Wind Song (26X) repairs and mods log

[Russ]

Looks great.

Sorry about the beer.

[Tomfoolery]

I spilled my beer. Dammit.

Whoa! Man down!!!

[Starscream]

I am a big fan of supporting BWYachts, and I purchase a lot of my stuff from them.

I decided to order new sails this spring, and I ended up ordering from Precision Sails. Their service was awesome, their price on graphics was fantastic, and the biggest thing is that with the US exchange rate their price ended up much lower and I couldn't justify the extra spend to support BWY. I still feel a bit guilty about that, but not $500 worth of guilty.

The new sails are in transit now. I'm looking forward to trying them out. If someone needs an old OEM main and slightly torn jib, send me a PM.

[hart]

I pm’d you Starscream.

I’m working, slowly, on the topsides today. It’s too hot to really get at it. But I washed the top this morning and am working on cleaning up the black using Starbrite Cleaner Wax by hand.





I’ve only done a little bit but what a difference.

[hart]

So it’s been about a year since I updated. I didn’t work on the boat much last fall or winter due to our baby being born. Then my mother passed this spring so I’ve had a lot on my plate.

However the admiral decided she wanted to participate as a family in BEER Cruise 2021, which concluded last week. I didn’t make posts along the way with everything going on. But first we ordered new sails from Blue Water about a month before the trip. The main performed well. Sadly the jib didn’t make it in time for the trip. It arrived the day after we left. Lol. Hoping to try it out this week or next.

Anyway, we cleaned the boat, I redid some electrical and we prepped for a 5 day cruise. We raised the mast for the first time in years and I inspected everything. I’ll need to replace the standing rigging eventually I suppose but it’s in good shape.

We bought new halyards, topping lift, I redid my lazyjack lines. Basically I replaced all the running rigging except the sheets. But I did have to replace the fiddle block on the main sheet.

And we purchased 8 million other little things like a new grill, vhf radios, galley items, etc etc.

And off we sailed for 5 nights/6 days. Here are a few photos from the trip:



Here we are loaded up and about to head to the ramp. No, I wouldn’t travel any distance like this. But the ramp is just a couple minutes from the house and I can stay under 35 mph the whole way.



Our crew: Mom and dad, and 3 boys ages 14, 8, and 9 months.



The boat under sail. Loving the new loose footed main from BWY. The astute among you will notice the motor is down. I guess technically we were motor sailing. But I was just using it to charge the batteries here. We managed to get some decent sailing time in during the trip.



My 14 year old took this picture at sunset. Beautiful! We were in Navarre Beach, Fl and the family was walking along the main road exploring. He noticed the sunset and ran all the way back to the beach to get this shot. I’m so glad he did.

Those of you in the Facebook group will have seen most of these already. And there are more photos and a couple videos in the Imgur album these came from

Overall it was a great trip and I hope all the boys have some great memories from it.

Repair wise we didn’t break anything during the trip so that was nice. I still have more work to do to Wind Song, but she sails! Looking forward to using her the rest of the summer. I’ll worry about more repairs after we have some fun.

[OverEasy]

Hi Hart!

Gotta question for you…. Where did you find the multiple 55 gallon barrels of elbow grease?
I could really use a barrel or two!

Great Job!

Best Regards
Over Easy

[Be Free]

I keep mine in the corner right next to the big pile of "nothing" that I never get around to doing.

[hart]

2 year update:

After the 2021 adventure I had some health issues that landed me in the hospital for a couple weeks and it took me a long time to fully recover. So that sucked. Wind Song sat on the trailer for a good while.

We’re back to sailing this season and took the boat out for a shakedown cruise last week. My son and I did a bunch of maintenance on the outboard including fixing a faulty low oil sensor, replacing the water pump, new plugs, lower unit lube, and a million other little things I can’t recall.

We have replaced most of the electrical terminals. All nav lights are now LED.

Replaced the original portable head with a new one. Same Dometic 960 we had before.

I’ve added another Fortress anchor to the boat. I know it’s generally advised to keep two styles of anchors but 99% of our anchoring is in sand. My original Fortress has been my best anchor by far. So I added a second and have ditched my oversized galvanized fluke.

The VHF antenna cable needs work. I’m hoping new connectors will right things and I don’t have to pull a new cable. That’s on my list to do. But we have the backup handheld, and the backup to the backup handheld, plus an emergency antenna. So it’s not urgent. And that’s about it short term.

The plan this summer is to use the boat as much as possible. And I’ve got my eye on “comfort” mods more so than functional ones.

It’s good to be back on the water again.

[Jimmyt]

Sorry to hear you’ve had some health issues. Very glad to see you’re back on the water again! Looking forward to seeing more trip reports.

[hart]

Sorry to hear you’ve had some health issues. Very glad to see you’re back on the water again! Looking forward to seeing more trip reports.

After the 2021 trip I got some sort of antibiotic resistant infection which landed me in the hospital for a knee surgery among other things. And as a result of that treatment I had rhabdomyolysis. Recovery took a long while but I’m mostly good now.

The knees still acts up (I’m too young for that!) from time to time. Anyway, we’re going on this year’s Beer cruise. We splash the boat June 8th with planned end on June 13th. Same crew as last time but two years older.

I’ve got more repairs and mods on the radar, but for now we’re just going to enjoy the boat for a while.

[Jimmyt]

Had a similar year, myself. Cancer surgery May '22. Recovered just enough to go sailing a couple of times, then had some bad labs. Hormone therapy and radiation in 2023. Just now getting where I'm strong enough and have enough endurance to launch and retrieve my boat. Luckily, my buddies have been taking me sailing in the meantime.

I'm glad you're better. I think enjoying the boat is a great idea! I always think I'm going to make the BEER run, but, so far something's come up (or I wasn't up to it). It looks like a blast, though.

[hart]

Beer cruise is a blast.

I told my wife I want to sail to Middle Bay light one day this summer too. I haven’t been out there in probably 20 years. We tend to always go east for the sand beaches. I think the kids are old enough now they can do without land here and there.

When I lived in Mobile I kept a Venture 222 on Dog River. Good times that was.

[Jimmyt]

Let me know if you head towards middle bay light. If I can, I'll try to be on the water that day.

[hart]

So I couldn’t stand the fixed mount VHF not working and messed with it last night and this morning. I trimmed the RG8x cable back to clean wire and replaced the connectors at the deck connection. The one for the antenna at the top of the mast looks ok.

Radio is getting good voltage (tested with multimeter) and powers on.

Trying both the main antenna and one of those Shakespeare emergency antennas I’m unable to receive the local wx station. Further testing shows I’m able to transmit but not receive.

By using two antennas, I think it’s a good guess the receiver in the unit is bad and probably time for a new radio.

[OverEasy]

Hi Hart & JimyT!

Glad you both are doing better!
Health issues are a pain 🫣 … especially when it gets in the way of playing with our boats!!!

Nice set of mods Hart!

Hope you both have a great 2023 season.

Best Regards
Over Easy