Repairing Rot in the Bowsprit & Snugging Up a Loose Rig
A calm morning in Marion Harbor makes for the perfect day to deal with the rot I found in Arabella’s bowsprit while we were back in Miami. What I thought was just a small spot of rot turned out to be a bit bigger than I had imagined—an indication that this rot was probably built into the bowsprit during construction. After all, when we selected which spruce stock to use for the main mast, the booms, the gaffs, and the bowsprit, the best quality wood was used for the mast, and the lowest quality wood was used for the bowsprit. There must have been a small rotten spot that we didn’t notice in the spruce we used for the bowsprit.
Fortunately, the bowsprit is a laminate, which means the glue lines act as rot stops. This undoubtedly prevented the rot from spreading into the boards above and below it.
I couldn’t get to the spruce in our storage container back in Granby, but I could get to a piece of hundred-year-old Douglas fir from Victoria’s main mast, which I’m completely comfortable gluing into the bowsprit. With the graving piece in place—glued in with TotalBoat Thixo Flex—I got to work with my hand planer. It’s not easy to hand plane while standing in a dinghy, but I eventually got the job done.
While waiting for the weather to cooperate with the rest of the bowsprit work, I decided to tackle another boat project: tightening the rig. When we launched, we used a fairly elastic dyneema for the deadeye lacings. This unfortunately didn’t keep our rig very tight, and we keep having to snug up, and snug up, and snug up loose stays. Now, I’m planning on switching out our deadeye lacings for new lacings made from heat-set dyneema, which has 1% stretch compared to 4% in our original dyneema. I’ll also be able to splice the heat-set dyneema, which I wasn’t able to do with our last deadeye lacings.
I start by installing the lacings on each stay. Then the fun part: splicing and snugging it all up. If you’ve ever wondered how to splice dyneema, there are plenty of resources online—including this video—to walk you through the process. You just need a splicing tool and a little bit of patience.
Tightening up the rig opens the door for us to get our new light wind sail installed. The sail—which is similar to a Code Zero—is much larger than our jib, and will allow us to make way when the winds are less than 10 kts. Along with a new sail comes new lines, so off to Rigging Only we go. Dan has been hooking us up with quality line for years, and we fully trust his recommendations.
But back to the bowsprit for a few more fixes…it’s time to install oak cheeks to reduce crushing the soft spruce under the washers. While I was back in Granby, I grabbed a hole saw to help with this part of the project. Tune in next week to see the finished bowsprit, and the rest of the work we got done in preparation for our sail up to Nova Scotia.
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Acorn to Arabella started as a wooden boat building project in Granby, Massachusetts. Steve began the journey as an amateur wooden boat builder crafting a 38' wooden sailboat in his backyard: designer William Atkin's Ingrid with a Stormy Petrel's gaff rig. These videos follow the journey from tree felling, to lumber milling, to lofting, to the lead keel pour and now sailing the boat—sharing details of the woodworking, carpentry, metal smithing, tool building, and tool maintenance that traditional wooden boats command. This ultimate DIY project continues beyond the boat shop, as Steve and crew travel and learn to cruise aboard the handmade wooden boat that they've built. Just kidding about all that, this channel is about a Siberian Laika named Akiva.
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Acorn To Arabella
Steve Denette: The 5th-generation farmer who built the 38ft wooden ketch Arabella from the stumps of his family farm, now pioneering big-wall climbing in Newfoundland.
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