Foiler Moths at James Island Yacht Club

The U.S. International Moth guys wanted an East Coast Regatta series as a tune up for the upcoming Moth Worlds to be held in Hawaii in October.  James Island Yacht Club (near Charleston, South Carolina) is hosting a series of regattas on three dates (11-13 Jan; 15-17 Feb; 12-14 April) to contest the North American Championship.  The Youtube video shows some of the action from the January racing.  This video, although blurry in spots, captures the speed of hydrofoiling Moths better than most which I've seen and also demonstrates the difference in speed between foil borne boats and those that have dropped down to "low rider" mode.  A good example of this differential can be observed at about the 1:00 minute mark as the leaders go around the first mark.  The boat in second place drops off her foils during the mark rounding and is immediately gobbled up by the next two boats which stay up on their foils during the maneuver.  Towards the end, there appears to be a little argie-bargie between two boats at about the 2:40 mark in the video!  Enjoy.

2013 RYA Dinghy Show

A sea of interesting racing dinghies and not a big tub in sight.  This year's RYA Dinghy Show will be held on the 2-3 March at Alexandra Place, London.  Some year I'm going to save up my pennies and jet over to experience this.  There is nothing in this country that remotely compares.  More info here.

John Z's new Moth--Building the mast tube

Picking up from the last post, here we see that John has installed some of the permanent bulkheads and support framing for the stern deck.

This post documents the construction of the mast tube for the semi-free standing rig which John plans to use in this boat.  Here, he is using a piece of conduit slightly larger in diameter than the mast as a form for the tube.  He first wrapped the conduit with wax paper and plastic sheeting to prevent the carbon cloth from bonding to the conduit and then scotch taped the end of the dry cloth to the plastic film before wetting out the cloth.

Next, he rolls the carbon cloth, plus a piece of peel ply tightly around the pipe. John lets the epoxy resin kick off without the benefit of a vacuum bag.  Experience has taught him that the vacuum bag tends to leave nasty longitudinal wrinkles which detract from the strength of the finished tube.

After the epoxy resin has cured, John removed the tube from the conduit form and sliced it in half lengthwise.  The reason for this is that John wants to be able to change the rake of the mast.  The oval spacer will permit the required range of fore and aft movement at the deck partner.  The mast will rotate in the tube and rake will be controlled via block and tackle connected to the bow stay of the semi-free standing (no side shrouds) rig.

The keel end of the mast tube is replaced over the piece of conduit while the wood spacer controls the shape of the tube at the top end.  The mast tube was made larger than required to allow the wood spacer to be cut off with the excess after the side walls have been added.

With one side wall finished, John removes the peel ply and repeats the process on the remaining side to complete the rough tube.

The finished mast tube before trimming to the required height.

The temporary bulkhead called for in the Mistral plans must be removed so that the mast tube can be properly located.  Here John takes off the bevels to fit a temporary brace which will prevent the bow of the hull from twisting after the bulkhead has been removed.

Bevels also must be captured so that the keel support for the bottom of the mast tube can be fabricated.

The mast tube trial fitted in the boat.  Yes, it is a bit crooked due to the bottom of the tube being rough.  Trimming carbon fiber is very hard on saw blades.  John recommends using a diamond cutting wheel on a dremel tool instead.  He uses a wheel from this source:  http://www.widgetsupply.com/product/D-HM04.html?gclid=CJ6ikqqOnbUCFQ2i4AodYR8AcQ

Another look at the hull with the newly fabricated mast tube temporarily in place.

Bill Schill--Over the bar.

William (Bill) N. Schill, Jr. posing by his first Moth, Win-Bag, Nr 941 in the year 1958.   Win-Bag was a Ventnor design Moth very much like Elizabeth which I've introduced in last week's posts.  Five years after this photograph was taken Bill was International Moth Class Association World Champion.  For the past year Bill struggled with cancer.  This past Wednesday, I attended his funeral.  He was a year and a half older than myself.  Photo credit: David Schill.

I first met Bill in the early 1960s when he was campaigning this Fletcher-Cates Moth, Nr 2081.  The name of this boat escapes for the moment, but that's not important.  What this photo captures is Bill and his father in the process of cutting back the decks of the boat in order to make her lighter and also to convert her from a deck stepped mast to a keel stepped mast.  These experiments paved the way to Bill's championship winning Moth Pegasus, Nr 2345. Photo credit: David Schill.

As Bill's racing skills improved he caught the attention of both sail maker Bob Seidelmann and boat builder Blair Fletcher.  This advertisement featuring Bill sailing Moth Nr 2081 (a Fletcher-Cates) is from the 1963 issue of Moth Doings, the old class yearbook.

Bill flanked by his parents after winning the Moth Worlds in 1963.  This regatta was held at Larchmont Yacht Club which is located just north of New York City.  Photo credit: David Schill.

From deep within your diarist's archives:  Winning the Moth Worlds was a big deal in those days.  Big enough that a few years later Yachting Magazine used this photograph of Bill sailing Pegasus as the frontispiece for the May, 1967 issue.  I believe I'm correct in saying that this is the only time a Moth Boat has been featured on the cover of Yachting.

This is how that cover shot was taken:  notice the man standing chest-deep in the water on the right side of this picture.  That's Bill Schill, Sr.  The elder Schill was a professional photographer and he stood in the water in front of Avalon Yacht Club while Bill Jr. made passes at close range in Pegasus.  One mistake and dad plus a very expensive camera would have taken a full immersion bath!  1963 was the high water mark in Bill's career as a Moth racer.  The following year the Moth Worlds were held in France.  Bill took Pegasus over to defend his title.  He used the British Moth Nationals as a warm up event and came in third at that regatta but at the Worlds, held at Bandol, Bill finished well off the podium.  In following years Bill moved from Moths to Comets and then International 110s and enjoyed further successes in those classes.  More recently Bill returned to Moth Boats and last raced at the 2011 CMBA Nationals at Elizabeth City.  Rest in peace old friend.  Photo credit.: David Schill

Elizabeth, initial survey part II

Let's step the mast.  Like most vintage era Moths, the Ventnor has a hollow mast with an internal halyard.  The heel of the mast has a "clothespin" notch which slips over a similar one in the keelson.

The standing rigging is a simple three stay configuration.  The bow stay has retained its Ventnor Boat Works-made pelican hook.  The hook has a home made "keeper" made from a copper hog ring.  The original keeper was made from copper tubing.  Both side shrouds have lost their pelican hooks.  Someone replaced them with screen door quality turnbuckles.  The turnbuckles were missing their bottom eyes.  Fortunately those eyes are the ones with right-hand threads and so I was able to come up with enough bits and pieces to kluge the rig together for the purpose of rigging the boat in my front lawn.

The stay wire is rusty, brittle 1/4" galvanized wire that is full of "meat hooks" and has long since lost its zinc coating.  I'll replace them with 1 x 19, 3/32" stainless steel braid.  Hopefully I'll be able to source a proper sized threaded eye to replace the swagged terminal.  I have a couple of period correct pelican hooks in my hardware collection for the side stays.

At the other end of the mast, the hounds are a scant 21" from the tip!  I wonder how much this mast will bend?  The mast on Bill Boyle's Ventnor has the hounds set at 28" from the tip.  Another difference between supposedly "production" boats.

Before stepping the mast, the tail of the halyard must first be fed through the deck partner.  Note the nice "streamlined" boss that protects the deck at the partner.

How does one retrieve the tail of the halyard from the far reaches under the bow deck?  Why with a "Higgins Stick" of course!

A Higgins Stick is nothing more than a coffee cup holder screwed into a piece of dowel.  Chuck Higgins, a member of the founding generation of Moth Boaters showed me this little trick before he passed away.

The mast stepped.

The sail up for perhaps the first time in many years.  Not a bad looking sail considering it's Egyptian cotton and is as old, if not older, than I am.  Two of the sewn-in battens are broken and will need replacing.  This boat was probably purchased with day sailing in mind and was probably never raced since the sail doesn't have the Circle-M class insignia.  Boats of this era often did not have numbers on the sails.  The identifying numbers were instead painted on the bow deck.

Merv Wescoat's sister worked in the sail loft at VBW.  I wonder if she stitched together this sail?

Rigged up; port side view.

Rigged up; starboard bow.

Rigged up; stern view.

I think that handy, but heavy bronze Herreshoff bow cleat will have to go.

The trigger on that little bronze hook has a bad case of arthritis.

I'll let it "rest" for a few weeks in this penetrating oil bath and see if it loosens up.

 With cold weather closing in I'll probably work on getting that red rudder to fit and then wait for spring.  Hopefully I'll get this boat back on the race course this summer.  In the meantime, I've been supplied with contact information for an elderly previous owner and hope to learn some of the boat's history.  I've been told that the boat was named after his first wife.

Elizabeth, an initial survey.

OK, in my last post I teased you with just a look at the damaged boom from my latest acquisition.  Yesterday provided a rare warm day in January so it's time for a full reveal.  Just what's under the tarps?

A lovely Ventnor Moth ripe for restoration.

Meet Elizabeth. 

As I mentioned in the last post, some of the deck seams have opened up since I last saw this little boat a year and a half ago.

Most of the cracks and open seams appear to be in the forward portion of the deck.

However, there is this somewhat worrisome crack which extends from the starboard chain plate all the way to the bow block.  The rig feeds a lot of the load from the sail through the shroud chain plates and then throughout the hull, so a solid repair will be required.  Probably the deck will have to be removed to accomplish this.

The dagger board trunk also has a dodgy looking fiberglass repair.  The trunk will need to come out and either a new one fabricated or if possible, the original one carefully pulled apart and reassembled.

The port side of the trunk has a wooden jam cleat for the halyard.

The floor boards are a collection of original (darker wood) and replacements.

Zooming in on the center floor board.  Splits starting at a fastener hole are a common failure mode.  Note, more dodgy looking glass on top of the keel.

I poked the camera up under the bow deck for a look-see.  Cobwebs and probably part of a rat's nest first catch the eye.  Otherwise the framing and bottom ply panels look to be in good condition.  The line coming down and through the cheek block, mounted on the keelson, is for the downhaul.  Note the notch in the keelson just ahead of the cheek block.  That is the mast step.  The heel of the mast has a matching "clothes pin" shape that matches the cut out in the keelson.

Looking under the stern deck we see more cobwebs, the fasteners for the rudder bracket and one end of the traveler rod.

The dagger board is the familiar and correct Ventnor Boat Works shape.

One of the always interesting mysteries encountered when taking over a used boat is trying to figure out the purpose of odd bits of gear which convey with the boat.  I have no idea how a previous sailor of this boat used this bit of poly line with the two swivel hooks.

Ditto this bit of clothes line with a small bronze snap hook.  It's too short and too fat to be the line used to attach the foot of the sail to the boom.  The hook has a bad case of arthritis but I'll keep it anyway.

In the days before Harken and Ronstan, the best boating hardware came from the hardware store.  This "shackle" attaching the block to the traveler rod must have been sourced from the Tractor Supply Co.

But it's not all bad news in the hardware dept.  This bow chain plate is an original VBW piece.

As are the shroud chain plates,

the rudder bracket

and the traveler rod.  At some point the traveler rod got bend.  Hopefully I can cold set the rod back to more or less vertical.

However, this rudder/tiller/hiking stick are clearly home made items.  One wonders what happened to the original VBW "barndoor" rudder with its distinctive "wishbone" tiller?

Fortunately, your diarist never throws anything away.  This is an original Ventnor barn door rudder with wishbone tiller.  This was from Moth Nr 764, one of the two Ventnor Moths which I raced in the late 1950s.  Nr 764 was heavily damaged in a port/starboard incident and in those days a Ventnor Moth wasn't a collector's item, just a worn out race boat.  I stripped the hardware from the hull, sold off what I could and salted the rest away for future use.  Apparently the "future" is now.

Let's see if she fits.  The blade made it under the traveler rod, so far so good...

The top pintle fits the bracket giving the tiller the required clearance between the stern deck and the traveler,

but the lower pintle is about 1/4" too high for this bracket.  VBW must have changed their rudder bracket design at some point during production of these boats.  I have two choices; either lower the pintle or root around in my junque hardware dept. and see if I still have the rudder bracket that matches this rudder.  Maybe yes, maybe no. 
We'll see...

Originally, the main sheet was lead down from the boom to a block on the tiller, back up to the boom, down to the traveler and then to the hands of the skipper.  A common modification in the '50s was to remove the block from the rudder and mount it mid-way up the boom so that the skipper turned forward during tacks and gybes, the "modern" way rather than facing aft (and turning one's back on one's competitors) during maneuvers.  I may do that on this boat as well.

Another racer mod back in the day was to add short hiking sticks to each arm of the wishbone.  I will certainly do that.  In the next post, I'll rig the boat and hoist the sail--probably for the first time in many years.