You would think that after three weeks of focused boat repairs and adjustments, sailing performance would go up.
You would be wrong. Icicle 4 was the worst race yet.
When we re-installed the jib, we tied on the old slightly smaller diameter sheets that had been found in the bottom of the lazarette. The theory was that our new sheets were too large for the turning blocks and were binding up during our tacks. Unfortunately as we unfurled the jib on our way to the starting line, one of the sheets came untied leaving the jib flapping in the wind.
We left our starting position to partially furl the jib and get the line re-attached, but that put us about 10 minutes behind and quite a bit off course.
Once the jib actually caught the wind, the bow of the boat started turning uncontrollably giving me a clear indication that the center board had not actually dropped when we lowered it. Apparently the centerboard winch was jamming up. We spent another 10 minutes finessing and finagling it while I was inside the boat jerking on the centerboard wire trying to get it to deploy.
At this point we were 20 minutes late and completely in the wrong spot to start. We had to spend another 10 minutes motoring back to to race area before we could even get into a starting pattern.
We started VERY late. There was only one J boat and a trimaran behind us.
The jib sheets did seem to bind up less during tacks, but it was hard to know if it was the line size that was making a difference or if it was the fact that I cleaned quite a bit of corrosion out of the jib cars, so that they were operating better. Unfortunately the self-tailing winches did not always hold the smaller line.
One of the biggest problems I’m still facing is that with our undersized shallow draft rudder, we have a major issue with the boat continuing to turn in a circle once it starts the tack. I don’t think there’s any cure for this. This boat was designed by a single man for anchoring in shallow water and drinking in the spacious cockpit. It’s essentially a trawler with a mast, and it sails like garbage. The fixed keel version handles much better, and I’m quite sad we didn’t go that route.
We managed to make one tack on the first leg of the course, then the wind dropped to 7 knots, and we stopped moving. Everyone was content to drift, but eventually we were drifting into a children’s regatta area, so we had to give up and turn on the motor to make sure we didn’t float over a bunch of kids on optis.
To say I’m more than a little depressed about the boat’s performance would be an understatement. Every other heavy, cruising class handicap boat finished the race. To be fair, they all had a 30-minute lead, so maybe there was jmore wind down the course or they were able to make the first turn to be on a better point of sail before the wind dropped, but I think something is seriously wrong with our rig and sail plan.
We have one race left in the series, and my aspirations of placing have diminished to just hopes of finishing. Of course, unless I can get the centerboard winch unseized before the race, we may not be able to sail at all.
At least we’re getting off the dock. That’s progress over the past two years.
Still, it’s hard to stay positive in regard to this boat when it’s sailing so poorly. I don’t mind having a pig, but this is ridiculous.
Spoiler alert, we did not start (DNS) Icicle Race #3. The north wind was gusting all day Friday, and there just wasn’t much water left in Clear Lake.
On a normal day, there is no beach here along the bulkhead of our marina. Due to low water and a low wind forecast, we decided not to risk leaving Finn with a baby sitter and getting stuck in the bay for hours. Had we made it to the race, we would have had less competitors, but sometimes the risk is not worth the reward.
Earlier in the week Mary began re-stitching the sacrificial sunbrella that was ripped on our jib during Icicle 1. Her Sailrite sewing machine has seen at least five years of hard use, and it finally gave out. While it awaits repair or replacement, we had to hand stitch the sail. I finished about four feet, and that has put me over my sewing quota for all of 2021. I don’t know what kind of sewing machine Mary wants this time, but I will buy it.
Despite the extreme low tide, the weather was really nice, and Finn enjoyed his weekend at the marina. His crawling is getting more advanced, and he made dozens of laps around the cabin floor.
He also tried out the swings for the first time.
During one of his naps we managed to get the jib back on the roller furling unit and ready for Icicle #4 (knock on wood).
It would have been a perfect, relaxing weekend except for one thing.
At some point, my wallet disappeared. The most likely timeframe is when Tex decided to randomly start peeing on the rug in the boat, and I rushed to grab him and corral Hemingway, then wrestle and carry them both up the extremely high bulkhead to get them to the grass for a bathroom break. I think as I was stretching and then sitting and twisting on the bulkhead, my wallet must have broken loose and taken a dive.
I spent several hours retracing my steps all over the marina and turning the boat inside out in the hopes that I had just set it somewhere, but with no luck. It is gone. Now starts the process of canceling cards and ordering a new driver license.
Honestly, I’m surprised I made it almost 43 years without ever losing a wallet before, especially since I’ve spent the past 11 years on boats every weekend. Here’s to hoping that will be the big loss of 2021, and the rest of the year will be smooth sailing.
After the line adjustments and repairs, I was fired up for race 2. Our handicap boat rating went from 218 to 221, so our start time was moved a minute earlier. We got to the course on time and managed to get the main unfurled correctly on the first attempt — everything was going great.
That’s us in the background of this photo Sunspot Baby took just before the start.
We started exactly on time on a starboard tack. It was beautiful, and a huge improvement over our late start last week.
Then the wind died.
The forecast projected 8 knots until 1 p.m., then down to 7 knots through the afternoon. In reality, it was closer to 4 knots with occasional gusts up to 7.
At 4-5 knots, the boat did creep forward but couldn’t point better than a broad reach. Below 4, we didn’t move and all steering was gone. We spent two hours bobbing around on the first leg of the course with no perceivable forward motion towards the mark.
We spent some time diagnosing why the jib sheets keep binding up. I think we’re going to have to invest in new jib cars. We also noticed the sheets tend to bunch up and bind in the turning blocks near the winches. Our options there are to either upsize the blocks, which will require quite a bit of teak work or the downsize the lines. I haven’t decided the best option on any of it yet since whichever route we go, it’s going to be expensive.
We finally threw in the towel and turned the boat around. Icicle Series 2 was a DNF for us. However, it looks like only one boat in the non-spin club handicap division finished.
I did get the new strainer basket installed in the climate control system, so we have heat and air-conditioning again. Mary and I also spent a couple hours removing old wires and autopilot equipment this morning, but due to the cold and rain we only got the interior sections of the boat finished.
We still have major water leaks that need to be remedied. We removed the old staysail track and epoxied the holes, which stopped the leaks coming down the front of the mast. I think the track was leaking into the core and that water was then flowing out at the mast opening. I’m not sure where all the water is coming from at the front of the mast. It’s a virtual water fall when the rain gets heavy. We used spartite to seal the mast in the collar, but the base of the collar itself could be leaking.
Fingers crossed that Icicle 3 will finally be our race.
2021 started on a good tack. We spent New Year’s Day on the boat prepping for GBCA Icicle Series 1, and we were treated to an absolutely amazing sunset.
I finally broke down and bought a 3M Stripe Removal wheel to take the old Florida registration numbers off the hull. It was working pretty well until it popped out of the drill and into the water.
Poseidon demands his sacrifices. I almost went diving for it, but then I remembered I still have stitches in my stomach from the hernia surgery, so I decided against it. Guess I’ll get another one and try again next weekend, but I’ll be checking the chock tightness frequently.
We were up early Saturday to finish boat prep before our crew arrived, and we cast off just after 11 a.m. for our first race aboard the Krogen 38. There’s no better way to shakedown a boat than to race it. As a wise man once said, “If it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen out there.”
We’re still having trouble with our furling main. It’s an early design, and it just doesn’t seem to work very well. Someone has to literally sit under the boom and guide the line onto the drum by hand or it wraps too low and then overwraps. It took multiple attempts to fully deploy the main. Then our staysail and jib furlers just don’t want to spin. Even with decent wind, it took some real effort to get them started. It probably doesn’t help that the staysail furler lost an eyelet during transport to Houston, and I had to rig it with a big U-bolt to stop it from overwrapping immediately. Apparently it’s not a great solution because when we attempted to furl it back in after the race, it was still an overwrapped mess.
Hopefully by the end of the series we’ll have it all figured out and working correctly because replacing two furling units and switching the main to a smart track is a really expensive proposition. We’ll see how it goes. Our furling issues definitely contributed to a late start for race 1.
Overall we did well. Our tacks were messy, but it was literally everybody’s first time sailing the boat. Yes, Mary and I have been out on the boat previously, but we never had the jib out in more than maybe 5 knots of wind.) We learned that the jib does tack across in high wind, but that it has seen better days. It did not hold shape well, and there were several patches of sunbrella fluttering in the wind by the end of the race.
Mary helmed the start and the first leg of the course while I was fixing furlers, then I took over the second two legs.
I have no idea when we could have possibly hit 16.8 knots. It must have been while Mary was driving.
Racing with dogs aboard was interesting. Tex has been sailing for the entire 10 years we’ve had him, and he could care less except when we start heeling, and he gets dumped off a bench. However, he does get cold.
Hemingway, on the other hand, was nervous the entire time. By the third leg Mary was designated dog holder. There had been discussion of possibly bringing Finn along for a race in his car seat, but I think that will have to at least wait until the summer rum races.
We spent this morning addressing all of the little issues we documented during the race. I also noticed the air-conditioning water return wasn’t flowing very well, so I decided to clean the strainers.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t much strainer left to be cleaned. The underside of the lid was coated in barnacles, and the basket was completely deteriorated. The good news is that the basket is a common size that is still being made. The bad news is, nobody had it in stock, so we may not have air-conditioning or heating for a couple of weeks — but that’s the excitement of boating, right?
Here’s the hoping 2021 continues to stay exciting, not just in sailing, but in all of our endeavors.
I had just started a new job, and we had a baby on the way. Focusing on the baby and staycation was the plan. We just had no idea the extent we wouldn’t even leave the house for months at a time.
It worked out great for the dogs. They’ve never gotten so much attention.
I think they actually appreciated getting a little less attention once Michael Finley arrived on the scene as the cameras are now pointed at him.
Although it’s hard to tell if they enjoy the attention they get from him.
I don’t know that you could say we really had an active social life before the pandemic, but we did at least occasionally have friends over for dinner or guitar jams or take people sailing, etc. Trying to be extra careful with an infant, that dwindled down to people visiting from afar.
Our friend Tammy was in town for the first time in two years, but instead of catching up over lunch, she stood in the rain and chatted with us from the dock while we sat on the boat. Thanks for coming by, Tammy, and thank you for the family photo.
So with 2020 being such a letdown, I’ve been focused on getting ready for life in 2021.
The boat projects have been intense. In the past year we’ve replaced the mainsail, replaced the engine’s freshwater pump, added a new isolated start battery, replaced the 4D AGM house batteries, and started replacing the autopilot system.
Turning the boom and mainsheet into a crane to lift the 150-pound batteries onto the boat and lower them into the bilge worked much better than expected.
There’s still many, many things to do, but we have her in shape to run the Icicle Series Regatta in January. I’m very excited. While I don’t expect to be competitive, racing is the best way to get to know your boat and identify problems that still need to be addressed.
In addition to getting the boat ready to sail, we also finally got a slip back on the peninsula of fun. Our O’day had been in one of the 38′ slips for several years, which gave us great access to the pool and the fire pits, but the Kadey Krogen was too long, so we were exiled to Pier 19 for the past two years. One of the 50′ slips finally opened up, so last weekend we moved back. The real perk is that our baby monitors reach from the boat to the pool, so once Finn goes to bed at 7 p.m., we can sit out with adults for a while, which will be refreshing. I’m sure Finn will also appreciate the swingset that is only about 15 yards away.
Then there’s the car.
We sold the old Z3, which Mary had been driving to work because the car seat didn’t fit, and it hadn’t left the garage in several months. That means the Cougar is now my daily driver. So far it has gotten me to all of my appointments, but I took a nice 100-mile cruise with the Southeast Texas Cats Mercury Cougar Club, and it ended with a screeching alternator.
The alternator was still under warranty, so there’s a new one on the way. However, I’ve got to decide if I’m going to pour some more money into the car to make it suitable enough to carry Finn’s car seat in the back or if I need to buy another new car with no exhaust leaks, etc.
But the car repairs have been nothing compared to body repairs.
Around August, I started falling apart. I had an ingrown toenail that just got worse and worse. Then my belly button started to bulge and my abdomen was super uncomfortable. When you compound that with lack of sleep, staying in shape was next to impossible. I finally sucked it up and went in for both toe surgery and hernia surgery in the past week. Fingers crossed that we kick off 2021 totally healthy and ready to lose the sympathetic pregnancy weight, baby weight, and covid weight.
I know that Jan 1, 2021 won’t magically solve all the problems created by covid in 2020, but I’m very optimistic that it’s going to be a better year.
Back in the 90s when the distinction between music store and pawn shop was rather blurry, I acquired a second-hand silver sparkle Les Paul guitar that only said “Lady Luck” on the headstock and “Made in Korea” on the back of the neck.
This was a time when cheap guitars were really bad. Everyone and their brother had a beginner-level Squier or Jasmine that wouldn’t stay in tune and had the tone of a brick.
Lady Luck played well, but she had an extremely bass-heavy tone. It just never sounded good. Sometime in the early 2000s I actually tried to revive her by transplanting some nice Seymour Duncan pickups, but she still only sounded marginally better.
The silver guitar just hung on the wall for the past 15 years.
Since I’m now working from my home office at least eight hours a day, I’ve been trying to clear the clutter and make it a more pleasant, usable environment. That meant some of the guitars, amplifiers and camera gear had to go. I decided to clean up Lady Luck and put her up for sale.
I opened the back panel and squirted a little bit of contact cleaner into the crackling volume pots. The knobs got stiff. Then they froze. Then they unfroze … completely … and just kept spinning.
In the past few months I’ve cleaned the pots on an amplifier, a vintage clock radio, and another guitar. This has never happened before. I also couldn’t believe the same thing happened on both volume pots. I guess the corrosion was the only thing holding them together.
I had just rendered the guitar unplayable. Selling it was no longer an option.
The “hand wired” tone craze started a few years ago when Gibson started using pots connected to printed circuit boards in their guitars. That was actually good news for me because there were dozens upon dozens of pre-assembled pre-wired pots available to replace those PCBs that ranged from $30 with some questionable looking hardware up to $250 with vintage bumblebee capacitors.
Since Lady Luck isn’t a real Les Paul, I was worried the pot spacing wouldn’t quite be the same. I was wary of buying a pre-assembled kit. I decided to spend $50 and order an unassembled kit from Amplified Parts that included everything from the input plug to the switch. It also came with some really nice shielded wiring.
I immediately ran into a few issues. The pots and the output jack had larger diameters than the original hardware. I wasn’t excited about drilling out the holes and risking a chip in the paint, but I decided it was worth the risk.
Then I had to address the fact that the new knobs were also longer than the old knobs. I made a run to True Value for 3/8″ spacers. Unfortunately, they were out of 3/8″, so I had to pay double and buy a set of both 1/4″ and 1/8″. I ended up $20 into the project just for spacers!
The new selector switch was more of an issue. It was taller than the original switch, and it needed to be countersunk to reach through the body. Lady Luck is mostly plywood with an unknown top. The switch area was not that thick to begin with.
I finally decided that countersinking the new switch to make it fit wasn’t worth the risk of having the new switch rip through the front of the guitar. I had already replaced the switch in the 90s because the original had been snapped off when I bought it. It was clean and seemed fine. I mean, after all, a switch is a switch.
The instructions that came with the MOD kit were very clear, so it only took about an hour to put everything together. Of course, I still somehow managed to hook up the switch backwards. There were no strings on the guitar, so all I could do was plug it in and tap the pickups to see which one was active with each switch position.
I thought, it’s fine, I’ll just rotate the switch 180-degrees and let the wires wrap around. Wrong.
Assuming all was well, I got to the business of reassembling the other pieces of the guitar with the new stainless steel screws I’d picked up while I was True Value. I also decided to put the chrome pickup covers that originally came on the guitar onto the Seymour Duncan pickups. That entailed a little double-sided tape and some solder on the back, but it seemed easy enough.
The next morning I spent quite some time adjusting the truss rod, setting the bridge height, and adjusting the intonation to get the action just right. Then, the moment finally came. I plugged her in.
A very loud hum came through the amplifier.
I strummed a chord.
Nothing.
When I touched my fingers various places the hum would change tone or sometimes stop completely, but never did a single note come through the amplifier.
Did I wire something wrong? Is one of the new pieces bad? Did I ruin the pickups by putting covers on them?
This project had gone wrong when I destroyed the original volume pots. Now I was an additional $70 and 5+ hours into the project, and I had NOTHING.
I hung the guitar on the wall and walked away.
The next morning I got out the multimeter and started checking continuity. This was my first time using shielded cable with a metal sleeve. My first discovery was that I hadn’t peeled the shielding back far enough on the wire going to input jack, and it was touching the base of the prong, causing a short.
My next realization was that by spinning the selector switch 180 and letting the wires wrap around it, they were shorting to the sides of the selector switch.
I remedied this situation by rotating the switch back the correct direction and adding a little bit of electrical tape for insulation — just in case.
At this point, I was still getting a terrible hum, but I was also getting intermittent sound depending on what I touched.
I decided to yank the pots and see if I could get anything to work outside the guitar. Unfortunately during this maneuver I lost one of the $3 spacers into the body of the guitar forever.
After a few solder repairs, which included hooking the switch leads up correctly, I suddenly had sound. That was amazing news since it meant I didn’t destroy the expensive pickups when I put the covers on them.
I made another run to True Value to get another 1/8″ spacer.
I put everything back into the guitar.
The hum was back, and the sound was gone again.
The shielded cables were just touching too many things inside the guitar.
If I ever do this again, I will purchase shrink wrap or some sort of plastic sleeve to put over the metal braid. I didn’t have either of those things, so I started wrapping it in electrical tape. A few minutes later, the hum was completely gone, and the guitar was singing.
So after more than 20 years, this guitar finally plays the way it should. Now I can’t decide if I still want to sell it or if I should hold onto it a little longer.
And for any tech geeks out there who might be wondering, Lady Luck has a Seymour Duncan Pearly Gates in the bridge and a Seymour Duncan SH4 in the neck. 220k-ohm resistors tie into 470pF ceramic capacitors on the 500k-ohm volume pots, and .022mf 600v MOD capacitors run between the volume and tone pots.
It was located on Peoria Avenue in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Apparently the building is about to be torn down.
The Golden Pawn II: It was a pawn shop … and also golden.
When my granddad took me there in 1992, it was both my first time inside a pawn shop and my first time to experience the joyous overwhelming sensory overload generated by a wall of guitars and stacks of amplifiers.
I didn’t know anything about guitars. The Internet did not exist. I had been learning on an old classical guitar I found in my dad’s closet. My knowledge was limited to what I’d seen artists playing in music videos (which I wasn’t supposed to be watching) and one second-hand Guitar Player magazine a friend gave me at school because he didn’t like the songs in that issue.
My guitar selection method began with choosing black guitars that looked cool, but quickly shifted to black guitars that actually worked when plugged in. I finally landed on a black Arbor stratocaster knock-off that looked much like the guitar Bryan Adams played in the Robin Hood Prince of Thieves music video. While the style hadn’t been my first choice, I decided that it was “cool enough.”
Sidebar: It was actually moderately difficult to find this video. When I finally did, it turns out the Stratocaster was red, and it’s clearly not plugged into anything. Definitely not as cool as I remember. Also, fun fact, Mattel re-used the Return of the Jedi: Ewok Village playset in a different box as the Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves forest hideout.
Amplifier selection wasn’t nearly as complicated. The deal was whichever working amplifier — with distortion — Granddad could get them to bundle with the guitar for $100. The man was a negotiator.
I played and played and played that Arbor Stratocaster and the little Peavey Rage amp for years. Eventually the amp died, and I upgraded to something bigger, but I always held on to that guitar.
The Arbor was gigged exactly two times for two songs.
My sophomore year of high school I played Creep by Stone Temple Pilots at the Bartlesville Mid-High Talent Show. My friend Chad sang the second part of the chorus with me. As far as I know, there is no photographic evidence of that performance.
Project Graduation (ProGrad) Talent Show Dinner at William P. Clements High School in Sugar Land, Texas, March, 1996. (Thanks, Mom. Your decades of hoarding really paid off for this blog post.)
In 1996 I opened the senior talent show with The Joker by Steve Miller Band with my friend Steve Love playing the wolf-whistle lead guitar part. Then I played Tears in Heaven by Eric Clapton to end the show — but not on the Arbor. The audience was really into The Joker. Unfortunately, it was my first time to encounter large-auditorium off-beat clapping, and I ended up having to stop for a moment in the middle of the song just to find the beat again. I thought Tears in Heaven went better, but feedback at school was, “You sang it too low.” Nevertheless, photos of my performance did appear in the school newspaper.
That was both the first and last time my music ever garnered any media attention.
The Arbor came to college with me, and many people took a turn on it during dorm jams and sing-arounds my freshman year. However, as time went on, it had more and more electrical issues. Eventually I was seduced by a brand new Epiphone Les Paul, and the Arbor was left in a case in the closet for years.
Having had success with the recent amplifier repair, I decided to see if I could work some magic on the Arbor.
At some point the tone pots had frozen up. Turning the tone knob equated to rotating the entire pot, which put strain on the wiring. Eventually one of the leads from a resistor had pulled loose, which was why the guitar had a terrible hum when it was plugged in and why it got put away in the first place.
As a kid I never realized the pick guard was just one big nicotine stain.
When I pulled the knobs, I realized just how much nicotine build-up was on the pick guard. I wasn’t aware of nicotine staining as a kid — no one in our family even smoked. However, I do remember always feeling like I could never really get the pick guard clean. Who knows what life this guitar had before my granddad and I came across it.
A few squirts of CRC cleaner got the pots working freely, and then it only took about 30 seconds to solder the broken lead back to the correct tab. I tightened the nuts on the pots to make sure they wouldn’t rotate again. I cleaned the 5-way switch, then put it back together.
The next issue was the bridge setup. Teenage me really didn’t have a concept of intonation. I had adjusted all the saddles to make a nice, neat straight line. As a beginner guitarist, I also had a tendency to miss the high E string when picking, so I remedied the situation by raising the high E above all the other strings — couldn’t miss it.
It’s not recommended to raise the high E above the rest of the strings, but if I had become famous, everyone would be doing it. The strings are finally level and intonated.
I adjusted the neck truss rod, leveled the bridge saddles, and put some new strings on it. Then, for possibly the first time in this guitar’s entire life, I intonated each string.
Playing her through an amplifier last night generated a brief time warp.
Fourteen-year-old me was home alone in his small-town Oklahoma bedroom, the amplifier pegged to ten, fumbling through the chords of Smells Like Teen Spirit before kicking the amp over and pretending to smash the guitar onto the mattress of his bed.
The action is nice and low. The tone comes through dirtier than it does on my American made Telecaster, but that’s what you’d expect from old, cheap electronics. It plays as well as any cheap guitar can.
Maybe someday Finn will think it looks “cool enough” to give it a try.
“Adopt a son,” was the tagline under the Instagram photo. A local music shop had a vintage Gibson amplifier listed for sale in remarkably good cosmetic shape — except for the logo.
1964 Gibson Crestline GA 5T Skylark Tremolo
I had a quick chat with Mary about the rising value of vintage instruments that veered into a promise to sell the large Line6 AX2-212 amplifier sitting in my study, and I was off to retrieve the Gibson.
The amplifier had the original speaker, the original leather handle, no tears in the tolex or cloth, and very minimal rust on the faceplate. Unfortunately, the amp didn’t play quite as good as it looked. We still brokered a deal, and I brought it home. That’s when I took the week long deep dive into vintage radio and amplifier repair.
Yes, we have gone way beyond banana bread.
The Death Cap
It wasn’t until 1969 that Underwriters Laboratories mandated three-prong plugs on appliances. Amplifiers from the 1950s and 1960s came with a two prong power cord, which could be plugged in either way. The lack of earth ground made those amplifiers susceptible to RF noise. To combat this, designers added a capacitor between the negative terminal of the power cable and the chassis ground of the amplifiers. It was well-known and accepted at the time that if a musician was touching the guitar strings and touched another reverse grounded object such as a microphone, he or she would receive a noticeable shock. The problem with having a capacitor coming from the cable to ground was that if it failed open, it would deliver the full 120 volts AC to the musician.
The “paper caps” and the “death cap” on the unmolested board.
While I wanted to keep the amplifier as original as possible, I decided removing the “death cap” and adding a three-prong power cable with ground to earth was the way to go. I also relocated the positive cable lead to run through the fuse before the switch for a little added protection of the amplifier internals.
Three strand power cable with earth ground installed.
120hz Hum
The most noticeable issue with the amplifier was a very loud hum coming through the speakers even with the volume turned to zero. A lower 60hz hum can be an indicator of poor shielding, but a 120hz hum is usually an indicator of bad filter capacitors.
From what I could tell, the amplifier internals had never been touched, so the circuit was sporting two paper-wrapped electrolytic capacitors — a Maximite and a Minimite. I didn’t have a way to test those capacitors, but it’s generally accepted that the lifespan for a paper-wrapped electrolytic capacitor is 6 – 10 years. Being 56 years old, it was a pretty solid bet that both of them needed to be replaced.
I replaced the Maximite with two modern 22mf 450volt capacitors, and the Minimite was swapped for one of the same. I flipped the amplifier back on, and the hum was gone.
A pair of 22mf 400Volt capacitors in place of the Maximite.
As a side note, if someone is selling you a tube amp and says, “It has a hum, but it still plays great,” walk away. You can’t play great battling that hum. You can’t record with that hum. You can’t perform with that hum. Also, it’s just a matter of time before the leaking capacitors fry the power transformer and cause more damage to the amplifier.
The Mysterious Disappearing Tremolo
This amplifier has a built-in tremolo circuit powered by the oscillations of a vacuum tube. When I purchased the amplifier, it wasn’t working at all. Later at home you could hear the oscillations in the 120hz hum, but it wasn’t evident in the actual guitar sound. Then I tapped on a few connections and spread some crowded wires apart, and the tremolo disappeared completely.
My online searches turned up conflicting diagrams, some indicating a 6EU7 tube and some indicating a 6C4. As I researched both, the 6C4 was noted for it’s oscillations, so I ordered one thinking I had the wrong tube. Turns out a 6C4 isn’t even the right size for the plug. I tried a new 6EU7, and the tremolo was back.
Matched Power Tubes
When I purchased the amplifier, the dates and makes of the tubes varied greatly. The schematic called for two 6AQ5 power tubes, but one was a much more recent 6005. Power tubes are supposed to be electrically matched, so that they have the same plate current and amplification characteristics. The performance of vacuum tubes can vary wildly, so matched tubes were allegedly manufactured at the same time and more rigorously tested to meet the same specifications. When I ordered replacements from Amplified Parts, they sent me a pair of matched new old stock 6AQ5 tubes that were manufactured together in France in 1963. It kind of blows my mind that there’s still parts for these amplifiers sitting in warehouses.
Does the amp sound better with the matched tubes? Maybe I’m just a auditory plebeian, but I can’t tell a difference.
With the three-strand cable, new filter capacitors and new tubes, the amp is playing well, and I imagine it should be able to handle another 50 years. However, if I get the chance to upgrade my testing equipment I’d like to take some measurement and see how far off the original values the other capacitors and various resistors have wandered.
I should also probably spend a little time working on my guitar skills, so they do justice to this amplifier.
That was always the goal, right? A flip-flop lifestyle with cold suds, warm sun, and sandy beaches?
One out of three ain’t bad.
Until March, “remote worker” was sort of a mythical job description, held only by special computer programmers or gifted day traders. One of my previous roles as a social media manager was the closest I came to remote working, and in that role, I still needed to be in the office most days to host events or shoot photos and videos for the social posts. One day a week from home was a long way from wandering the world seeking adventure–jumping on wifi at foreign coffee houses to accomplish my daily tasks.
My first week at home I started writing a piece about how this pandemic was going to bring an unprecedented change to things like sports, movies and concerts, but it felt trite. I left it sitting in the drafts folder so long that now it seems naïve and irrelevant. (By the way, I had predicted it would all be over by July. I was definitely wrong about that.)
Aside from our trip to the hospital at the end of May to deliver the baby, we haven’t been anywhere or done much of anything.
Meet Michael Finley Facker, born May 31, 2020.
We spent five strange days in the hospital. Masks had to be worn at all times. The facility was a ghost town when we arrived. The halls were eerily empty. No visitors. No elective surgeries. However, that first big wave of Covid took hold in Houston while we were there, and by the time we left, there were people everywhere.
Since then it’s only been an occasional weekend trip to the marina, but we’ve been avoiding the pool and the pavilions as part of our social distancing. I don’t know how Covid will affect an infant, but I don’t want to find out.
He doesn’t seem to mind wearing a PFD, so that’s good news.
We had purchased concert tickets at Christmas for a show in April. In April the show was then pushed to August. In August it was canceled. The entire tour was tentatively rescheduled for next year, but I don’t know that next year will be any better.
I think that even if a viable vaccine is found by the end of this year, with all the logistics involved in manufacturing and distribution, it would probably roll out with the annual flu vaccine in September of 2021. Maybe after the election we’ll get some insight into more honest, realistic timelines.
We thought about spending a few weeks on the boat, but Mary’s big dual-monitor workstation has taken over the kitchen table. My large dual-monitor workstation has taken over the study. While her massive spreadsheets and my design work could be done on laptop screens, it would be tedious at best. The Kadey Krogen 38 doesn’t even have a nav station, so the one and only option on that boat to set up monitors would be at the one-way-in one-way-out foldout table — not ideal. Maybe as the weather cools and the cockpit becomes a viable place to work, we can spend a few days there, but between the speed of internet and hardware required, it turns out that our remote working still isn’t nomadic remote working.
There are definitely some advantages to working from home. The lack of commuting adds over an hour back into the day. We’ve cut at least 1,000 miles a month of driving. That’s only about 10 gallons of gas per week, and gas is cheap right now, but every little bit we can save helps.
For the most part work has continued as normal. I write articles, I build powerpoints, I update websites. Unfortunately, all of my photo and video work is completely gone. The added value I brought to the table with corporate portraits, executive videos, project documentaries, etc. is impossible to continue during our current circumstances. We’re running entirely on stock photos and self-shot smartphone or webcam video messages. And to be honest, I don’t think that work is coming back. Everyone has deemed iPhone pictures “good enough” and decided they can live without shallow depth of field, good lighting or high-fidelity audio.
The quality of audio/video in a Zoom or Teams call is now the acceptable business standard for the entire world. Craft your message with care because only the words matter now.
Before the baby was born, we couldn’t sleep at night due to the existential dread of the proliferating pandemic. Now we don’t sleep because the baby doesn’t sleep.
So here we are, sitting at home. Remote working. Hoping we stay employed to keep our healthcare. So far, so good. I hope everyone out there is doing ok.
It was December of 2018 when we closed on our most recent sailboat, a 1990 Kadey Krogen 38 Cutter. After ten years of sailing around Galveston Bay, this was supposed to be our “forever boat.” It was supposed to be a comfortable weekender with space for friends that would provide a great platform to cruise the Caribbean when we were ready.
Kadey Krogen took a lot of design risks with this boat. I think the flush deck makes the entire thing look like a bathtub barge, but my wife loves the look of it, so I put my personal tastes in style aside and gave it a chance. The upside to the flush deck is that it creates an incredibly large, beamy interior. Unfortunately that spacious interior is broken up in a way that leaves occupants constantly crawling around each other, feeling cornered, crowded, and always in the way. The fixed keel model is not quite as bad as the centerboard models because at least the U-shaped settee has access on both ends instead of requiring someone to scoot around the table and remain trapped in the corner the duration of a meal, but the unique galley design manages to completely block access to the companionway, the aft cabin, and all of the electrical panels at once.
On my 27′ Starwind, the galley sink was under the cockpit overhang requiring one to hunch down under the overhang in a strange position to wash dishes. It was so uncomfortable, and I hated it so much that I vowed never to have another boat with a sink under the overhang. The same goes for the entire galley in the Krogen. I absolutely hate it. I understand that there could be some benefit to bracing yourself in the narrow hallway while using the galley underway, but that idea in no way makes it worth the tradeoff of completely blocking the use of the companionway and the traffic flow of the entire boat.
Now let’s talk about that aft cabin. Mary fell in love with it because it has a queen size bed with a window to look out at the anchorage, and a big hanging closet. I will say, the closet it great. I will also say, the area under the bed provides pretty good engine access. It’s not GREAT, but it’s better than on our last boat. However, before we even started looking at boats, we agreed that we did not want a pullman berth that required us to climb over each other to get in and out of bed. The bed in the aft cabin of a Kadey Krogen is a pullman berth. It’s just turned sideways, so it’s even worse than a pullman berth because if you were to use it underway, you would literally have to change which end of the bed you had your head every single time the boat tacked. In the course of the past year I’ve gone from being so excited about that large bed and nice cabin to hating that cabin and bed just as much as I hate the galley and just as much as I hate the crowded one-way-in-one-way-out couch situation. If I’m on the inside, I spend the night pushed into the wall under the overhang. If I’m lucky enough to get the outside, I get pushed off the edge. It’s guaranteed that somebody gets woken up and climbed over at some point every night for a visit to the restroom or to take dogs out, etc.
So let’s talk about the head. The KK38 was one of the few vessels that had a separate shower stall in the head. That was on our list of things we wanted. It seemed great. All in all, over the course of the past 18 months, I think we have used the shower three times. Turns out, we didn’t really need a shower. Meanwhile, there’s no sink in the head to wash your hands. After using the restroom you have to make your way to the Vberth, galley or aft cabin to wash. Having sinks in the bedrooms but not the bathroom makes absolutely zero sense to me. I don’t get it.
Now, if the boat sailed great, and we were having exciting adventures on it, I could live with the inconvenient interior features. But, unfortunately, it doesn’t.
This issue is on me. I knew better than to buy a boat sight unseen, but I got caught up in the excitement and said, sure let’s roll the dice. The previous owner made some interesting rigging changes. The boat came with a non-original mast with a very early version of in-mast furling. Even with the entire system serviced, a brand new sail made just for it, and lessons on how to properly furl the sail in and out, it still took a half-dozen tries yesterday to get the sail out without the furler jamming up. We also have no steering lock or autopilot, so it turns the entire process into a complicated multi-person job with multiple trips to the mast to re-align the furling line to make sure it doesn’t overwrap, etc.
Another huge issue is the Westerbeke W-46 diesel. My Starwind had a Westerbeke 10-Two, and after seeing the prices Westerbeke wanted for a starter and rebuild kits, I literally threw it away and bought a Kubota-based motor. My research and experience has proven that Beta Marine and Yanmar are the two solid, affordable choices for sailboat diesels. You avoid Volvo and Westerbeke like the plague. However, we ended up with a Westerbeke motor and generator. That’s fine until something breaks, and we lost the water pump a couple months ago. It was $940 to get a replacement. The same style water pump on a Ford car engine is literally $30. I searched and searched for a Mitsubishi pump that would fit or for some other alternative. That ridiculous water pump is literally 20 percent of the cost of putting a new Beta Marine 50hp in the boat. It killed me inside to finally do it, but we had no choice.
Unfortunately, the Westerbeke isn’t through with me. While it now runs great in neutral, the transmission is screaming in gear, so I’ve probably got to tear that apart next. As I was investigating that problem I also noticed that I think we have a crack and leak where our stern tube come through the bottom of the boat. Again, not something we could have even guessed at with this boat had we seen it since it was sitting on the hard and couldn’t be put in the water before purchase. Another reason we should have walked away.
Project boats are fun when the projects are small and inexpensive. They’re not fun when they require cranes and thousands of dollars.
With any project, it wouldn’t be so bad if you at least knew you could recoup what has been spent. Unfortunately, to me, the long term value of these boats looks bleak. Of course, that’s not what the owners group will tell you. But I see the same issue with the Mercury Cougar’s owners group. From basbeball cards to beanie babies, people want to believe that what they’re invested in is worth more than it is. I think the “bargain” estate sale price we paid is actually probably not far from the realistic value of these boats in good shape. That puts us extremely upside down on this project, but at some point you have to let go of the money to hang on to your sanity.
svgimmeshelter 