Messages

Last year I replaced the dome light and all four of the main cabin lights with Dr. LED's, three white/red and two white/white. I have been very happy with them, low power drain and better light than the original lights they replaced. If I did it again, I think I would use white/red for all five lights since I never use the low white light setting.

Gary

I put my compass on the center line/water line under the drawer in the vee berth and the control unit on the port side of the aft side of the aft berth bulkhead near the engine panel.

Gary

I met with my sailmaker yesterday afternoon to order a new 155 and a new
main. When he measured my boom, my current main measured 13.09 feet. His form on a Catalina 34T said it should have been 12 feet, as does the factory brochure.

Does anyone else have longer boom? My boat came from San Diego, a light air area, and had been set up to race. The main was cut with a very full foot and a flatening reef. The boom would hang down without the flatening reef in Oder to add unrated sail area.

We discussed the new main and decided to go with the 13.09 foot but without the extra boom sag. Today I am wondering if I should have gone with the standard 12 foot main. Any opinions?

Gary

Terry -

I thought about changing to TackTick last year but couldn't decide how to handle the three large round holes left by my Signet units. How did you handle this problem? The riggers in my area are real high on the TackTick system.

- Gary -

Rick -

I recently tried to preserve the treads in the plates when installing thru-bolts in my new traveler and ran into a problem.  When I used a 12" bit that would go through the 1/4" treaded holes in the plates without touching the threads, I found that the bit was prone to bend when drilling through into the cabin. When I used a 1/4" bit drilling up from inside the cabin, it looked like the holes lined up perfectly, but when I tried to screw in the bolt from the top, it did not line up close enough for the bolt to go through to the cabin. The only solution I had was to give up on preserving the treads in the plates and to use a 12" 1/4' bit from the top all the way into the cabin. After I re-drilled the holes with the 1/4" bit, the starboard hole lined up with the first hole I made while the port side hole came out about 5/16" away from the first hole.

By the way, I was unable to get bolts from Catalina and got them from Garhauer instead. Although I asked for 9" bolts, Garhauer made 9 1/2" bolts which worked out perfectly as 9" would not have been long enough on either side. I trimmed the bolts to the exact lenght I needed with a Dremel tool and the 1.5" washer covered the extra hole perfectly.

- Gary -

When my boat was hauled out last fall, instead of painting over my original faded hull stripes, I used vinyl stipes from Vinylstriping.com ( http://www.vinylstriping.com/ ). I bought the premium vinyl stripes in 150' rolls, enought to do the boat twice. They have a good selection of colors and were willing to send me color samples to make my final choice. My son-in-law and I installed the stripes in a few hours. The installtion process was very easy and they look great. - Gary-

Ray -

I have been using a Garmin 76CSX and have been very pleased with it but have been thinking about buying a used ibook/powerbook to keep on the boat to be used as a TV/DVD player as well as a chart table chartplotter.   The PO installed a 19" LCD TV above the chart table that took up too much room so I took it off and gave it to my daughter. The mac can work on its battery or plug it in to charge.

I have been looking at the MacENC and the MacGPS Pro software and have yet to decide which one to get. How do you like MacENC, has it worked as well as you thought it would? Did you buy their USB antenna and if so, did you mount it topside or in the cabin? If you mounted it topside, where did you put it and did you need a USB extension?

Thanks for your help.

- Gary -

I used to race on a Santana 30/30 where we had a "lance cleat" on the mast about a foot below where the halyard came out of the mast so that you could jump the halyard to get the sail up as fast a possible and you would slid the halyard under the cleat half. After you had cleared up the tail, the halyard automaticaly poped out of th cleat half when you started to use the winch to finish. The lanch cleat we used was limited to 3/8" line an dhad a working load of 500lbs. I don't know if anyone makes a larger size that would be useful on our boats but it is a very simple and useful cleat.

- Gary -

Both of the listed sites no longer have the A65's in stock. The cheapest sites I have been able to find the A65 in stock at have it in the $380-400 area.

- Gary -

Stu -

My boat is hull #231 and was probably build a week after yours. Can I assume the my opening ports are Lewmar or did Catalina use another brand at that time. The one boat project my wife wants me to do is to replace the opening ports that are completely clouded. I would like to only replace the lenses if possible as there aren't any problems with the ports themselves. Does anyone sell just the opening part of the ports?

Thanks,

- Gary -

Stu -

Thanks for the information.  I am going to continue to try to have the thru-bolts use the threads in the metal plates if at all possible. When I used the long bit to go thru into the cabin on the starboard side, over a pint of water came out of the hole. It seems it had leaked into the traveller pedestal and was trapped there until I drilled my hole. When I drilled out the hole on the port side no water came out. I think this was because my port dorade vent leaked inside the boat after the last rain storm like yours did and the water must have come from the pedestal.

My original traveller had three screws in each side and Garhauer duplicated the hole pattern in the new traveller for me. I have used two short screws in the outboard holes on each side that go into the metal plate as before. It is the inboard hole on each side I am trying to use the threads and thru-bolt.

The thru-bolt on the starboard side over the galley is easy to work with an acorn nut. On the port side, the hole is above the inboard side of the chart table behind the head door when it is opened all the way but the head door does not have very much clearance and I will probably use a flat nut there.

I was not able to drill additional new inboard holes in the pedestal for the thru-bolts as a PO had drilled holes (fore & aft) on the inboard sides of the pedestal and inserted pvc pipe into the holes as a lining to serve as additional line fairleads (Mainsheet and main halyard).

I will take a picture next week of how it comes out.

- Gary -

I have a question for those of you who have installed the 9" traveler bolts thru the cabin top.  Did you use a 1/4" bit all the way thru and ruin the threads in the metal plate or did use the threads as well as thru-bolting the bolts?

Since my original traveler never had the 9" thru-bolts installed, I wanted to install them when I replaced my original traveler with a new Garhauer traveler. Garhauer make me two 9 1/2" bolts by welding 3" bolts to thread stock so that I could thread the bolts into the metal plate in the traveler bridge as they passed thru the hole I drilled thru the cabin top for added holding power. I used a long 3/16" drill bit to go thru the existing holes into the cabin so as to preserve the threads and then used a long 1/4" bit to enlarge the holes from inside the cabin up to the metal plate.

My problem is that when I screwed the bolts into the metal plate, they did not line up exactly with the 1/4" holes I made from the inside. Am I just wasting my time trying to preserve the threads or should I just drill straight thru with the 1/4" bit?

Thanks,

- Gary -

Try this link.

http://www.datamarineinternational.com/datmar/index.htm

When I bought my boat last year one of the recommendations in the survey was to replace the upper shroud toggles as the PO had used them as a base to connect a soft vang as a preventer (boat has a solid vang). The practice of connecting the preventer to the toggles had distorted the upper toggles on each side and there was a question about their integrity.

Just a thouhgt.

- Gary -

I have decided to upgrade from the original Nicro-Fico traveler and from my unknown brand solid vang this weekend with new Garhauer products. My question is which traveler and vang should I buy?

I have been offered a great deal on a new MT-2 (only $200), but after looking at a picture of the traveler,  I am worried that the stacked blocks on each end of the traveler may have a high potential for hanging up lines while the newer (and more expensive) MT-UB2 traveler has a cleaner, more protective look.  As I am planning on racing my boat quite a bit this year, I would like to avoid potential problems where I can, but am not sure the MT-UB2 will be worth 3x the cost.  Has anyone with a MT-2 had a problem with it? 

Regarding a new solid vang, the catalog shows three models that fit a 34, the RV20-1SL, the RV18-1 DX, and the RV20-1DX.  Each model has a different tune diameter, with 2" being the largest.  I think the 18/20 number relates to the purchase ratio but I am not sure.  My first reaction is to go for the RV20-1DX and its 2" tube but thought I would see what other people have been using.

Thanks for the advice.

- Gary -