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. |
17 April 2024 | St Marys, GA
Dinghy Skeg
I was suffering with what seemed like a cold and also had allergy symptoms. I awoke and felt fine. The green pollen that was coating everything was gone. Maybe it will return.
07 April 2024 | St. Marys, GA
Clammy Hands
Items came in from TEMU, the Chinese cut rate retailer. One was a nice little drone that cost about twelve and a half dollars. It looked like an easy thing to play with while I coughed and sneezed. I was fighting a summer cold, even though it is not summer elsewhere, it seems like it here. A nice [...]
02 April 2024 | St. Marys, GA
Sun Doggie
After laminating the cedar strips onto the gunwales of the dinghy I found the screws I used wouldn’t come out. The epoxy had seized them. The screw heads were stripped so I cut a straight slot in the heads with the cut off wheel. The cedar smoked when the screw heads got red hot. I could remove [...]
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.
Proa Leeboard Pattern
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I decided to continue with the proa model, adding a couple of leeboards that mount in cassettes, which mount between the ends of the crossbeams and a couple of additional short beams within the hull that poke out to provide the mounting point.
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I got the idea of the cassettes while looking over plans made by O. Gulbrandsen for the United Nations Fisheries. His work was developing modern alternatives to traditional Polynesian boatbuilding, which usually required a whole tree to hollow out to make the canoe. The canoes were classified as 5-piece canoes, there was a long dugout keel part, two sides added to that, and two end pieces, all carved out of large pieces of wood. Gulbrandsen duplicated the general plan of those old fashioned canoes using modern materials, like plywood or dimensional lumber. His ideas are well worth perusing. He has many interesting solutions to the crossbeam to ama connection. The rudder cassettes are simple. The rudder has it’s upper leading edge, where it normally would attach to a transom, cut away. The cut out fits back into the rudder, keeping it from shifting up and down, but it is designed to allow the rudder to pivot back. Two rudder cheeks are attached to this cut out piece to keep the rudder in line, and the cut out piece is attached to the gudgeons and pintles that would normally attach to the rudder. The rudder is held in with bungees. If you hit something, the rudder pops back, pivots up, and is unharmed, as well as the boat not suffering any damage. Great idea.
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This first photo is of the pattern drawn on heavy paper, snipped out, and outlined on 1/8“ birch stock. The pattern includes the leeboard and the inside part of the cassette.
