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 [...]

No Fuel like Old Fuel

23 September 2020 | Crisfield, MD
Cap'n Andy | Perfect Weather
I was clearing out the cabin to resume work on the Atomic Four engine. I partially filled the two water tanks and turned on the water pump and began flushing the antifreeze used to winterize when I noticed water soaking the carpet. We had a leak in the water system.
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We also had a prolonged rain forecast. I stayed on board putting pots and pans under the drips from the cabin windows which continue to leak. Although I solved most of the original leaks, new ones developed. The window repair procedure is such a pain I decided not to try to repair the original windows, but do the Euro style windows, externally mounted with screws and Dow Corning 795 glazing adhesive. I found an alternative way of mounting them using 3M Very High Bonding tape, VHB tape. It is expensive, but I found a surplus dealer who had a roll of the tape at a discount. I ordered plexiglass samples of the 4 available shades of tinted plexiglass.
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I remounted the alternator on the Atomic Four. I removed the carburettor and disassembled it following the guidance of the Moyer Marine Atomic Four engine manual. When I got to the part where the intermediate fuel jet is removed, the manual said the correct screwdriver must be used or risk damaging the jet. When I found the correct screwdriver I found the jet had already been damaged and could not be removed. The manual said not to remove it if there was a chance of damaging it. OK. I also found a passage plug seized in the carburettor body, so I did not fool with it. I sprayed the carb’s jets and passages with carb cleaner.
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My plexiglass samples came in as well as a pair of winch handles and the VHB tape. I decided to use the #2074 Dark Gray plexiglass. The alternative was a lighter shade of gray or two shades of bronze. The bronze made everything seen through it look reddish.
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We had another ceiling sheetrock weekend and had sanded and applied 2nd and 3rd coats of compound. We will probably paint the ceiling next time. The room was masked off of the rest of the house due to the amount of sanding dust we created.
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I remeasured my existing cabin windows and calculated the size plexiglass sheets I would need. Unfortunately the stock sizes the vendor had on his eBay store didn’t correlate with what I calculated. I emailed him about alternate sizes. My guess is that he cuts the standard size sheets with a CNC machine to make his stock pieces and he has no waste, but his pieces are very odd sizes. For instance, the dimension 31.88 inches comes up a lot.
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I removed the big fuel filter/water separator and found the element was damaged. I ordered a replacement on eBay for about $15. The liquid in the bottom of the filter body wouldn’t drain because the plug wouldn’t unscrew out the bottom. It was frozen in there, so I used my handy Harbor Freight pump/siphon to pump out the liquid into a clear container (bottom half of a water bottle). It looked like muddy water and I wasn’t sure if it was fuel or not. I sent it through the Baja filter funnel and it went through leaving residue. Ever since I started working on the carburettor, the sediment bowl on the fuel pump, and the filter/water separator I noticed a stale gasoline odor. I was accumulating a lot of bad gas. I wondered what was the condition of what was in the fuel tank.
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I had a 3 gallon plastic fuel tank, complete with pick up tube and barbed fitting, that Doc of Doc’s Chop Shop had given me. There was remnant hose on the barb and debris in the tank. I removed the remnant and cleaned up the pick up tube and barb and flushed out the tank. I found the ship’s fuel tank under the quarter berth and saw its hose could easily fit on the plastic tank’s barb. Since I had been running Kaimu for a while on a 3.3 gallon day tank, why not use a plastic tank on the Atomic Four for now. My plan was to pump over what was in the main fuel tank and dispose of it, once I find out where to dispose of bad gasoline.
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When I asked at the marina office where to dispose of old gasoline they shrugged their shoulders and said maybe I should call Dept. of Natural Resources. I didn’t have to call, they have a website. After much searching and reading of various environmental laws I found the recommended practice was to mix bad gas with good gas and use it in your motor. An alternative is to bring it to your local community hazardous waste disposal site on community hazardous waste disposal day. Somerset county has no such program, although most Maryland counties do.
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I now had up to 25 gallons of old fuel. It will take a long time to mix it with good gas, bit by bit, and burn it up. If the motor even runs.
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The photo is from the recent Labor Day fireworks at Crisfield, not the Atomic Four exploding.
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