was a popular product in the seventies for "rescuing" wooden boats that were past their discard date. The problem with the concept is that epoxy saturation may stop rot progressing if it's done properly, but it doesn't restore the strength in the area - in fact, the drill, dry and fill process you describe robs the area of the fibreglass strands that are the source of the deck's strength. It's sorta-kinda okay for small parts like a hatch cover, but I would not employ such a method for a large structural panel like your deck, where a lack of strength in one area has the potential to reverberate through the entire structure.
At the risk of prosing on about something you already know, let me explain that the balsa core is like the vertical part of a steel "I" beam - the flat sections on the top and bottom of the beam have considerable strength, but what gives the beam _real_ strength and resistance to bending is that the vertical part resists movement between the top and bottom panels. Since they can't move in relation to one another, the beam won't bend. You can model this by clamping or taping two long battens together with a spacer of styrofoam - your once-bendy battens become a very stiff beam.
When balsa core gets wet, the bond between the balsa and the fibreglass layers quickly breaks down. so instead of acting like the stiff composite batten-styrofoam-batten beam described above, the panel (in your case, the soggy deck) becomes just two very flexible battens again, with little bending resistance or strength. Moreover, most fibreglass doesn't like bending repeatedly, so the breakdown of the fibreglass layers is accelerated.
None of this would matter if CPES restored the bond between the upper and lower glass surfaces and the balsa core, but in many - probably most - cases it can't. Moreover, you've turned one source of your deck's strength into Swiss cheese, drilling away the glass that provides 90% of the deck's strength (and filling those holes does not restore strength). You end up with a compromised deck panel whose undue working may cause problems in adjacent areas.
Dealing with your damp balsa in the way described in Black Arts will make your wet deck as good as new; CPES will give you a half-measure that may come back and bite you.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Tom,
The exec summary is that I am happy with the placement, as it serves my needs. Whether it is ideal is anyone's guess, but as I only now race two major regattas a year on Towser, it's good enough for the regattas. Where it really works is in our club races.
Our situation is a bit peculiar, so I will outline a bit. The Harbour Commission doesn't allow us to fly spinnakers in Toronto harbour, where our Tuesday night races are held, so typically, we often race with a sail at least one size larger than we really should upwind, to maintain downwind power. With the long track and controllable car, I can move the lead around at will for upwind conditions (including right aft when it's honking), then run it right forward for the off-wind legs.
Moving the car forward provides a good, relatively-far inboard position for the no. 2, which is cut close to the deck. Obviously, by the time the car is set for the no. 3, it's pretty far outboard, particularly compared with the boats that have car positions on the coach-roof. In the one real test we've had of the no. 3, though, the boat performed very well. It was a regatta with about 30 kt of wind with a short chop (just about the worst conditions imaginable for an older 27 - the V's ran away from us). Nevertheless, we sailed as high as anyone else and we sailed fast - in the last race, we were the first older mark to finish.
That result makes me hark back to something a one-design dinghy friend once said of his very successful boat: "We can sail as high and as fast as anyone in the fleet and be well up in the melee at the weather mark. If we have the presence of mind to crack off a degree or two, we'll leave them all in our wake." Obviously he was turning better boatspeed into a combination of better boatspeed and better foil/water interaction, equalling better VMG. Something like that was going on for us in that regatta.
Would that also be true with the no. 1 in our club races? I just don't know. I do know that Towser can point as high or higher at the same speed compared with most of the other boats (there is one boat that appears to have a pact with the devil re: pointing angle, so I don't include her). Inboard sheeting gives you an extra edge on the line, where you're scrabbling for inches. Would it be better to move the lead a few inches outboard once you're clear and sail for VMG? There are so many variables, including the difficulty of finding and staying in a lane of decent wind when so many boats are sailing in a fairly small patch of water, I just can't tell.
Sorry I can't be more decisive about things. Ask questions if I've left any holes.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Found this in an issue of Ocean Navigator and thought I'd pass it on - Sugru mouldable rubber (article) or (company site). This looks to have all sorts of potential for our inventive and project-oriented membership.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV
Clare,
We had a long thread about this some years back with savings on the order of 10 or 15%, then someone weighed in with the story of having ordered a slew of different types of hose from Defender at something like half of the prices quoted by other sources, and all cut to precise lengths priced by the inch, so the fellow wasn't paying for hose beyond need. Unfortunately, I can't find it by searching "Defender", and "hose" returns 580 posts, which isn't helpful. The thread may be in the archived posts.
I sympathize with the desire to find a Canadian source, but it probably all comes from the same factory (in Mexico) anyway. Just don't let them ship UPS - they will clip you an outrageous $40 or $50 "brokerage" fee.
David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV