Las' Go Around / PA31

Happy New Year

2012-01-08T22:26:00.001-06:00

Well happy new year. The plan is to put the boat in this year :-)

2011-05-09T18:52:00.002-05:00

And now another PA-31 is found, all the way down in Florida. Here is the note I got from the owner:

Dear Erik:
My name is Michel Bxxxxxx and I currently live in Punta Gorda, Florida. Before moving to Florida I lived in Lake Geneva Wisconsin. While in Wisconsin I commissioned Mark Leonard to build me a PA 31 in 1986 to replace my PA18 that I had owned for several years. I still have my PA31 after 25years! It has spent several long periods of time in storage, but it never occurred to me to sell it. It has currently been in storage here in Florida for about four years. Just thought you might be interested in where at least one of the PA31's went.

So now we know where 3 of the 7 are, and we will keep a look out for the other 4!.

Michel, if you can send me a picture of the boat, that would be Great!

Quick Update.

2010-02-16T08:42:00.002-06:00

The boat is goin in th elake this year. as always there are a number of things that need to be done before that can happen. the boat is also "sleeping outside" right now as my Dad is kind enough to put my RV in the indoor spot the boat usually has.

Another one found!

2009-03-12T15:39:00.002-05:00

This is "Crysal Blue" and she sails out of Port Washington.
Heck, if we can find the other 5 we can start a one-design fleet!

FFFF BOATS!

2009-02-07T12:10:00.002-06:00

My whole Blog is about BOATS!

frozen Over

2009-01-22T15:40:00.002-06:00

Here is our parking spot in the harbor at south shore. It is frozen over.

Straightening the rudder

2009-01-07T17:04:00.002-06:00

So, when we pulled the boat out in the fall I (Eric) ran the rudder into one of the trailer support posts...... So the rudder post is bent. oops.

Dad (Earl) is straightening the 2 inch stainless steel rod.

We plan on putting the boat in again in the spring.

Moving Dinghys for college students

2008-08-29T08:48:00.003-05:00

We used the same truck that pulled our boat out to the lake to haul 8 Dinghys for the University of Illinois Sailing Club from where they purchased them to Champaign/Urbana.

This is the culmination of a nearly $40K project. With these 8 boats the club will now be able to host it's own regattas in the Midwest Collegant Sailing Association.

the truck had a flat front tire on the way down, so when we got there we had to unload in the dark.

Bird's Eye View

2008-08-11T19:35:00.006-05:00

These pics are from the harbor cam at Shouth Shore in Milwaukee. http://www.lakefrontcam.com/jpegsouth.html

This boat is the "Dirty Vicor" a neighbor in the mooring field.

Sailed this weekend

2008-07-28T10:38:00.002-05:00

We got the boat out under sail this weekend. And even in only 7-10 knts of wind the 155 is way too much headsail in those conditions.

We got the Autohelm calabrated, but may still need to move the "cumpass" as it is off by 18 degrees. The ST 4000 also tries to correct course by turning to port only. From researching the intraweb, it turns out that is common and we have to look at "low voltage" or whatever that means.

The Knt meeter said we were doing 0.0kts, but the GPS said 6.9 knts, so we gotta sort that out.

Parker (9 year old grand son) was aboard and did well, even though we were all over the place with tacks and jibes. We managed to make a huge mess below decs, as it has accumulated 10 years woth of crap sitting and not being sailed.

The GPS unit worked great! We put a Lake Michigan detailed map "chip" in it and it performed as expected. It is monochrome though, color would be nice, but is not actually neccessarry.

Wish I took the camera, oh well.....

HAPPY BIRTHDAY !!

2008-07-14T15:58:00.001-05:00

Today is my dad's birthday!

Happy birthday Papa!

Love,

No Need to pull the boat out, nor the motor

2008-07-03T15:48:00.003-05:00

JB Weld is a cool thing. We were able to fix up the motor's crack with out pulling the boat out and without pulling the motor out of the boat.

There are some seals and "O" Rings that need replacing, but that is not an emergancy. So that's nice.

Daddy's Little Sailor!

2008-06-27T16:05:00.003-05:00

(even wearing dad's hat!)

DARN!

2008-06-26T20:50:00.003-05:00

OK, so the boat is in the water, but we thought we had a leak. Well we do, and this is the leak:

It has a crak in it and whenever it runs it sprays water all over the cabin.

We will be pulling the boat out, then deciding what to do....

Darn :-(

Happy Anniversary Hon!

2008-06-09T15:52:00.002-05:00

Eric & I have been married 18 years today! My gift to him is this blog redesigned. Hope it isn't too sissy looking!
I even made you your own signature!

I LOVE YOU!

Pics from the launch

2008-06-07T22:30:00.013-05:00

It was a long day. I could tell you all about it, but you probably have done the same things yourself. There are a thousand deatail to look after. There are Three very spacific screws needed to put the furler back together, and all three of them were in a differnt location, I am shocked we found them in a few minutes, let alone found them at all. But you have done stuff like that.

Here are the pics from the day, not all of them, but enough to tell the story witout words. Clicking on the pics will show them full size. There is even some video further down.

But First a harty meal!

Floating

2008-06-05T15:49:00.001-05:00

Just after launch

sorting out lines

2008-06-05T15:46:00.000-05:00

Just before the launch I was sorting out some lines.

Climbing on

2008-06-05T15:44:00.001-05:00

After this, I remembered that you could just step over the live lines....

It was nice that my son got it all on camera...

It's In the water.

2008-06-05T13:16:00.007-05:00

I am writting up the event. but here are some quick shots of it going in.

Getting Ready

2008-06-03T09:07:00.002-05:00

June 4th is the launch date, so we are getting ready today. The grand kids have just 1 and a half hours of school today. When they get home we will run to Wal-Mart for an oil change and pick up snacks for the trip.

We are packing up "esentials" for the launch. I wonder where our priorities are as some of the esentials include a PSP and a Laptop. Well at least the laptop will be set up as a chart plotter using Sea Clear II free chartplotting software. http://www.sping.com/seaclear/ Somebody should complile that code for use on a Macintosh now that all macs are using the X86 Chipset. the PSP is to keep the 9 year old occupied while we are doing things during the launch that a 9 year old should not be involved in. One of those things is oporating the Boom Crane, though I am sure he thinks he could handle it.

The 15 year old got a new digital camera for his birthday this year and is tasked with documenting the whole process through pictures.

We will be driving up from champaign Illinois to Winnebago Illinois, about three hours, and then taking 10 years worth of accumulated stuff off of the boat. We will pack only what is needed for the launch this afternoon and head out for Mckinley Harbor, Milwaukee Wisconson early Wednesday morning.

Launch

2008-05-16T16:01:00.000-05:00

We are launching on June 4^th. We plan on being at McKinley ramps about 9 am. If you want you can come and watch. Or you can call the paramedics when stepping the mast goes horribly wrong.

PHRF Cert Received

2008-05-09T16:56:00.001-05:00

We got the PHRF Cert. The number is just like it was 10 years ago. Were not going say what it is, though. That’s just how we roll.

Queens Cup, a race

2008-05-01T10:03:00.000-05:00

So the Queens cup is a race form Milwaukee to Someplace in Michigan nearly due west across the Lake Michigan. It is the last weekend of June. At first we thought there was a life raft requirement for the race but it turns out that though a life raft is a good idea, it is not mandatory for the race. Outside of that large obstacle the only prohibitive factor now is, well, cost.

We will need to decide if we are doing it and then start writing checks (inset cliché about sailboat ownership being like money holes in the water, or tearing up $100 bills in the shower here).

Launch Date

2008-05-01T09:58:00.000-05:00

We are picking a launch date, in fact I think Dad already has one in mind and I just don’t know it. We are hearing that Lake Michigan water levels are low, so we are hoping that at McKinley Harbor in Milwaukee has enough water to float the boat off of the trailer. The boat only drafts about 4 feet, but there is a large beam on the trailer that we have to get over.

Still waiting for spring

2008-04-12T10:54:00.002-05:00

Snow is forecasted for today. Gesh, when is spring gunna get here? In central Illinois there are a group of students from the university of Illinois Sailing Club that are going to clinton lake anyway. The will be cold. Theya re getting ready for a regatta at Northwesten University next weekend. The regatta that was going to happen a few weeks ago at Iowa was canx'd due to Ice.

The Big Boat is just waiting for nicer weather. Well that and the marinas in Milwaukee to open up.

When the boat goes in we will have to calibrate the new autohelm that was put in last summer and then try to get the GPS unit talking to it. but, there will be plenty of time for that.

Come on spring, we are waiting.

New Riggers

2008-03-17T21:46:00.002-05:00

I have an FJ that was donated to the UofI Sailing Club. Parker and Dori are ready to go sailing!

PHRF Cert Rumor

2008-03-13T09:06:00.002-05:00

So the rumor is that our PHRF Cert will be mailed on April 1st. um... APRIL 1ST! can you immagine the jokes that will insue if your Cert was issued on April Fool's Day?

I already have a few jokes, but I will save them as excuses when we fail to sail to our new rating.

LOL April Fools day, what are they thinking?!

New Look!

2008-02-27T17:49:00.002-06:00

Thanks to Diana at custom Blog Designs for giving my blog a makeover! I really like the way it looks. Many custom atributes that make the blog uniqly mine.

You can read more about custom blog designs by following the link on the right side of this page, just under the hit counter.

This is the boat; in the water

2008-02-21T16:54:00.004-06:00

I have gotten some feedback like, "hey there are no pictures of the boat". Well there are, you just gotta click on the "2007 posts" linky on the right hand side there.

For those of you who just wanna take a peek, here is the boat. these pics prove a number of things:

1) the boat floats

2) in moves under sail power

3) Graney pictures form the early 1990's don't scan well.

The Jacket

2008-02-20T22:28:00.005-06:00

Sombody mentioned "those port and starboard jackets" and how corny the are. I was all like "Hey, I got one of those!" I wear it , really.

Here is the jacket, the sleeves are almost too short...... I don't know what happened to my neck in the picture, I usually have one. you can also tell that the jacket is original, circa 1975, check out the collar!

It's ok to laugh.

New Zealand!

2008-02-20T18:00:00.003-06:00

I posted on another website (sailinganarchy.com) that no one from New Zealand had viewed my blog. Well now they have! Woot!

And it was also pointed out in the comments that if everyone from the east coast of the US and Canada keep viewing then we will tip the whole map to the right.

World Famous!

2008-02-20T09:47:00.005-06:00

I have added a small app to the blog provided by statcounter.com Without invading anyones privacy it tells us from where people have viewed our blog. It turns out we are world famous! check out the map.

*we do not keep anyone's information, nor do we proved informatioin to any third party. Just the map and only the map.

Sailing Doo-Dads

2008-02-19T21:54:00.008-06:00

Recently on a web forum I post at someone asked about Sailing Doo-Dads. You know all the sailing crap you have around the house, that isn't part of Actually sailing. Well I got a family room full of it. Since the web page I post at doesn't allow uploading of images, I thought I would put them here.

keep in mind, I didn't clean or anything before I took the pics, but this gives you an Idea of all the sailing stuff in my basement. I'll give a short description of each picture

stuff by he CDs and DVDs

PHRF Cert Applied for...

2008-02-15T19:51:00.002-06:00

Well in preperation for the spring and summer season we are filling out the paperwork for the boats PHRF certificate. This will give us a handicap number in an effort to levelize racing with boats that are note exactly the same. In the past the boat rated a 132. We will get our cetificate here http://www.lmphrf.org/

I am hoping that we make the queens cup this year (http://www.ssyc.org/queenscup/default.asp), and some weekend races.

Thwarted by the weather

2008-01-31T16:19:00.001-06:00

Looks like the weather is going to get in the way for the Friday trip From Champaign and Winnebago to Chicago. We will try for Saturday. If we can’t go Saturday then we will have to skip it this year as I am hosting a Super Bowl party on Sunday.

Going to Strictly Sail chicago

2008-01-28T10:20:00.001-06:00

So on Friday we will be going to Stricktly Sail at Chicago's Navy pier. I will take a lots of pics and post a few here.

http://www.strictlysail.com/shows/chicago.asp

Test Post from eMail

2008-01-22T15:12:00.001-06:00

I know a lot of people post to blogs via email. I just never have turned it on, well not until now anyway. Here is the first eMail post to the blog.

-Eric

Video! from 1995

2008-01-03T19:33:00.001-06:00

So here is a vedio from 1995. I got around to moving the video from VHS to youtube.

Merry Christmas

2007-12-22T12:56:00.000-06:00

Just a mid winter post to wish everyone a Merry Christmas.

I am working on getting some old VHS tapes converted to Digital to post. They were made in 1994ish, and show the boat sailing and at dock and some ducks.

Eric

Packed Up

2007-10-17T09:41:00.001-05:00

We will see you in the spring.

Dude, did you hear that? buzzing?

2007-08-03T22:01:00.000-05:00

OK I can hear the buzz,

We are damn close to launching, in fact it will probably happen this next week.

I will take a crap load of pictures.

Then we gotta sail in a circle to get all the megnetic gear calabrated. Then we gotta get all the rigging tight. then we gotta take a nap.

Soon, very soon, after a very long time.

I can feel the buzz...

Digital Scrapbooking

2007-07-26T17:32:00.000-05:00

Diana (a Daughter in law) is into digital scrapbooking. Here you see one of her creations

Autohelm wired

2007-07-25T16:48:00.000-05:00

We had to remove the stainless steel stantion and use a drill press to get the hole in it. We ran the wire internal to the cabin where the stantion mounts to the deck.

GPS Mounted

2007-07-25T16:45:00.001-05:00

Yes we have spent a lot of time on the GPS unit. The plan is to have it talk to the Autohelm. We don't have them communicating yet, but we believe we gotta calabrate the autohelm first...

New Battery

2007-07-25T16:43:00.000-05:00

Well, you gotta be rudundant. The old battery was taken out by a lightning strike. This is the replacement. Gotta love "Farm and Fleet" stores.

GPS Wired and functioning

2007-07-14T11:40:00.000-05:00

We pulled out the old Loran C wire and ran the GPS wire. We spliced the line into a planed disconned so the antenea could be stored inside the cabin when not in use.

Test og the GPS, all good. It is an older unit, but it is the first time we took it out of the box. We have a G-Chart of lake Michigan. I will also be riggin an older laptop with Sea Clear Chart plotting software and seeing how that works out.

We pulled out the old Loran C wire and ran the GPS wire. We spliced the line into a planed disconned so the antenea could be stored inside the cabin when not in use.

All done! bottom paint

2007-07-14T11:37:00.001-05:00

Beauty, Eh?

Bottom Paint

2007-07-14T11:32:00.000-05:00

We are puttin on Interlux bottom paint. Next year will will sand it down to primer, but this year we are just gunna cover it for the shortened season.

Before: 8 years of rain and neglect

Cutting in before rolling it on.

Warn spot.

Auto Pilot

2007-07-08T22:22:00.000-05:00

We are also putting in the Auto pilot.

THe unit before we have run the cable to it. We will remove the stainless steel rail to drill it for a clean internal cable run.

The units all work together and talk to the GPS unit. We will set waypoints in the GPS and the boat will stear to them, or that is the plan anyway.

Weather covers.

Navagation Station

2007-07-08T22:14:00.000-05:00

Here is the new, mint in box, Garmin GPSmap 230. Bought a few years ago new, and now just being put in.

It will go in the navigation station mounted to that bulkhead. We will also put a folding table there.

It is replaceing the Loran C unit that was taken out by a lighning strike a number of years ago. The loran was mounted to the white bracket.

Scrub Her Down!

2007-07-08T22:10:00.001-05:00

Well we got the deck hands to was and wax the boat. Jake (14) and Parker (8) liked getting wet on a 90 Deg day.

Top View, just for giggles

2007-06-17T18:58:00.003-05:00

A shot taken topside minus all the riging.

Navagational wiring

2007-06-17T18:54:00.001-05:00

What a tangled web we weave...

So out of this we have to get all the navagational electronics talking to each other, and getting the sounder, the wind unit and knot meter working. AND we have a new GPS chart plotter to put in *sigh*.

Abra Cadabra

2007-06-17T18:47:00.001-05:00

Guess what is behind door (steps) number 1 ? Hey! that is my bunk on the left there, what is all the crap doing there!!!

Already for the Volvo Ocean race, um, well guess not. But it is a Volvo Marine Diesel motor. All one cylinder of it. We have a 13 gallon Tank and have filled it once. the boat was launched in 1989, and when we removed the tank it still had about 12 galons in it! that is pretty effecient.

Washed!

2007-05-11T17:42:00.000-05:00

Well it is at least a little cleaner....

2007-05-11T17:37:00.000-05:00

The boat was pulled up to the house where electrical power can be run to it. In the pic you can see the 15 foot motor boat that we use because the sailboat is on a moring.

Soarting out the mast

2007-05-11T17:34:00.000-05:00

The mast has been removed and we can now untagle the web of lines.

Cleaning the barn

2007-05-11T17:32:00.000-05:00

We now have a clean spot for when the boat gets pulled out in the fall.

Work to be done before launching.

2007-05-11T10:43:00.000-05:00

1) Bath and wax.

2) Some electrical work (took a lightning strike a number of years ago)

3) New hole in hull for depth finder unit.

4) Install new GPS system (Garmen GPSMAp 230) Yes I know it is not "new" but it is still in the box....

We will also need to have it re measured for a PHRF rating, as the last one is about 10 years old.... And for those of you who ask, "What's it rate?" well the last rating was 132.

Money shot

2007-05-11T10:41:00.000-05:00

Here is the tail of the boat. I am going to incorporate that layour into the "logo" including the Sail Number and hull number.

Boom, um, boom...

2007-05-11T10:39:00.000-05:00

Here is the boom rigged in the back of the truck that helps stand the mast up. Two people make it easier, but with this one person can do it safely.

Free at last!

2007-05-11T10:36:00.001-05:00

Here you see the boat cleared of clutter and pulled out of the barn.

WOW! it really needs a bath!

Still Trapped.

2007-05-11T10:34:00.000-05:00

Here is a front view of it in the barn.

Trapped!

2007-05-11T10:30:00.000-05:00

The boat is in a metal barn in Winnebago, Illinois. Trapped behind 7 years of clutter. Look closely and you will also see the Handa Gold wing (circa 1983) in there as well.

Um, still putting it back together

2007-04-03T20:23:00.000-05:00

Well, the boat is still in a machine shed. It needs put back together.

We (well mostly my father) are working on it....

Sailing Blog Started

2007-02-27T12:34:00.000-06:00

Hi, I started a blog for my father's Sailboat. A 31 foot Pierce Arrow launched in 1989.