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 [...]

Christmas Spirits

19 December 2017 | st marys, ga
Capn Andy/chilly winter
In the days coming up on Christmas I remembered a song by Joni Mitchell and I found it on you tube:
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River
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by Joni Mitchell
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It's coming on Christmas
They're cutting down trees
They're putting up reindeer
And singing songs of joy and peace
Oh I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
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It reminded me of when I could skate along on any of the frozen waters near my home, it was a freedom that only comes in the right conditions, no snow, hard freeze, and the endless nights of the North, clear and a million stars.
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But we have a different thing down here in the North River Marsh. The huge Christmas tree was fork lifted into the yard and the organized tree decorating thing never happened. We had a pot luck dinner which was supposed to be about decorating the Christmas tree, but the tree was still bare, a lonely string of lights pasted up on it and trailing away on the ground. Nothing else.
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This inactivity is in a boatyard where there is plenty of activity, boats are going into the water. The winter season is when boaters down here get their boats into the water and go to the Bahamas or the Keys. There are a few from up North who come down and plop their boats in the water and go away It is too cold here now to hang around, but up North it is imperative to get away from the arctic and get down to the South. They don’t hang around here.
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We had a couple of mornings already with frost on the deck. The daytime temperatures are ideal for hard work. 60‘s and even 70‘s. I can’t say that I have embraced these conditions and forged ahead on my bottom grinding job. I found that coarse grit flap discs did the most efficient job of cleaning off the old bottom paint. Most boat yards won’t allow them, though, there is no containment of the debris. They require sanding machines with vacuum attachments. Here I am using large tarpaulins around my work space and the debris accumulates there. I then either vacuum up the debris or work it to the edge of the tarp and then it goes into the dumpster.
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Debris from our boatyard is like rich ore from a mine. Lots of minerals, metals, and it goes off to China where it is smelted.
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I’ve been grinding, but not like the young yardbirds who work all day, with a well deserved lunch hour, I get into it after lunch, which for me is breakfast, and work 2 to 3 hours. Sorry, I give up after just a short time. I knew it would be like this, I have a large store of Ibuprofen. We are now 2/3 of the way done with both hulls. I am waiting on more abrasives.
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I found that 40 grit flap discs from Harbor Freight worked very well in removing the old lead paint. After about 5 minutes the abrasive lost its edge and we had to limit how long it ground on the paint. The surface would heat up under the disc and then the paint would liquefy and condense on the abrasive. Then it would no longer bite on the surface. In the long run, the HF discs lasted longer than the blue zirconium discs from DeWalt. The DeWalt discs were flat on the surface though, and they would remove an amazing amount of paint for the first few minutes. You had to move them around quickly. If you were paying for the time to do the job, then the DeWalt flap discs would pay for themselves quickly. After a while they too lose their bite.
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The photo is of the boatyard Christmas tree, still undecorated, but someone put a little angel at the top.
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