Sailing Around Australia; Gadgets

4^th March 2014; Gadgets

On our sailing around Australia Adventures aboard Easy Tiger we have found that there seems to be no end of gadgets that are supposed to make the life of the cruising sailor easier.

One gadget Leanne bought me for my birthday was the Winchrite powered winch handle.

We have an 18 metre high mast on Easy Tiger. That means when it’s time to put the main sail up, someone has to physically pull the halyard (a rope attached to the top of the sail, that then runs around a pulley at the top of the mast) at least 17 metres up. This is achieved with the help of a rope winch, which is operated with a crank handle.

I normally can get the main sail half way up by just good old fashioned elbow grease, while Leanne steers Easy Tiger into the wind. Then we used to get the winch handle and wind, round and round, round and round, raising the sail just centimetres on each revolution.

This proves to be very good aerobic exercise, when you do it once a day. Sometimes in fluky or strong wind conditions we may be required to do it 2 or even 3 times a day and that is when it is just plain hard work.

The introduction of the Winchrite on to our boat has made it just so much easier to get the sail up. I would still pull the sail up half way manually, then the next third or so is achieved by the winchrite. To finish off, we only have to do a couple of dozen turns with the winch handle and we are under way. We don’t collapse in a heap unable to catch our breath any more.

Just before we set off on our sailing around Australia adventures, we found that we had a problem charging our Winchrite. I was horrified at the thought of having to manually wind up our main sail up every day. I thought I would probably end up looking like Michelin Man at the end of our adventures. So a quick call to Chris at Boating Hardware in O’connor, Perth was made.

After some discussion with Chris and Sven from Sailology (the manufacturers) we were very pleased that they were prepared to support their brand and their product and they sent us a replacement Winchrite.

Having not had any assistance on the ropes for more than a month, I was like a child at Christmas receiving the Winchrite replacement. I may need to find another form of aerobic exercise now though.

Our rope winches are other gadgets on board we could not possibly do without. We have 2 speed Anderson Winches. Operated with a crank type handle, if you turn them one way you get quicker rope movement without as much pulling force, turn them the other and you get more force less movement.

On the last day of our Great Australian Bight crossing, our main rope winch gave up. I had to then run the rope past that winch on to another, but as it was lower, the rope wound on from an angle and kept tangling and knotting.

This caused more grief and more words rhyming with truck and duck.

After a call to the agents for the winches, Allspars in Brisbane, the parts arrived at Killa’s today and I have just finished repairing and servicing the winch. Another supplier providing good service.

So we are now ready to go sailing again with all our gadgets fully functional.

All we need now is a bit of a wind change. For the 20 days we have been in Streaky Bay, the wind has come up from the south east to over 20 knots on 15 occasions. Our next destination is Sceale bay and Flinders Island after that. These both lie South East of here. After pushing into the wind for four days across the great Australian bight, none of us are interested in pushing into the wind, or, in sailing slang, going uphill.

The weekend looks like it may produce a couple of days of light wind in the right direction, so we may tear ourselves away from Streaky Bay then. Of course that is unless we get another feed of whiting, crabs, razor fish or go for a scrumptious morning tea at Moceans.

There will be plenty more weather windows…won’t there?