On this week's episode of Onboard Lifestyle we soak in a ton of information from one of the best respected Rigsmiths in the World. We review the five takeawa...

Closed Captions (CC):
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welcome back to ask me basic well last

week's episode I gotta meet a pretty

special guy his name was John he's

well respected and a very talented

rigger

he just happened to be coming through

our marina the same day that we were

here he was here less than a day and he

offered to come over to our boat just

put on all this gear fly up the rig and

inspect it it was so much information to

take in it was a pleasure to listen him

speak

so today I'm gonna go over some of his

findings and talk about the suggestions

he has for us on what we could do to

make our boat more efficient and safer

when the Terra 95 pulled into the field

dog we all took notice

I mean TL EMA and I wanted to see this

boat up close and personal so we headed

down to the field dog and John and his

crew were so gracious and inviting they

had us come right on over to give a

quick tour so while we were touring this

beautiful boat

John had casually mentioned if he had

time that he would come over and check

us out never in our wildest dreams did

we actually believe he was going to do

it because really his time is really

precious they were only in for a few

hours and you know he's busy he has a

big journey ahead of him so we headed

back to basic and worked on our own

projects cuz you know I mean it was a

nice day and after about an hour and a

half we looked up and there is John and

Eric at the end of the dock heading

towards us and it's a long dock and it

felt like a scene out of a movie you

know when everything kind of slows down

and you can almost hear the music kind

of like in Top Gun one of my favorite

movies where the fighter pilots are

walking towards you in all their gear it

was just awesome okay the first thing

John did was through on his gear and

went to the top of the mast

we had winch him up well actually there

wasn't much winching to do he climbed up

for the most part by himself it was

amazing how fast he scrambles up a mast

he's done this a time or two

what I noticed was that he was not only

looking at the rig but he was feeling

the rig and that was the impressive part

to me he would get to a position on the

mast and he went from the top down and

he would grab a stay or a shroud and

just shake it and shake the rig

violently to see how the tube reacted

and he could tell by that what needed to

be adjusted or added or subtracted from

the rig it was quite an interesting

scene and the noise that came out of

this when hit when he would start

violently shaking the rig was

intimidating oh my goodness the noise

was so loud like compass and I were in

the salon and it felt like the mast was

just gonna fall right through the

ceiling once John was on board he was

ready to go right up the masts and the

last thing that we wanted to do was to

pick up the camera and film it because

here is a man of expertise willing to

donate his time and knowledge to inspect

our rig so you know it just felt

disrespectful to do that to him and it

wasn't until about an hour into his

inspection that we asked him if we could

film some of it and he said yes

[Music]

after John left I immediately went to my

tablet and took as many notes as I could

I reviewed some of the footage and

wanted to make sure I retained as much

that information as possible

he threw a ton of stuff our way and I

wanted to heed his advice there was

about well actually it was five big

takeaways I got from our meeting and

I'll go over those five items right now

I guess the first thing he mentioned and

we knew this we've been putting it off

and it hurt a little to hear but we knew

it had to happen

replace the boom you know he didn't go

into much detail about the boom but

looking at it he could tell it was

terribly undersized even though this

boom is 27 years old it is the original

boom from the boat and it's lasted this

long

and it's time for it to retire so he did

give us some insight and some contact

information for spar manufacturers that

he trusts and that he respects

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makes my sparse he was a bunch manager

and so we'll be approaching those in the

next week or so and get some quotes to

see what its gonna take to replace this

what's it costed if I 100 percent start

over item 2 on the list was our running

back stays and you know he had some

great information for us on how to

modify these to get these so they're

gonna be running more efficiently and

putting the right pressure on the mass

to get better performance out of our

sale plan it's a cold formed ok pressed

they're strong but and it's been in

fresh water and it's a lightly loaded

thing so it's not gonna break right away

but when you change that I would just

make this would all be spectra right

back running backs don't need to be

wired they just to up sales okay

so it'd be nice if we just covered

synthetic no I great and then then you

would just have a just come down to an

eye splice right with a thimble and then

get your new blocks on yeah and then

with fresh rope it'll work much night oh

for sure the next thing we really talked

about was eliminating these they're in

the way

they seemed to have no function in his

opinion we slacked them as much as we

can and his ingestion was to get the

main up and run with these in the slack

position and see how the mass performs

see how it breathes and if we could live

without them to actually put check stays

at the second spreader that will tie

back into our runners back here yeah

that's that's an easy improvement and

then if you thought you needed these

again I just make them check stays right

off I'd like that betters

I like that idea yeah just if I'm if I'm

replacing this might as well check to

that position yeah and then the way to

do that again is that just bring them

both to a delta plate and then just

fine-tune the length of this one just

with spectra lashing right that way it's

all software right and you can even make

that delta plate out of UHMW or

something that so there's no metal of

death you know something right so you're

you don't if you forget to ease your

runner so you don't chew up your sails

on it right right or if you just don't

have time to do it right you know I

talked to John about synthetic versus

wire for us and which direction we

should go and he was not real excited

about going all synthetic with us there

is a place for it there would be there

is a few areas that synthetic works on

our boat any likes the idea of synthetic

if it's near a place a sail rubs on a

state or a shroud in the case of our our

runners back here synthetic is a way to

go because it does get close or may rub

on our main along with those checks days

so the idea was to have the checks days

and this runner here all synthetic run

down to a new block D didn't lead down

and over to a big winch right here that

way we could put the appropriate

pressure on that check stay and running

half days it's a neat idea I love it and

you know I had an idea of putting a

winch here regardless and that's why I

put this big radius on the deck and then

a lot of people and they're really

dependent on the runners they get away

from the block and tackle to a jammer

they'll just take it to its own winch

that way you can really fix a link

that's hard to really get much of a

reliable consistent strain with tackle

but it's all this boat needs right well

I do want to put two other winches here

and I could certainly run lay that would

be so sweet yeah like right there right

here a dream so you're watering your

check stay would come to their own winch

in right with those checks days

installed what we'd really need in his

opinion is an interstate and that would

run from the middle spreader up here

down to in this position here and he

says putting a high field lever to make

it a removable stay would be the way to

go after all we do have a working jib so

this stay would only be used when we run

long tacks

and what it'll do is create that bow in

the center of the mask

that'll give that right shape to the

mass to make our main perform better

guaranteed an interstate like a sincere

interstate and then you'll you'll sail

with a lot more peace of mind for sure

and that's synthetic as well you're

saying why not you're not gonna Hank a

sale on it right and and it's not a

tease and how do you split tension on

that just a block and tackle at the

bottom how do you tension it sure sure

or a high field lever right if you have

fixed link yes dude yeah cuz blocking

tackles sometimes it's hard to get

enough tension on it like right if you

really want to constrain the behavior of

the mast it'd be great if you if it was

like when you threw the lever up right

was the length right that put the

positive pretty bend in the tube right

and that was the end of the conversation

and what's that gonna do for the head

cell is it gonna slack that no the head

stays controlled by the backstage okay

so you're just gonna take the middle

section the middle panel of the mast and

give it a positive prebend the way they

like to be and then what what'll happen

then is is that when you're when you're

sailing deep briefed and powered up your

leech won't be dragging the center of

the mass back right I bet you when

you're sailed this sailing this reef

that mass gets deeply inverted right

another thing is is if you have an

interstate to pause a positive prebend

then when you put the runners on you're

actually going to control the top at the

masthead better because right now when

you pull those back the whole mass the

mass would love do it continue inverting

into a buckle this way right it's nature

of a column right right so when you

tighten these you're actually putting

more negative inversion into them just

due to plain old compression

right you're like it's like a bow yeah

so but if you have an interstate that

that check that negative movement when

you loaded the runners who would

actually let it would bring the

mast-head back so that would help push

the midsection forward to some extent

especially the heavy load on the main

cantilever it you know to some extent it

would deep our domain another thing we

talked about was really exciting to me

and it was adding a light wind sail

adding a pull off of our bow and running

a screecher or code zero and leading it

aft that to me is what we really need

you know our jib here our new ninety

percent jib it's a great sale but it's

not gonna do it in ultra light winds

that's where that screecher

or code zero is gonna come in handy

because I want to put tracks here with

other jammer I want to put a code zero

on here the office creature and it'll

run off that and then actually blocked

over these positions let's get started

there's sign up she's over there - so

the big takeaway from this whole meeting

was we knew we needed to you know

obviously modify this rig it's an older

rig

but some of the things he said was

encouraging I think he really got a kick

out of flying up her mast and looking

how this boat has been put together you

know this isn't the original mass that

was on our boat and to make this mass

work the rigger had to get creative and

John could appreciate that some of the

things he thought were innovative some

things he got a kick out of some things

he flat out giggled at so it was a good

time it was insightful and you know

we're gonna take his advice on

everything he said because these are

items that we knew were issues items

that we knew we had to take care of and

it felt good to have somebody like John

come on board and just confirm our

original thoughts

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so our next step is now tail is going

through and looking at everything that

we need and I'm talking making a list of

all the parts evaluating the condition

that what we have currently is in and

just taking stock of what we need in

order to get this all together it's a

lot to take in and you don't really

realize how much you have to have in

order for one thing to pull together

it's not just like buying a boom and

just slapping it on and calling it a day

there's a lot more to it than that one

steel gets the list down then I come in

and do my work I absolutely love doing

the research and resourcing trying to

source out where we're gonna get these

items you know it's some of these things

you can buy at the marine store

ready-made but there are other things

that it's gonna take a little time

you're gonna have to have that special

customized and made for you so you know

we have to figure all that out whilst we

get all the pricing down then we have to

set our budget yes we set budgets for

ourselves anybody that says that they

don't have a budget

you're lying I mean we're all human and

this is going to be a huge and

kind of spendy project so we budget for

everything that we do once that budget

is set then we break down all of our

projects what we need and can do right

now some of these items will take time

to place the order and and just figure

out when it's going to be coming in you

know the boom is not ready-made these

are made special for your vote and it's

designed for your boat so that can take

up to four weeks we don't know so it's

it's a lot and then aside from that you

know now that spring and summer is near

and the weather is getting better we're

going to be on the move anytime that

there's a nice weather window we're

gonna be taking the opportunity to sail

down the coast which means logistics

wise we have to plan where our orders

are going to be coming in we're not

gonna order everything all at once and

just carry that on board so since we've

left Port Townsend I have been trying to

anticipate and plan all of Till's

projects so when we go into a port I

want to make sure that we have the parts

I want to make sure that it's been

ordered if it's something that takes a

little bit longer so imagine placing an

order and not having an actual address

so

that has been a struggle but it hasn't

been too bad my main I guess advice to

anyone that's doing this is get to know

the port and marina get to know the

personnel there they can be your best

friends

I have called ahead introducing

ourselves and letting them know that

we're gonna be there and maybe I'm going

to ship something over there to them

they usually keep it really safe for us

and it just gives us that much more of a

connection there's a lot to take in and

my brain already hurts

[Music]

so that was a productive day and I think

it's time for us to annoyed and what I

mean by unwinding is just having some

family time over a meal and just

relaxing just kind of taking it in of

what we've done it's a balancing act

when it got comes to boat projects and

family life because you know you gotta

have a little bit of both

so our biggest thing is after dinner and

you guys know that food is really

important to me is we sit back and play

a card game or we do a board game and

most recently with movies we watch a lot

of movies not only do I love movies I

love Messick gums and it's so funny

because since we've left Seattle there's

been really no TV for us so we've been

really creative in trying to find things

that we all are really interested in one

of the things is as we've got into ports

we've done a little research to find

movies that have been filmed in those

areas first in Port Townsend

there's the officer and gentleman we had

to watch that and then in Port Angeles

there was returned to Red October and

that was really interesting

then of course La Push we went and

watched or we watched at the Twilight

series so now that we're in Astoria

obviously there's been a lot of movies

I've been filmed in this area but did

you know that the Goonies house is just

right up the street from us so tonight

we're gonna be watching The Goonies and

having a meal

so if you watched our previous video

you'll understand that we are carnivores

actually we're omnivores but we are

right in the middle of Lent and is

Friday so we do not eat meat

tonight I'm going to be making crab mac

and cheese this is all the ingredients I

have on board already

it sounds decadent well it kind of is

but this is crabs @mn teal caught

locally and I have a freezer full of it

so why not indulge

let's eat you gonna say crap mac and

cheese let's eat that looks delicious

[Music]

now it's time for the movie

thanks for watching this week's episode

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patrons without them these videos would

not be possible you know it was perfect

timing for us to meet John at this stage

of our project and he gave us so much

valuable information to improve our rig

so come back next week to see how we

progress see you then