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Cat Scratch Fever The game plan was simple. 6:30 Friday night, set the boat for transport. Saturday, completely assemble the boat. Sunday morning sail 20 miles to my mooring. Very straight forward. Friday at 6:30, I met 2 friends of mine to help me attach the amas to the main hull. From there, we needed to lift the amas and crossbeams 90 degrees to the main hull for trailering. Well, my friends show up, we attached the hulls. As we were lifting the starboard hull, it went up a bit fast (my fault) and destroyed the crossbeam. Totally crushed the edge of the crossbeam where it meets the main hull. Not a structural problem, only cosmetic. After several F-bombs, I called a friend of mine who designs and builds multis. He is in the town where I was headed to launch. He told me to bring it by and we'd fix it. Cool. First set back, but under control. Saturday morning, I drove over to the boat, attached a few more lines to the trailer, hooked it to the car and started heading north to the boat shop. 3 miles into the trip, the boat started to unfold on the road. The breakage would not allow the entire rig to sit the way it was designed to be in trailer mode. Pull over, re-tie everything. FUCK THIS!! I headed back to the boatyard where I started the morning. A few more F-bombs. Called Solo, he showed up 45 minutes later. That engineering mind of his kicked in. He came up with a way of setting up the boat on the trailer, that wouldn't, A. Beat the shit out of the boat and B. Make it 20 miles safely. Mission accomplished. (Murphy's law: when you trailer, every knucklehead is either behind you or in front of you). Second set back, still winning the battle. Ted my multihull designer/builder buddy set me up in his shop for the repair. Spent the whole day repairing the crossbeam. Around, 8 pm it was done and wasn't half assed. Behind schedule, but looking good. Went home to call the 2 original friends who had planned to sail down with me. Told them we were on. They show up around 9 on Sunday morning. Went to the boat shop to pick up the ama/crossbeam. Ted added another coat of epoxy, because he wasn't convinced there was an adequate amount. OK, time to get breakfast to kill an hour while the epoxy cures. Pick up the amas/crossbeam. Go to the ramp. Spend 4.5 hours assembling the boat. I had been making a check list all winter and wanted to address everything before getting it wet. Everything that was planned to be checked was checked. Final steps, raise the mast, attach boom and back it into the water. As we were raising the mast, it kicked out of the mast rotator, fell and snapped the mast rotator in 2. Several colorful examples of the English language which teetered on the insane. I stopped and thought, there is nothing I can do. The people who run the park had already stopped by to tell us to get moving because we were taking up 3 spots where campers normally park. I Couldn't get it to the mooring (no outboard). Just got to the point of, "I don't know what to do". Fuck this, I won't be denied!! I went to my trunk, pulled out the epoxy, ready to make a quick fix. My friends who had a firmer grip on reality, were able to talk me down. "Give it up", "the boats not going in today." Several F-Bombs mixed with different nouns, verbs and adjectives, I conceded. I approached the yardmaster (that's what it said on his hat), told him, it took 4.5 hours to get to where we are. I can't launch it nor drive it away with a 16 foot beam.. Ok, now what. He took pity on me and gave me several parking spots to leave it until I could launch. He only charged me for one spot. $5.00 a night, what a country. Yesterday, I spent the entire afternoon at the above mentioned boat shop fixing the rotator. We did it the right way by vacuum bagging and finishing it properly. Ted didn't charge me a penny. He opened up his shop, supplied everything including knowledge and his time. I'm completely blown away by his generosity. www.warrenmultihulls.com Yes, a shameless plug for someone who dropped everything and went way out of his way to help out a friend. I'm back to the landing tonight after work tonight, to raise the mast and go for a quick sail then to a local mooring. Delivery, this Saturday, weather pending. I will point out, none of the issues are due to the boat simply being a multihull. They are products of an overzealous guy who was hell bent on getting the boat in on schedule. Yes, there are additional steps with multihulls. In my case, these additional steps opened the door to problems, but if I were a bit more focused on each step, the snowball effect wouldn't have happened. For you nothern types who haven't launched your boats yet, take it slow and micro-manage each step. Do it right the first time. Otherwise, shit happens... John |
