Just bought a 1982 Island Packet 26 MKI

[Seafarer]

Another friend stayed aboard Tuesday through Friday and I spent a few nights aboard with them as well. The previous "tenant" left food in the trash can, plus I had left some hard candies in wrappers that are apparently not ant proof, so there was a sugar ant invasion.

Still, we both enjoyed the time aboard, even just tied up at dock. After I've moved the boat to its mooring I will bug-bomb it. Until then I'm making sure nothing is left out.

Paid the $1,000 repair bill for the outboard on Saturday >:( Then had my wisdom teeth pulled today (Monday). It might take until the end of the week before I am ready to try to move the boat again. Plenty of time to clean things up and get it all organized. Planning on making a two-day trip of it, over-nighting at Egmont Key.

[Seafarer]

I don't really like marinas. Not for what are probably the most common reasons, like expense and noise, but because of the bugs. The friends who stayed aboard left some food out, and I came back to an ant invasion. I sprayed pesticide around quite a lot, and every time I return to the boat there is a variety of dead insects aboard- mostly large cockroaches and spiders, though I recently found an ant nest in the folded-up bimini. They climb aboard on the dock lines so the most obvious way to avoid them is not to be tied to land.

The IP is still in O'Neils Marina. That was probably for the best when T.S. Debby came through. All it lost was the jib and the solar-powered interior lighting (salt spray ruined the little panels that power them). The MSD Porta-Potty also broke about a month after I bought it, which prevented me from being able to tilt it without the contents spilling out. I just set it in the cockpit and let the contents evaporate... What a waste of money, I'll never buy a plastic POS head like that again.

My live-aboard Cal Cruising 35 didn't make it though. The 3/8 anchor chain snapped and the boat hit the Cortez Bridge. The mast and rig were simply too strong to break, so the boat heeled over until the waves swamped the cockpit and then sank the boat. I had to take out a loan to have it raised and hauled out at a nearby boatyard. I paid for a months dry storage while I pump out the collective mess of diesel, oil, seawater and mud. The boat is a total loss, so I'm stripping it of everything I think has value.

A lot of those parts might end up in the IP. The LAVAC head, for one, maybe the stove/oven if I can replace the non-stainless bits. I am also seriously considering replacing the cockpit in the IP with the cockpit from the Cal. My IPs cockpit is about the most retarded, uncomfortable, unattractive, and dangerous "design" I've ever seen. Bare in mind, this is a custom "design". A forward sloping sole to a pair of too-small drains that lead to through-hulls below the waterline, which are of course too clogged to drain. Side-mounted access panels under the seats that don't have any method of being secured in place. No bridge deck, of course. I love the design of the Cal's cockpit, though. Of course, it's considerably longer, but I don't think it is any wider, so I should be able to cut it down to size.

I am thinking about naming the boat "UNLUCKY" or maybe "STRANGE LUCK". It is hull #13, after all, and with me being the owner and the way things have been going, there is almost certainly an unfortunate end in its future :P I am planning to sail it to the Bradenton Beach anchorage during Labor Day weekend. No telling what sort of things might happen!

[Travelnik]

Sorry to hear about your 35!   :(
That sucks!

Hopefully you'll get everything worked out on the IP soon. Maybe you'll catch a break...you're overdue for one!

[Seafarer]

I didn't get the cockpit out of my big boat before it was crushed, but I did get a lot of other parts. I've determined that my IP doesn't sit on its lines, but instead floats bow-down. This is likely due to the lack of a diesel inboard. I may rectify that by installing a diesel or putting waste, water, and fuel tanks under the cockpit.

I'm split between tearing out and building a new cockpit or just selling this boat and finding something else....

[Oldrig]

I've determined that my IP doesn't sit on its lines, but instead floats bow-down.

You're right about the IP being designed to sit on its lines. The hull of these early IPs is based on the Cape Cod catboat. They're lovely boats for coastal and shallow-water cruising. Good luck with the boat--or its successor, if that's the way you choose to go.
--Joe

[Seafarer]

There is a complicated back-story that I will not get into the details of, but the resulting situation is this:

At this time it appears that an acquaintance of mine is going to live on the IP for a while. He has been living aboard and fixing up sailboats for longer than I've been alive, and is a very generous, honest, and resourceful person who has fallen on hard times due to no fault of his own. I told him that the boat was his to use as long as he kept it cleaned and maintained, and he was thrilled to have a private place of his own again. He is one of those people who loves to fix things up, and has all the knowledge and skill to do so. Suffice to say, the IP will be in good hands while he gets back on his feet and then either buys the boat from me or finds something more suitable to his long-term goals.

Between his random collection of boat parts and my room full of salvaged items, the IP should end up very well outfitted for coastal cruising.

[Seafarer]

Pressure-washed months of bird poop off the boat today and blasted the cock-pit drains free.

Pulled the remaining head-sail out of its bag and found that it is more of a stay-sail or storm-jib size. Other-wise in good condition! There is already a tang about 2/3 up the mast, and a pad-eye on the bowsprit in the proper location for it. I'll make a piece of rigging to fit, add a halyard block, and arrange everything so it can be easily removed or added. Everything, including the sail, will fit into its bag and be stored below when not in use.

I'll also measure the forestay and see about finding a sail to replace the one destroyed in T.S. Debby.

I might use the salvaged roller-furler from Starquest and put a genoa on it, but my friend who is preparing to stay aboard wants to put a high-cut yankee on the forestay and fly all three sails at once!

I'm rummaging through the salvaged deck hardware for blocks, tracks, and winches to handle the head sails, but trying to keep it as simple and uncluttered as possible. There are no side-decks to walk forward on. You must go up and over the cabin-top, which is currently very bare-foot friendly and I would like it to remain that way.

[Seafarer]

Scored a pair of Kyocera 85 watt solar panels (kc85t) for $340. Just need to get a cheap charge controller and build a transom mount for them like dinghy davits. If I had to do it again, I would probably have bought the 140 watt single panel from WindSun for $300. Slightly more dollar/watt but only one panel to deal with and a little cheaper.

We got a shore power cord long enough to reach the boat from about 3 slips down where the nearest free outlet was. This got the 110v outlets working so we added a lamp and a 1.7 cubic foot fridge/freezer. The existing cut-out for a small fridge was slightly too small, but it can be changed into a cabinet easily enough. Instead, the fridge was put into the stove cutout where it fit perfectly (but required cutting a few holes for the cord to pass through to an AC outlet). The counter insert that fits above the stove just cleared the fridge, and a counter-top propane stove that uses 1lb bottles will be set up there for now.

We also added some lighting. One always-on "nightlight" in the galley, a rechargeable flashlight that can also be set to turn on and off with a photo diode, and a lamp that we put a nice LED bulb into that sits on the dinette table. I'd never seen LED replacement bulbs before, but it seems really nice, especially considering everything came from Wal-Mart.

The V-Berth cushion covers were removed, laundered, and replaced. Now they are "only" a little scratchy instead of itchy from fiberglass like before. A fleece blanket covers them to keep the scratchiness away and a nice comforter and pillows complete the bed, which is huge. 3 people could sleep up there with the insert in place. Right now it's arranged for 1 or 2 to sleep crosswise (athwart ships?).

Pictures to come.

[Seafarer]

Current picture of the galley:



The blue bag on the left is being used as a hamper. I found it in the headsail bag (or at least the odd-shaped bag that had the staysail in it). If you look under the drawers you'll see an opening, which must have originally been intended for a dorm fridge slightly smaller than the ones they make these days. That will make a nice cabinet, but for now the trash can hides there.

I bought a pair of reconditioned 6v Golf Cart batteries to use as house batteries, which will fit in the battery box along-side the starting battery. A 30am charge controller is in the mail to handle the solar panels. I installed an (automotive) volt meter to replace the failed original and the shorted-out test-switch.

The motor for the pressure water pump is froze up and I'm going to pull it and have it rebuilt at an alternator shop.

The old, large, defunct depth sounder display that is bulkhead-mounted in the cockpit was removed, and found to be full of water. That portion of the bulkhead was found to be full of rot. The outer fiberglass layer is solid but I could have ripped a few square feet of soggy sponge-like plywood out with my bare hands. Instead, I installed a new Ritchey compass (with a gasket) in the hole and will deal with the bulkhead later.

I also used my rock climbing harness to go up the mast. I tied into the main halyard and climbed the side-stay "ladder" while a friend took up the slack on the halyard winch. Once I got to the end of the side stays I attached a new halyard pulley to the tang for the staysail. I then climbed the fore-sail halyard to the top of the mast and inspected the mast-head, before being slowly lowered down while spraying the sail track with white-lithium grease.

Now for the latest batch of drama... the centerboard is lying in the mud under the boat. The slip is very shallow- the boat only draws 2'4" and it sits in the mud during neap low tides. The bottom cleaner found it there- the pendant still attached made it pretty easy to find. The board being out of the boat made cleaning the slot easy and he said he was able to wrap his hand around the pin and it was still solidly fixed in place. I must have left it "down" while in the slip, setting the end of it in the mud. The falling tide must have lifted the slot in the board (I'm assuming that it is a slotted board) right off the pin. Hopefully this has something to do with the bow-down trim of the boat.

[Seafarer]

Finally some good news!

Thursday, I used the boat hook to snag the centerboard pennant, pull it out of the boat, and tie it off to the dock. We hung the engine and hooked up the fuel hoses. Things went quickly and smoothly, and the boat was almost ready to leave O'Neils on it's own power a year after being towed in.

Today (Friday) I brought about 8 gallons of fuel to put in the tank, which unfortunately I did before hooking the vent hose up. I climbed under the cockpit and hooked up the hose while choking on gas fumes. We left the access hatch open to vent the compartment and dropped a vehicle off at the destination marina, and picked some gas-station food and coffee up on the way back. The fuel-pump primed itself and the motor fired up without too much hesitation for having sat around the past year. It pumped water great and we were letting it warm up while packing and untying some lines when I noticed steam coming from the "pisser". I quickly shut the engine off while thinking "Damnit, not again!" We gave it 5 minutes and started it again, this time the water flow wasn't all that strong and eventually it stopped and began steaming. I titled the engine up and pulled the thermostat housing off. The new thermostat was a little dirty, but wide open. Underneath it, in the coolant passage, was a different story. The passage was blocked with a glob of grease mixed with sand and shell kicked up from when we tested the shifting of the engine earlier. A small flathead screw-driver removed the blockage and the thermostat was left out when the housing cover was bolted back on. Water flow was restored, though the engine would require clearing the "pisser" where it passes through the housing a few times on our trip as more shell was brought up.

We used the spring lines to pull the boat out of the slip and push the stern around, kicked the engine into gear and headed into the inter-coastal. We took it easy on the engine for the first hour, and it easily pushed the ~8,000lb boat with barely any throttle. As the water-flowed improved and I gained confidence in the engine we gave it full throttle. I really expected a big increase in speed, but the boat only got up to 5 knots at most. I guess that is why the factory powered them with 18HP diesels! My 9.9 Yamaha has roughly half the power, but it gets the job done and is (more than) paid for.

The trip to Holiday Isles Marina in Madeira Beach was entirely un-eventful, which doesn't make for an interesting story but does make for a really good day on the water.

The boat still needs work, like navigation lights (I have a whole set of brand-new LED lights... that I can't find!), and lots of sanding, varnishing, painting, fiberglass, and let's not forget re-hanging the centerboard. However, it's somewhat functional again. After we got to the new marina we unbolted the top/rear part of the engine cover which serves as an air intake housing to keep rain/water out. With this removed the engine will tilt up with the cover on, so a new low-profile way of letting air in while keeping water out will have to be devised.

Stay tuned! Eventually I'll take a trip that involves some intentional sailing!

[s/v Faith]

Congrats!

Grog to celebrate!

[Seafarer]

Went to get the centerboard out of my slip today and somebody else's boat was already there! No big deal, Nikko pulled on the pennant that I'd tied to the dock, when suddenly it moved. "Uh oh" he said as we figured the pennant had just separated from the board. He kept pulling and up came the top of the 'board! The two of us hauled it up over the seawall, scraped the growth off it, and slid it into my van.

NO idea how the board fell off, as it is a through-pin design. The dimensions are not inspiring, either. The board is long and narrow in profile but rather fat and blunt in section. It looks like it would slow the boat down more than help it go to windward! Alas, it is also "bent" near the attachment point and we are not planning to re-use it. Instead, we will be building a new board which will hopefully have some more surface area and a more hydro-dynamic shape. Eventually I'll pull the boat out for new bottom paint and we'll install the new board then.

[Seafarer]

The area where the outboard motor was mounted completely rotted out. The wood around the transom opening, the little "well" area of the cockpit sole, etc. It's all been cut back to good wood and will be simplified to a solid transom (with through-transom scuppers) with the outboard on an adjustable bracket. I scored the bracket off Craigslist already.

The pressure-water pumps motor was seized up, and has since been replaced. One more system functional! If it didn't come with this system I'd have foot-pumps in it, but alas, everything was in place and the fix was simple. I'd like to install a deck-fill for the tank, but am not sure there is clearance for it. The tank is mounted in the center of the V-berth and the fill is right under a removable piece of plywood. It's pretty easy to just run the hose to the tank from the open hatch above....

The head has an over-head hatch that only had one functional hinge. The roll-pin had fallen out of the other hinge at some point. I pulled the hatch (not the frame) off and drifted out the remaining roll-pin. Some small SS nuts and bolts and washers replaced the original hardware and now it doesn't flop around anymore.

The head also has an opening port on the side, which is usually left un-dogged and often propped open. The sole is simply the raw fiberglass of the bottom of the hull, sloping towards the door. A special "through hull" type fitting, intended for shower drains, was installed and epoxy poured so that rain water (or, later, shower water) can drain out of the head and into the bilge. A short length of hose runs from this fitting, across the sole (in an out-of-the-way location) and into a bilge access plate. I'm debating installing a shower sump. The bilge pump already has a section of nylons wrapped around it as a strainer, and I was thinking that installing a strainer/trap on the end of the hose leading from the shower might together be sufficient to keep debris from clogging the pump. I wouldn't really mind soapy water sloshing around the bilge just a bit, keeping it clean. We'll see how I feel about this later....

The VHF and stereo have been tossed as neither of them worked. Might be getting a used VHF off Craigslist for $50 tomorrow. Needs some cleaning to be presentable but so long as it works.... I'm hoping to find a stereo that takes flash drives (USB input) and is Bluetooth compatible, but I'll probably just go for whatever is cheap.

I should probably name it "CraigsBoat" since that is where it, and nearly all of the components for it, have come from!