It is difficult to draw a line under the work on a boat build, and say that it is finished. As you use the boat you discover that there are perhaps better ways to do things, or that there are extra features and changes that would make the boat easier to use, or more fit for purpose. So is the case with Pitthirrit. I've made a few changes, and have a couple more in mind. I've taken my time, and used Pitthirrit for a while now, and while I am still very happy with the way she turned out, there have been some changes to make.
Click on each image to see a larger version of it, and some details about the photo.
I've added a tiller clutch, to allow for easier solo sailing. I am a little dubious about this, as if I did go over the side, and the boat righted itself, it is possible that the locked tiller would let the boat sail off while I floated about in the water twiddling my thumbs. A 5mm cord runs from one side of the boat to the other, and is looped through a fairlead on the underside of the tiller. A clip tied to a 7mm shock cord connects to the line once it has passed thrugh the fairlead. The shock cord can be pulled tight and secured in a cleat. The tighter it is pulled, the more force is required to move the tiller. This has allowed me to move about in the boat without the weight shift making a big difference to the trim and directional stability that would be otherwise caused by the untended tiller. Yes, the ketch rig does allow for great balance, and the boat can be made to keep tracking in a straight line without touching the tiller, but if I move to the bow then this doesn't work anywhere near as well as when I remain seated towards the stern of the boat.
I've added sail tracks to the masts, and Peter Green (https://www.petergreensails.com/) has replaced the sleeves on the sails with slugs that slide in the KT1 tracks I bought from Spar Crafters (https://www.sparcrafters.com.au). This is a track that has a hollow section for slugs (or boltrope) to slide up and down inside, rather than cars sliding up and down the outside of the track. The track lengths were 6.5M, which I thought I would be able to fit inside my van, but they were too rigid to flex enough to fit. This meant having to cut them in half and then carefully align them when butting the sections up to one another on the mast.
I’ve drilled holes every 200mm, taking several passes to get up to a size that will accommodate the 316 stainless 10G x 1” PAN Phillips-head screws. I got these screws from Cost Less Bolts (https://costlessbolts.com.au/). These were about 1/3 of the cost that a chandlers wanted for them. I finished off each hole with a slight counter-sinking, to ream out the coarse edges. Tefgel (https://www.tefgel.com.au) was squeezed into each of the holes drilled into the aluminium tracks, to help prevent corrosion between the tracks and stainless steel screws.
I made some 300mm wooden tapers that fit under the track to allow my existing loops for securing the snotters to fit under the tracks. This means that the sails can freely slide up and down the track without having to remove the snotters, making reefing much simpler. Creating the space to hold the track away from the loops meant that the tracks didn't crush the webbing. S hooks fit into small gaps left in the sewing of the webbing loop. The webbing goes around the mast three times, and the S hooks are pulling against two thicknesses.
A wooden plug fits into the top of each track, and is screwed through the track to the mast, to prevent the sails from being hoisted up past the top of the track. Metal slugs with a machine screw and knurled nut fits into the bottom of the tracks, locking into place and preventing the sails from dropping out at the bottom of the track when lowering the sails for reefing. To secure these slugs, I've added plastic strips that are screwed to the tracks and fit onto the screw between the slug and the nut. This way, I can remove them from the tracks, to pack away the sails, and not loose them in the bottom of the boat.
Apart from the uphaul block for the sail at the top of each mast, I added one for a topping lift on each boom, and another for a halyard that can be used for hoisting burgees or an all-round white navigation light. The topping lifts hold the booms up when the sails are dropped, either completely or while reefing, and have been a great addition. It also makes setting up easier, as the sails can be unfurled from around the mast (which is where I usually leave them if not trailing the boat great distances), attached to the booms, and then dropped before launching the boat. Then it is just a matter of hoisting the sails and we're away.
In preparation for the Tawe Nunnugah 2025 raid (https://livingboattrust.org.au/tawe-nunnugah-2025/), I've bought a handheld Gamin GPS and mount, and have made a bracket that folds away under the center thwart when not needed. A block of timber slightly deeper than the base of the mount is fixed to the underside of the thwart, with a bolt running though it, to connect a length of pine that holds the base of the mount. A knurled nut provides tension to hold the bracket in place when it is stowed or in use.
