Kaimusailing

s/v Kaimu Wharram Catamaran

Vessel Name: Kaimu
Vessel Make/Model: Wharram Custom
Hailing Port: Norwalk, CT
Crew: Andy and the Kaimu Crew
About: Sailors in the Baltimore, Annapolis, DC area.
21 March 2024 | St. Marys, GA
01 March 2024 | St. Marys, GA
23 February 2024 | St. Marys, GA
15 February 2024 | St. Marys, GA
11 February 2024 | St. Marys, GA
06 February 2024 | St. Marys, GA
26 January 2024 | St. Marys, GA
14 January 2024 | St. Marys, GA
09 January 2024 | St Marys, GA
23 December 2023 | St Marys, GA
10 December 2023 | St Marys, GA
25 November 2023 | St. Marys, GA
17 November 2023 | St. Marys, GA
17 November 2023 | Somers Cove Marina, Crisfield, MD
03 November 2023 | Somers Cove Marina, Crisfield, MD
26 October 2023 | Somers Cove Marina, Crisfield, MD
17 October 2023 | Somers Cove Marina, Crisfield, MD
11 October 2023 | Somers Cove Marina, Crisfield, MD
04 October 2023 | Alice B. Tawes, McReady Pavilion, Crisfield, Maryland Eastern Shore
03 October 2023 | Alice B. Tawes, McReady Pavilion, Crisfield, Maryland Eastern Shore
Recent Blog Posts
21 March 2024 | St. Marys, GA

Just Add Water

The rainy weekend started off with overcast and fog but no rain. It looked like I might be able to get something done on the D4 dinghy. I wanted to change the bow seat which is really the bow deck. The sailing option uses the deck to hold the freestanding mast. I didn’t like how the deck looked, [...]

01 March 2024 | St. Marys, GA

D4 Dinghy Alternative Seats

The rain event was more wind than rain, strong winds with gusts up to 44 mph. We drove into town to see what the harbor was like. There was a small sailboat that had dragged anchor and was sitting close to shore. The tide was out. We left and played with Bleu at Notter’s Pond.

23 February 2024 | St. Marys, GA

D4 Inside Seams

Day two of the dinghy build started out with me finishing wiring the hull bottoms together on the centerline of the bottom panels. This was much easier than the wiring of the chine edges of the bottom panels and the side panels.

15 February 2024 | St. Marys, GA

D4 Dinghy Day One

A Wharram Pahi 26 had been anchored in the river nearby the boatyard and was hauled out with the travel lift. I went around to look at it and talked to the owner couple. I was surprised that it had been built in Martinique in 1988. The boat is more than 30 years old.

11 February 2024 | St. Marys, GA

D4 Redux

The inflatable (deflatable) dinghy I had bought was deteriorating. It had bottom seams separating. It is a West Marine branded dinghy made out of PVC. HH66 is the adhesive to reattach the seams. A friend had a similar problem and bought the same adhesive. I was waiting to hear from him how it worked [...]

06 February 2024 | St. Marys, GA

The Clincher

We decided to go to Amelia Island for the day, probably to the beach. Our plan to cycle around on the Raleigh 20’s seemed like a bad idea, Bleu can’t keep up with a bicycle for very long and when he quits he quits. So we would walk, where?, Fort Clinch State Park. She has a forever pass for Florida [...]

S...S...Sandy

28 October 2012 | Bodkin Inlet/Chesapeake Bay
Capn Andy/Storm Warning
The news was a video of the Oracle America's Cup team crashing their 72 foot catamaran in gusty conditions on San Francisco Bay. The term used is "boneyarding" or "pearling", from the surfers. When a surfboard's nose goes under the water a little bit, the whole board starts to follow and it goes down very quickly. The same thing happened to the early beach catamarans. The thrilling pictures of a hull up in the air as the catamaran raced along was not the only picture. When the tip of the other hull, the one in the water, went into a wave, the effect was like stubbing your toe while running. Of course you will cartwheel forward, and the catamaran would do the same thing.
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.Hull shapes evolved with the bow looking like it's upside down, with a deck that is sharp, almost like a keel. When the catamaran jammed into a wave, the bow was supposed to rise more easily and prevent the "boneyard" effect. In comparison, the Wharram catamaran bow shape is the opposite. The deck is flat, the bow has a long overhang and a lot of freeboard. The idea is that the bow will have more and more buoyancy as it's pressed into a wave and the boat will ride up over the wave. It seems to work just that way. Of course it adds more windage and subtracts from the waterline length, so it will not be attractive to the racers. They want to maximize waterline, reduce windage, and also chop off that extra bow to reduce weight. That increase in performance is at a cost in seaworthiness, not to mention the 8 million the Oracle boat was reported to cost to build.
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.My own disaster came when the 420 dinghy responded to a gust of wind right at the dock, just as we were going out for a sail. It slammed into the dock and the forestay fitting on the bow broke into 3 pieces and the rig came down. It was just as well as it happening there, rather than a mile up the inlet. The fitting was bronze, but it was 45 years old. The fact that it failed and not the forestay wire showed that the fitting had deteriorated. This happens when the bronze alloy loses its composition due to electrolysis and metal fatigue over the years.
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The new hatch over the dinette table was epoxied into place using a 50/50 microballoon silica mix that came out as usual, like chocolate frosting. The inner part of the hatch had already been installed and it was impossible to remove it from the epoxy putty, even though an oily release agent was used. The outer part, which is the hatch itself, was put in with no release agent, and extra care, since once the epoxy sets up it will be impossible to remove.
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The damaged hatch over the chartroom/head was under repair and its construction is 3/4" pink high density foam with a 3/16" ply layer on top and bottom. The edges around the foam are solid wood. The repair is complicated by all the layers of the composite construction, but by putting in one piece at a time and being patient as the epoxy cures in the chilly weather, the repair was completed, just in time for...
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A tropical storm has turned into a hurricane, smashed Jamaica and Cuba, headed up through the Bahamas, and is now predicted to follow the Gulf Stream north, then do a 90 degree turn to the west and slam us. It reminds me of the anxiety of last year when Irene came through. That storm was weakened by traveling over so much land, this one is predicted to come directly from the sea and not lose too much force.
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The picture is of the hurricane's predicted path, courtesy of wunderground.com.
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