The SCOA new millennium was celebrated at the Annual Meeting held on President's weekend in Newport, Rhode Island. Commodores Bob and Judy Boudrot organized a very informative and entertaining agenda starting off with cocktails and snacks at the Hospitality Suite on Friday night.

SPEAKER #1 -Passagemaking on a SC31

The Saturday meetings began with George Smith and Janet Murphy speaking on their passagemaking experiences on SC-31 #148 Apogee. George and Janet's passage notes in the SCOA newsletter have been an inspiration to many Southern Cross owners for some time now. Apogee was built and launched in 1983. That summer Apogee went to Maine and then made two Bermuda Trips in 1984 and 1985 before leaving on a world cruise.

Apogee was equipped at the factory with double insulated backstays, double forestays. A whisker pole mounted on the mast. Today Apogee is in Turkey. An Aires windvane and three autohelms on board do the steering. A cockpit cover attached to the dodger helps with sun and weather. Additional items of note include a built-in boarding ladder and radar.

George and Janet took off in the summer of 86 and circumnavigated the Atlantic to see if they really wanted to do all this. Then they went through Caribbean, Panama Canal, Galapagos, Tahiti, French Polynesia, Cooks, and New Zealand. Between 1992 and 1995, they knocked back and forth between New Zealand and Fiji and New Caledonia, and then on to Australia in 1992. Then they cruised they East Coast of Australia between and Tasmania, followed by pent two years in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, with stops in Sri Lanka, Yemen, Oman. They made their way up the Red Sea to Israel, Cypress, Turkey.

GO TO TOP

The First Rule is avoid going to windward in a gale.

Sails and Rigging. "Our largest sail is a 110% percent genoa. We also have large and small yankees and a small jib. We have a storm trysail and boom crotch. Solar panels are on top of dodger and we also have a boom brake (Dutchman). All lines are led aft to the cockpit. Apogee has twin forestays and backstays, two jib halyards and two main halyards, one of which is used as a topping lift. There is a nylon screening for the companion way."

Down Below. "Inside, we use one of the settees and run lines up to handrails for a lee cloth. We run four-hour watches at sea. We have salt and freshwater sinks. No pressure water. Stove is kerosene stove with Primus burners. There is a two-gallon tank and we use one gallon of kerosene per month. We have an icebox and no refrigeration. The chart table includes VHF plus hand-held, ham and single side band radio, and a notebook computer. We use a Kantronics TNC to receive weather maps and use email. The entertainment center is a portable CD player. Climate control is accomplished using a portable electric fan and heater. Forward berth includes large nets along the side, triangular sleeping bag, and a chart storage box on the roof. Have all the charts you possibly can onboard. We avoid copies of charts."

Ground Tackle. "We carry 45lb plow on 60 ft of 3/8 chain 300 ft of 5/8 rode. We also carry a 25lb Danforth. The jib is hanked on at all times. A Simpson Lawrence manual Hyspeed windlass. We also have another Danforth as a stern anchor and 75lb Paul Luke Fisherman Anchor with 10ft of chain plus 180 ft. of 3/8 chain. We do not use trip line on anchors most of the time."

Customs. "The first people you meet on shore is customs. In Bermuda it takes about 20 minutes. Things went down hill from there going around the world. In Fiji you tie up to a quarantine area. After many hours, somebody shows up and says your ok and then you have to find customs, etc. in three different buildings. It takes two days. We started out carrying a rifle, but you have to give it up at each port."
"Our normal thing is to carry lots of cash. You can get good exchange rates by bartering with traders. If you have Travelers checks and must go to a bank you get less of a rate. Credit cards take a lot of waiting and paperwork. We avoid trying to put things on a charge card. US dollars are good any place in the world. Usually we convert, but sometimes you can get better rates with dollars."

Provisioning. "Provisioning involved visiting third world markets that are a lot of fun. You spend a lot of time transporting water and food. It is a daylong event. If you go to Fiji make sure you have some Kava to take to the chief of the village. They grind it up and you have to drink it all at once and smile and sound as though you enjoy it."
    Spares and Equipment. "We carry spares for everything. You have to haul out. Mast steps are handy when going through the inside of reefs to locate coral heads. Radar was installed in New Zealand. It was purchased from West Marine. We had to get a freshwater pump for the engine in Egypt. Mack Boring shipped one in. It was shipped and arrived at the airport. The customs people knew nothing about it. They said to check with this airline. One kind-hearted fellow finally checked and it was at the federal express office in town, and there was our water pump. We had to hand out a hundred-dollar bill. We won't say anything more about our experience in Egypt."
GO TO TOP

• Never have a schedule except by season

• Never start a voyage in bad weather

• No visitors on passages; people who come to you on vacation always need to get back on a schedule.

• Take all the spares you can carry

• When in doubt, stay to windward

• When not in doubt, stay to windward

• Now substitute reef for stay to windward

• Always put one reef in at night
  
  All present did not mind the preaching from such experienced voyagers.
  

SPEAKER #2 - Electronic Navigation, Tony Bessinger from Armchair Sailing

Next on the agenda was Tony Bessinger from Armchair sailing speaking on Electronic navigation. Regarding hardware, Tony said that a lot of people look for waterproof computers. For the SC31, we don't need to be that hardcore. Get the biggest, brightest screen you can get. Hard-drive space is important due to the large graphics files on most e-charting systems, so get at least a six gigabyte hard drive. Each chart uses between 2 and 8 Megs of space. You need a Windows PC operating system. Processor speed is not that important.

As far as software is concerned, most systems use raster-scanned charts. They are exact copies of NOAA charts. Because they have been scanned, there is a lot of information and it is unmodifiable. Vector charts use layer technology (they take all the information on the charts and put it into the computer on layers) Vector charts do not look like the NOAA charts. Right mouse button is used to get information about what is on the chart. Nobeltec uses both vector and raster scan charts. You get all the charts on a CD and then get release codes for various charts via credit card.

Close overseas, all of Caribbean, Bahamas, etc. Mediterranean, S.Korea, and Japan are available. Admirality Raster charts are expensive ($50 per chart in digital form; are updated to date of issue). You can update Rasters on the hard drive but not on the CD. You can get updates for a year via email. Maptech has an agreement with US GOV to create digital charts. They will update for 6 months free but need a new disk after that.
You cannot rely completely on electronic charts. You must use dead reckoning and paper charts too. Electronic charting is good for high-speed navigation. Service packs are available to update the systems to get rid of bugs to enhance reliability.
Laptop layout for the SC31 . Some people buy a flat screen to mount in the nav station and use a spare keyboard and mouse. It is nice to have a printer to print up chartlets of small chart areas. All programs come with tide and current software. Chartview Professional and Visual Navigation Suite (Nobletec) allow you to link tides and currents with your course itinerary.

Product Review.. Maptech has done a great job in scanning charts. Cruising Navigator sells for $90 dollars. Regarding Offshore Navigator. Maptech should stick with producing charts.

Nobeltec owns Chart View Pro and Visual Navigation Suite. Suite uses vector charts but can read Maptech charts. It is easy to contact them and get charts. It Suite has tide and current station availability. For example, you can put in your average boat speed and it will tell you when to go through the canal.

The Cap'n tries to do an awful lot. It is an old system that hasn't been revamped. We have negative customer feedback on this product. Nobeltec is the easiest to use.
Regarding plotters, they are as expensive as a laptop, but don't do as many things for you. With your computer you can email, write a book, get weatherfax information etc. If you are going around the world, get two.

Northstar 961 is best GPS out there. Their Navionics are good (worldwide coverage with C-Map).

Use Weatherfax for Windows for weather forecasting by hooking laptop up to SSB receiver.

Tony can be reached at the Armchair Sailor in Newport. (401-847-4252.

GO TO TOP

SPEAKER #3 -SCOA Web Site

After lunch webmaster Judy Boudrot gave a tour of the SCOA website and updated members on recent changes and updates. These changes include an interactive message board for posting and answering questions, a gallery of boats, and helpful links for cruising sailors. Thanks to Judy for her good work to make our website more informative and helpful to members and owners of Southern Cross Yachts. The address of the site is:
http://www.southern-cross.org/ We have had almost 10,000 hits on the site. Check it out and have some fun.

SPEAKER #4 - Rhode Island Lighthouses

John Rohland displayed a collage of Rhode Island Lighthouses by Roger Gustafson to be presented to Clark Ryder. Roger was crew on Peter Muennich's Carrabarra at last summer's rendezvous.

SPEAKER #5 - Owner Improvements

John Rohland presented how he mounted a Garhauer radar mast on his Gilmer 31 Trigness. The Garhauer mast allows manual leveling adjustment of angle for the heel of the boat. The mast is mounted on a 3/8" stainless plate that is bolted to the rail. John is an avid cycler and displayed a bicycle that he can use onboard.

GO TO TOP

SPEAKER #6 - Dieter Empacher of Dieter Empacher Designs

Safety at Sea and Design Characteristics of the SC31 Compared to Other Boats
Marine architect Dieter Empacher of Dieter Empacher Designs, made a very interesting and informative presentation on safety at sea and yacht design ratios, with an emphasis on the design ratios of Southern Cross yachts. Dieter provided hard copies of his presentation. Dieter first reviewed safety procedures, including marine distress communication procedures, necessary paperwork and piloting books to have onboard, offshore safety recommendations, pre-sail checklists, float plans, medical procedures, assessment and procedures after running aground, seacock and other safety equipment mapping.

Southern Cross design ratios reveal that the SC-31, with its high displacement to length ratio and its low sail area to displacement ratio, has a motion to comfort ratio comparable to much larger yachts (Moody 58, Taswell 56) and better than such yachts as the Tashiba 31, Pearson 31, and the Island Packet 31.
Contact Bob Boudrot (vamcirm@cybercom.net ) for a copy of Dieter's presentation.

SPEAKER #7 - Coronet Restoration, John Summers

John Summers, Curator of the International Yacht Restoration School, gave a humorous oral and pictorial history of the yacht design and racing in America by tracing the life of the Coronet, a two-masted pilot schooner built in Brooklyn New York at Poillon's for Rufus Bush in the 1880's and now residing at the IYRS in Newport. The goal of the project is to restore Coronet to inspire others with yachting history, craftsmanship, and tradition. The estimated cost of the project to be completed by 2005 is 7 to 9 million dollars.

GO TO TOP

SPEAKERS #8 - Owner Improvements

Bob Boudrot reviewed recent electrical system improvements for SC31 Second Wind. For house batteries, he used a pair of 6V 220Amp Hour, deep cycle, we cells from West Marine. They were placed under the quarter berth/nav station on the starboard side. He mounted a West Marine 12V starting battery under the galley sink. Each battery bank has its own main switch with a third main switch for combining all batteries for an emergency start. A neat feature is a battery combiner (a sensor/solenoid combination) connected to the plus terminal on each battery bank. When a voltage greater than 13V (engine/alternator on) is sensed, the solenoid closes, connecting the plus terminals of both banks to receive the incoming charge. When the voltage drops (engine/alternator off), the solenoid opens and the banks are separated again.
Contact Bob for more information and diagrams.

Michael DeSisto presented information and pictures on installation of a Monitor Windvane on SC31 Aileron and other SC31's. The major issue for recent installations of the Monitor on the SC31's is the bend angle of the upper tubes. Based on our recent experience and feedback, Monitor is re-engineering the design of the upper tubes and the installation diagrams. Be sure to speak with Gillian Bartolo at Scanmar International (scanmar@selfsteer.com).

GO TO TOP

Michael DeSisto and Steven Bliven were elected Commodore and Vice-Commodore for 2000. John Rohland was elected Treasurer, Charlie Claus is Secretary, and Judy Boudrot was again named web Captain.

GUEST DINNER SPEAKER - Dr. Hester Rumberg, Director of Education and Programs of the Sleavin Family Foundation (http://www.sleavin.org/)

   Dr. Rumberg related the horrific story of how three of the four members of the Sleavin family were killed during a circumnavigation when a large freighter collided with their sailboat. Michael and Judy Sleavin were very experienced sailors with prior offshore passages and an extremely seaworthy boat. They had taken care to prepare the boat and their children extensively for blue-water cruising. They had all the systems in place, including a plan for day and night watches. The tanker that ran them down did not have running lights or radar on, and did not stop to help once the disaster happened. Dr. Rumberg described the work of the foundation which includes discussions with many individuals and officials in the USCG, the Merchant Marine, Bay Pilots, and numerous shipping executives and attorneys. She also presented the latest information about visibility and safety equipment, collusion avoidance, search and rescue, and legalities. Perhaps more important, she presented information about the present day status of the ships we might encounter at sea. As spokesperson for Judith Sleavin, Hester's goal is to share the information from these discussions and research and to promote safety at sea education.

GO TO TOP

The meeting ended with an informal get together at the Commodore's suite on Sunday morning. Once again, it was fun to renew acquaintances and friendships and discuss common projects and share our love of boating and Southern Cross/Gilmer yachts. We all look forward to another successful 20 years of SCOA in the new millennium, and hope to see you at the summer rendezvous in August and at the meeting next February.

Thanks to Commodore's Bob and Judy Boudrot and all our guest speakers for a very informative and fun meeting.