Maintenance
19 June 2010 | Port Jefferson harbor
Bill, sunny, 83, 10-15 knots
I has been maintenance time again. Yesterday i pulled down the genoa and inspected it for damage... and it has some. we are not sure how it happened. There is a rope sewn into the leading edge of the sail that feeds into a slot in the foil on the forestay. Somehow the material has been chafed.
Chafe is something we are always working to avoid. Anything rubbing on anything will destroy one of the two. Mostly we try to avoid having things touch. Many recreational sailor leave up their Lazy Jacks (a webbing of lines that help when lowering the main.), we stow ours once the main tied with sail ties, and deploy them when we are ready to lower the main. Leaving them up causes the lazy Jacks to chafe against the main sail all day long. from a previous owner, the stitching is worn in the area of the the Lazy Jacks.
Other maintenance: defrost the fridge and freezer, "tune the standing rigging, lubricate the roller furling for the Genoa... and look for things we can take off the boat!
Extra unused things are painful on a boat. Everything must have a place on the boat... and every place is valuable. Also, extra weight reduces performance, both under sail and when motoring.