Bristol-Blue Lake Michigan Sailing Adventures

Over the past few weeks, I've been reading about sail design and trim. I've been reading about loose footed mains and decided to give it a try.  Many sails are designed with a bolt rope in the bottom that holds the sail to the boom along the entire length. From what I have been reading this turns out to be a bit of holdover from the old cotton sail days wear ripping and tearing were an issue. Modern Dacron does not need this additional support and a lot of sailmakers are going to loose footed sails. The easiest way to try this out on your boat is to simply remove the bolt rope from your boom and see how it goes.   On the Mirage 24, I have been very impressed with the results so far.  Sail handling is much easier especially with regards to tensioning and loosening the outhaul. You can really tune your sails foil shape and so far I can not find a single reason not to do this.  Here is a nice video of us sailing along at 6K loose footed main  ...

We set out to the lake again today.  It was a great time.  We are still getting a feel for the procedure in tacking.  Moving the traveler setting the genoa blocks, prepping the sheets, changing up the backstay tension. This boat has a lot going on compared to the Typhoon and we are loving every bit of it.   We spent our first night out in the anchorage after we returned.  This panorama of Lake Kalamazoo early in the morning show the tranquility before the channel gets busy. The new mosquito netting on the forward hatch and companionway worked great for our first night out on the hook. I attached both of these with industrial strength velcro. This velcro is supposed to hold up to 10lbs and work when it is wet, so I know the netting is not going to fly away in the wind. We even got the privacy curtain installed. Now the head can be used without flashing everyone on the boat. Again I used industrial velcro but at the top, I installed ...

The season has entered full swing. This week THYC had their kids day. We decided to spend the night aboard as a family. The wind scoop is one of my favorite things on the boat.  It just blows cool air right down the front hatch.   The club had games and crafts set up for the kids and we spent some serious time playing with the giant Jenga set. We decided before we do too much more camping on the boat it was time for some mosquito netting.  So I broke out the sewing machine this week and got busy.   I took a few short cuts with the netting instead of hemming all the edges I melted a few of them with the blow torch.  I think this will work just as well to preventing the Sunbrella from fraying and it saves some of my material for future projects. I decided to sew up a quick privacy curtain as well.  This will separate the main cabin from the head and V berth. To do this I used Sunbrella for the backing.  In Ann Arbor, there...

We finally settled on a name for our Mirage 24. With much discussion and input (from the 10-year-old.) We have gone with Woodstock. Not the 60's music bash but the cute little yellow bird from the Peanuts. I found a great sign shop here locally and they printed these up for me $25.00 to do both port and starboard nameplates. I came down to the boat and stuck them right on.  First the starboard side then I pulled out of the dock and backed the boat into the slip, so I could do the port side.   Turns out I really like the boat backed into the slip. So I've been leaving it backed in. It makes it easier to leave the dock when it is just me sailing and it is a bit easier to get back into the slip as well.  Our third trip worked out well after I reassembled to boom gooseneck.  As I pulled up the mainsail the boom dropped right off. Turns out the thing had been assembled upside down. The pin had been pushed up and the nut was on the top and it worked it...

As we move from beer can racer to weekend cruiser there are a few things we are working to add to the boat. First off we are looking to fill out the galley. The boat is equipped with a sink and water tank.  So our thoughts are we need is a way to make some coffee. So I picked up this sweet german made alcohol stove. Off course it needs a little work. I pulled it apart and replaced all the o-rings and seal.  An afternoon well spent to ensure a safe working stove. Frame Cleaned up. Many of the seals were pretty hard and dried out from sitting. Packings for the valves were the trickiest part. Time for re-assembly.  One burner is a go. Flame on two burners. Hot coffee in 10 minutes or less. Yeah, alcohol burns hot.

So the P.O. of our Mirage was using it for club racing with his grandson on Lake St. Claire. Fun but we are planning a bit more relaxed sailing and have started making some modifications to allow for more extended weekending trips.   One of the first things I needed to do was sort out the mast lighting system. Coming down the mast he had two sets of wires run. The first set ran the masthead anchor light and the second set the steaming light. Coming through the deck there is only one port to be plugged into and the plug only matches the steaming light. So the anchor light simply had no place to go unless you hooked wires to in and stuffed them down the plug. This did not seem like a good long term solution. So it is time to get creative. I called my brother up, the electrical engineer and told him what I wanted. He sourced out the parts for me on Amazon and drew out a wiring diagram for me. I got to work wiring it up.  The results are a waterproofed 3-way switch lo...

Last weekend we headed out with my parents for our second trip on our new to us 1976 Mirage. The winds were blowing from the east and most everyone out on the lake had their furlers reefed in. We sailed under main only and hit a new speed record of 6.4 knots.  This boat just zips along.  I need to get the reefing lines sorted out and figure out how they are all supposed to run. Something is telling me that with this tall rig mast I'm going to need to be reefing more often. Here are some great pictures from the day.  Wild blue yonder.  Myles was not too happy at the start of the trip.  This was his first experience with this boat heeling over and he was struggling with where to hold on.  As the day went on and he got more comfortable things improved.  Crewing today my Mom and Dad just back from their first retirement RV trip.  The return trip up the channel is great fun.