been doin' some thinking the past few days: Sheet-to-Tiller Self Steering:
Added a brass knob to the top of the tiller for the sheet-to-tiller rig. After sailing with it for the weekend, I've decided that the cam cleat idea is a keeper, but that they need to be no further aft than I can easily reach while sitting at the front of the cockpit. I'm envisioning adding a wood bulge to the tiller to make room for mounting them. If it's sculpted right it might not look too bad. Instead of one cleat on each side of the tiller, both on top so that both lines can be adjusted without having to go to the other side to see what's going on. I'm finding that I use the S-T about half the time I'm sailing. If I make it REALLY easy to rig then I'll probably use it more, at least until a windvane gets operational, in which case I might use it instead. One thing I learned: a sheet bend works well for connecting light line to surgical tubing. ************** Battery location: I've noticed BuscaBrisas frequently has a slight list to port due to unbalanced loading with the engine and battery on the portside along with the galley storage on the portside. On the vacation I packed my canned goods in the starboard q'berth which helped, but the following idea occured to me: what if the battery were mounted to stbd instead? Not sure if it would fit outboard of the pot or not, but that would surely balance the boat and open up the aft port side of the vee-berth for storing other lighter things. The distance to the panel wouldn't be all that much different... Tod _______________________________________________ http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/montgomery_boats
