New deck paint.

Before the start of the season and after the change of the portlights I decided it will be a good idea to renew the deck paint.
In the areas where I walk I placed the Interdeck beige antislip paint from International.

Interdeck Sand Beige

In the other areas I went with the Super Gloss HS pearl white paint of International.

Super Gloss HS pearl white

New antifouling.

It seems that the idea about the antifouling from the last year is working. When the boat got out of the water the soft antifouling was washed out and the hard antifouling Interspeed extra was staying:

After that I placed on top of it new layer of Cruiser One antifouling:

Looks like we are ready for the new season :)

New portlights and deckhatch.

I decided it is about the time to change my boat glassing :) My friends were joking that now I will be able to look and see through my windows :)

For a deckhatch, I went for flushing deckhatch 500x370, R=42 from gebo from a local shop:

flushing deckhatch

The same type of deckhatch was recommended on Jeremy Rogers web page.

The portlights, fixings, and linings I got from Jeremy Rogers Limited:

portlights

Looks good :)

I installed the deckhatch so it opens forwards. The idea behind is when it is open in calm weather the accidental wave splashing will not come inside.

It is time now to paint the deck I think :)

Merry Christmas and Happy New 2017 year :)

Brilliant lighting at Scheveningen harbour during the holidays :)

Merry Christmas and Happy New 2017 year everyone :)

AIS Class B transponder

I think it is a good idea to get AIS information on board in North Sea traffic lanes in the Netherlands. For all commercial vessels and vessels above 15 m in length the AIS class A transponder is obligatory in the Netherlands. Because I think it will be nice not just you to see the others, but also it would be useful that others see you I decided to go not just for receiver, but for transponder device. My boat is not extremely fast, and it can be very useful when crossing the big ships  traffic lanes a front of Hoek van Holland, Rotterdam, or Westerschelde area in front of Antwerpen for example. I do not have marine plotter on board, and I considered mainly wi-fi options. Funnily there are not many of them:

Smartfind M10 / M10W AIS Class B Transponder
XB-8000 Class B AIS Transponder with Built-in WiFi and NMEA 2000 Gateway
EasyTRX²-S Klasse B AIS Transponder
Watcheye B Class AIS Transponder

I went for the cheapest and easier to install: Watcheye, it has integrated GPS antenna (so no need to drill extra holes in the hull), I got also the antenna splitter from Watcheye (no need to install second VHF antenna), and the Watcheye wifi device.

 

The installation is pretty simple and straight forward. I display the data with iSailor software on my very old Android Samsung Tab. I normali use Navionics, but iSailor was the cheapest software solution (other possibility would be WinGPS Marine, but it was way too expensive for me) which would permit importing AIS and NMEA data via wifi direct on the nautical charts. The free Apps solution were like displaying on a radar like display.

More August sailing :)

Could not resist to post that, nice sailing evening with my niece and unexpectedly met friend and sailing buddy :)

Dutch summer :)

Brilliant weather for spinnaker sailing yesterday at the North Sea :) There was not space for extra line since I installed the rolling Genua. I placed the spinnaker halyard through a block at the top of the mast with a help from friend of mine. It was the first test. We sailed into the sunset together with my niece (the last photo is hers) :) Looks good thought :)