Moving on

The KD650 "Sparta" now has a new owner.
The project has been very fun and rewarding. She has looked after me and my family on many trips around the gulf. However time has come to move on to new things.

Coromandel

On the eastern side of the Hauraki Gulf, the Coromandel Peninsular is one of my favourite places to visit for holidays. Usually I drive there. But this time I managed to get there in the KD650.

The boat went well and since I was in cruise mode I waited for favourable conditions to sail over with a reach there and a reach back 3 days later. It took about 5 hours from Auckland which isn't bad considering it is normally a 3 hour plus drive.
It was great to see places I have not seen before and a reminder of how lucky I am to live so close to such nice places.

More Sailing

I had a nice sail on Monday and have a new video to show.

Shortly after this video ends, a front came through with much more wind (and a bit of rain so I put the camera away) so playing it safe we dropped the main and sailed under jib for a while and headed over to calmer water to set up a reef in the main sail by which time the wind had eased off a bit. The picture below shows our GPS track firstly gybing down wind in about 10-15 knots then later coming back up wind under reefed mainsail only in about 20 knots of wind. Tacking wasn't easy without the jib in the chop but was ok if we found a calm patch. A small jib would have made it much easier, so might be on the shopping list. But otherwise the sailing balance upwind was still ok with only the reefed main doing 6-7 knots and felt safe. And the tacking angles seem ok also.



It was nice to push the boat a bit on this trip and get to know it a bit more.

Haul out time

It's been a year now since the boat was put in the water and the hulls were getting a bit harder to keep clean and with summer sailing season here it's all good reasons haul the boat out for some new bottom paint.

In this picture after the water blasting you can see where the antifoul has been working. It came up pretty clean with nothing much to do other than a light wet sand to prep for the new paint.

And here she is ready to go back where she belongs (in the water). The paint is a strange colour when put on but becomes mostly white once it starts reacting with sea water.

And we're back. Ready to go.
You might have noticed the new bow net. I have been ok using without one until now but for the occasion when I need to drop the jib in rough conditions it adds a level of safety. It is as minimal as possible while still allowing access to hank on or off the jib.

Waiheke

Another cruise on the KD650.

Easter weekend we tagged along with some other multihulls for a cruise around Waiheke Island.

First day sail to a packed Oneroa bay. The sail was down wind in 10-15 knots and there was a lot of other yachts heading out of the harbour at the same time, it felt a bit like a race start and was good to have the opportunity to compare speed with other boats and I was happy with how it went.

 

If you look carefully, it's hard to miss the only orange boat in the bay, despite being the smallest.

Then the next day further down to the other end of the Island for a night at Hooks Bay.

Some well known local multi's in this photo.

Headed back home after two nights on the boat via Tamaki straight, completing a trip right around the island.

Up hill

One of the unknowns with this design is how well a boat without dagger boards can go up wind. The KD650 is an asymmetric hulled Catamaran and is designed to be able to go upwind without boards.

Below is a Google Earth image from my latest outing with my GPS track overlaid. The wind was a good 15 knots or so and a bit gusty. I sailed from the top right of the image down wind and on to a reach then back up wind again with a bit of tacking. This is the Waitemata harbour in Auckland and the tide was coming in so I was going upwind against the tide. As I got closer to the bridge I was more going for speed than height, and having some fun :)

As you can see it is not bad, considering the pros and cons of the design I'm pretty happy with this performance..

Average speeds up wind were about 7 knots and top speed on this trip was 13.6 knots.

KD 650 Review

I have a done more sailing and cruising now with the KD650 and can report more good things about the boat.

It can sleep 2 adults and 3 children! Was a bit of a squeeze but it worked.

I have added a prod to help manage the jib and hold the jib when it is lowered (a furler would be good if I had the money). Also I have found a good spot for holding the inflatable dinghy up front (might look a bit strange but much nicer than having it on the tramp).

The bows feel quite boyant, I have done some down wind sailing in waves, it surfs waves very well (fun) and the bows never felt like digging in, though the leeward bow has punched through a few bigger waves it felt safe, I think this is helped by the hull flare in the inner sides. The boat feels very stiff with no noticible wracking.

Highest speed under sail to date is 9.6knots (using main sail only on a reach) haven't really pushed it yet or been in winds stronger than about 15 knots. I have been effectively sailing it single handed and taking it easy.

Those rudders work very well even when not fully down. At anchor I pull the rudders all the way up and the boat does not sail around at all, in fact the motion also at anchor is nice for such a light boat, I'd say this is another advantage of the slim hulls.

I have a couple of videos to share also.
First video is sailing with just the main sail averaging 8 knots https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTEtMfhBKsg.

And second video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-WSbz8jymk with main and jib, finally! Please excuse the slack jib halyard, I tightened it after the video was taken but still in the video the boat is matching windspeed of about 6 knots.

And finally a picture which speaks for itself :)

It's in

Today with less than ideal conditions we put the boat in.

To launch it we put some wheels under the hulls and wheeled it down the ramp with it tied to a car to slow it down. Seemed a bit unconventional but it worked, but probably wouldn't want to do it that way on a bigger boat.

I have not sorted out sails yet, so it was a motor cruise for the first voyage. The 5Hp motor seems enough. Cruises around 6.5 knots, max speed 8 knots.

Still lots of small jobs to do, including sails, don't think I'll have enough money for new sails though. But I'm happy with how it is coming together.

Moving Day

Today the boat was moved near the water.

This was the first time I was able to properly see the boat, it takes some getting used to after all this time in the garage. The mast was temporarily raised to measure lengths and has since been lowered. Hopefully the boat will be launched within a week.
The day was a lot of hard work and this would not have been possible without the many helping hands giving up there time to help me. Thank you guys.

Tiller's

Here are some pictures of what I've been up to with the tiller's.

Here is the laser helping me line up the centre line.

Then based off the marked centre line I can work out the Ackerman angle for the tiller. The steel rule in the picture below shows the optimum angle for the boat.

Then I made the tillers to this angle. Much the same as how Hardy made the ones for his boat. These are PVC tubes wrapped in carbon uni at 0 degrees and then wrapped in carbon double bias. If I did it again I would probably use laminated wood as I would prefer the look of a constant curve to the tiller. I thought I could have a constant curve with the PVC but it was harder than I thought, hence the final resulting curve seen in the picture below.

I have been pushing myself a bit lately to get the boat ready hopefully for some sailing over summer holidays. As a result I haven't been taking as many photos for the blog as normal, but things are progressing for sure.

Looking back at the build so far, one thing that I wasn't quite expecting is that building the hulls was a much smaller part of the overall project than I initially thought.

Fitout rolls on

A few pics here of what has been happening with the fit out.

Here is one of the battery holders. These 7.2 Ah batteries are quite small but should be enough for what I need.

 

The picture below shows the finished depth transducer installation. It is mounted as an "in hull" transducer and hopefully will punch signals through the small section of solid GRP I made when constructing the hull. Also as you can see I have made a protective box to stop anything damaging or knocking the transducer off it's epoxy bed.

And here is where I have installed the display for the depth sounder. I chose this model for it's simplicity and low power consumption.

Obvious what is going on in this picture. The location for the porta poti is not as in the plans as this unit is a little to wide to be mounted at the forward location. But this spot is just as good. I made a raised removable floor for it to sit on. I had considered putting in a proper marine head, but recent changes to marine rules about discharge of waste made me think the extra cost and weight not worth it for my intended use, for now anyway.

I'm still enjoying working on the boat even after all this time. Though I've been putting in a few more hours lately as I hope to have it in the water for summer holidays :)

VHF

It is nice to be doing a few jobs that do not involve sanding or fibreglass. One of these jobs is installing a fixed VHF radio.

This picture shows where I have mounted it, in the starboard hull. I will be putting all electronics/switches for both hulls in this area so that they can be operated from outside by just leaning in to the cabin without having to go inside.

 

 

In this picture you can just see how I have made the hole for the cable. I drilled an oversize hole, then filled it with epoxy filler then drilled a smaller hole through the epoxy so hopefully this won't get water/rot problems later.

And here the aerial is fixed in position.

Hatches

I have finally installed two of the first pieces of hardware I bought for the boat. The bow hatches.

First check they fit ok and mask around the edge. The sealant can get very messy if you're not careful.

 

Then the sealant is added.

 

Here it is, screwed in place and job done.

It is funny, I have heard this stage of a build seems to take longer than you think it will. And sure enough it does! I think the main thing is that the number of jobs on the "to do" list becomes massive compared to earlier in the build. The list was something like 3 things, build hulls, fibreglass hulls, paint. Now the list has at least 30 things on it!

Just like Bernd said, I think I have done 90%, so now I just need to do the last 90%. :)

Interior Lighting

I'm starting to work on the electrical system for the boat. I will try to keep things minimal while still allowing for some items to make cruising easier.

This small LED strip light will give plenty of light in the cabin. I am also happy with the mounting as it is designed for corner installation so takes up very little of the small space in there.

It is a good thing now with LED lighting using so little power I should be able to get by with small batteries. The plan is to have separate batteries and circuits in each hull with solar panels to keep them topped up.

More on the Rudder Housings

Some more work here on preparing the rudder housings.

The process can be seen here for the mounting points to the gudgeon's, starting with plywood sandwiches shaped to fit the housing.

Then cut around the outside and glued in place.

 



 

Then wrapped up in a about 2 metres of 300 GSM carbon uni.



I have had to stop there for now on the housings as the boat will need to be moved forward to allow me to line up the gudgeon's on the housings. The transom of the port hull is hard up against a shelf in the garage so I'll continue with these once the boat is moved which I'll leave until later as once moved I have less space in the garage.

Cleats

I have fastened cleats at the four corners of the boat.
Here is the port bow cleat and fairlead.

I positioned the cleat forward enough so the hatch lid can open without touching it. Also the fairlead is hopefully positioned in a good spot where the anchor bridle won't interfere with the forestay bridle.

And here is where I have positioned the aft port cleat.

No surprises here really, though I thought about putting it on the lower area near the transom I thought the higher position suits me better.
It is a bit of a guessing game with things like this at the moment. Hopefully after getting out and using the boat, the choices I have made turn out to be ok.

Motor bracket

So I am finally getting around to bolting things on. Here you can see where I have positioned the bracket for the motor.

It is a standard "off the shelf" rise and fall bracket and the location here should allow me to get the motor on and off without too much trouble as I can more or less stand over it but obviously having the motor off the centre line is not ideal.

Weather has been pretty miserable in Auckland lately, I'm kind of happy the boat is safe and sound inside at the moment.

Washboards

As commented on in an earlier post, I am using plywood for the washboards.

Here they are, in place with the trim almost finished. Also the sliding hatches also have their trim which fits over the top of the washboard.
I have been doing some prep work for the trampoline also but not much to show yet.

Bolted

A bit of a major step has been made here with the two hulls joined for the first time!

 

 

It was a lot of work getting all the measurements right twice and making sure I only had to drill holes and cut once. The platform feels pretty solid. Would be nice to put it in the water right now just to see how it floats, but I think I'll just press on with the fit out. :)

Trim

Just a couple of latest progress pictures here of the trim around the hatches.

The pictures tell the story here. This mahogany might be the only exterior wood to remain unpainted on the boat.