"Susan J" finally reentered the Penryn River on Monday May 10th, after hastily bolting on the, now, re galvanised, releathered, oiled and tallowed gaff "bucket", Julie having antifouled, the engine recommissioned and started and the other rigging sorted the week before a family gathering in Somerset.
A blustery cold day with even more wind on the Tuesday afternoon, we decided to swing off the docks to finish the lacing before departing early the next day. Falmouth Haven was too windy to rely on at anchor, as we needed to hoist the sails fully for a while, so we picked up a mooring, quite far out. It was a "Fowey" type mooring with no pick up but a ring on a relatively small buoy. Despite the gusts we had the buoy alongside but Julie gashed her hand and lost a glove while (fortunately!) retaining the boat hook and the rather low buoy. In the meantime I had come forward, having attached the tiller lines and promptly sat on the windlass, very hard. When writing this in mid June I still tend to sit on one or other buttock but Julie's hand is fine and the errant glove replaced!
Too windy to hoist, we had our first supper aboard of the season. By dusk it was almost flat calm. The main was hoisted, successfully and the jib run out and furled, all was well, stove lit and peace restored.
With a forecast 5-7 in the afternoon we put two reefs in and set most of the staysail and then heard an imminent F8 gale warning east of the Lizard on Ch 16. This was at 09:30, while we passed under Pendennis Head. We were already laying the Helford entrance and under reduced sail, mainly as we were supposed to be gently trying the new rigging. So we continued We called the coast guard on Ch 16, to reassure them we had heard but would carry on anyway but failed to raise Nare Point NCI, half way across the Bay, as advised.
As forecast, we duly noted a steady 36 knots with gusts as much as 48 knots but all settled once in the mouth of the Helford. As a result of this first season sail, Double Deckers have now been reinstated, to compliment the Kit Kats, thought now sufficient by the skipper for such occasions!
Matt and Rosie insisted!Having crossed the Bay, we were called by Nare Point NCI, half a NM away to ask why we didn't respond to their acknowledgement of our call on Ch 65 about an hour ago! We explained that, despite several calls from us, we had received nothing from then. I telephoned them, once safely on our mooring and explained our dilemma vis a vie our VHF's apparent inability to receive over more than about half a mile and endeavoured to try again, with mobile to hand, later in the week.
At the time of writing this in early June, we have achieved the same results on the emergency taff rail aerial, with and with out the AIS, which shares the aerial. The SWR is always around 1.7:1, which is fairly good. The AIS receives, from the masthead aerial at 4-5 NM although, as ever, our AIS transmissions appear sporadic, neither ideal and warrants further investigation. In hindsight, I felt we had not been receiving properly since I installed the new wireless in 2019. It has been to and returned from iCom, who says it is OK, including the suspected squelch filters. Next, once back on board, is to eliminate sources of interference such as the instruments, MFD, the 12 v socket telephone charger and possibly the 12 v handheld iCom charger. If that fails I might try reducing the coax cable by a 1/4 wave length apparently 1.5 feet.
Having relaunched and had a few trial sails, "Susan J"'s much simpler rigging, has resulted in, a much more attractive and traditional appearance, in keeping with her aspirations. The mainsail is going up and down more easily and her rolling is less pronounced. We are modifying the routine to tighten the free flying jib, without the massive additional purchase, now eliminated. Tightening the jib halyard first, lifting the bowsprit within the gammon iron and finally using the handy billy to lower the bowsprit back. this seems to work and has the merit of ensuring less strain on the spar.
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