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Newbe with no experience buys big boat

63K views 343 replies 85 participants last post by  glenndamato 
#1 ·
I just finished this book.
Breaking Seas: An overweight, middle-aged computer nerd buys his first boat, quits his job, and sails off to adventure: Glenn Damato: 9780985816209: Amazon.com: Books@@AMEPARAM@@http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51VUNGcnmUL.@@AMEPARAM@@51VUNGcnmUL

What a fun read. Every couple of months someone asks if they can buy a boat with no experience and do some serious cruising. Not something I would do but everyone is different.

This guy did it and really barred his soul about what worked and what didn't work. I'm going to try to get him to join this forum so you animals can tear him up as is your custom.:)

For a short fat guy he is tough as nails and I'm sure can take it.
He found himself on a lee shore with a busted impeller and a full keel boat that would not point.
He saved the boat, with a clever hack, how did he do it.
 
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#2 ·
I just finished this book.
Breaking Seas: An overweight, middle-aged computer nerd buys his first boat, quits his job, and sails off to adventure: Glenn Damato: 9780985816209: Amazon.com: Books

What a fun read. Every couple of months someone asks if they can buy a boat with no experience and do some serious cruising. Not something I would do but everyone is different.

This guy did it and really barred his soul about what worked and what didn't work. I'm going to try to get him to join this forum so you animals can tear him up as is your custom.:)

For a short fat guy he is tough as nails and I'm sure can take it.
He found himself on a lee shore with a busted impeller and a full keel boat that would not point.
He saved the boat, with a clever hack, how did he do it.
Sea turtles?
 
#12 ·
Hello everyone - this is Glenn, the author of Breaking Seas.

David let me know via email he had started this message thread on sailnet. Thanks David!

Some readers are perplexed and disappointed that I did not complete the circumnavigation -especially after spending all that time and trouble getting as far as I did!

In view of that, I want to clarify the two big reasons I decided to go back to San Diego. First, I discovered during the periods of heavy weather and rain, Serenity's belowdecks were not even close to watertight. After spending years and dozens of tubes of 5200 to seal everything I could see topsides, I learned that in order to have a prayer at keeping the cabin dry, I would have to have a boatyard remove and re-bed the entire deck - it was the hull-deck joint that needed total rebedding, and more 5200 would not do a thing. As anyone who has ever been in a boatyard knows, that is a HUGE and expensive task, particularly nasty to contemplate less than a year after coming out of an American boatyard! Until that was done, even a RAIN would result in my bunk cushions and other gear below getting soaked. The boat might make a fine weekender in Southern California (where it rarely drizzels between April and October) but not for world cruising - and especially not to the Marquesas, one of the rainiest spots on Earth.

The second reason for cutting the trip short was I did not desire or plan to do it alone. BEST CASE scenario would be to do it with a lover - an attractive female with no ties ashore willing to go the distance. Those who read the book will be able to fill in the details there.

The second best scenario would be to circumnavigate with a trusted friend, either another guy or a woman with whom I shared a platonic, non-sexual, non-romantic relationship. That would have been fine with me . . . but it didn't work out that way. For the details, please read the book.

While ashore, I would have said I was willing to circumnavigate alone, but after the experience of being at sea and anchored off a strange land, the idea had zero appeal to me. Yes, I was lonely. It seemed to me that all the other singlehanders I could see had fallen into alcohol abuse. They were clearly NOT a part of the "standard" cruising community, consisting of families and couples. As detailed in the book, I could not see myself living that lifestyle. I craved mental stimulation, and my old job as a software instructor.

One of the Amazon reviews (the one negative review in the bunch, really) said something like, "He went back to the job he despised," or something like that. But nowhere in the book do I say or hint that I hated my job! I found it quite comfortable in every way, and I did not realize until I left it how much I enjoyed teaching and the regular interaction with my fellow humans, even if in a professional environment. My head ached for new input, and this was in the days before eReaders became common, so I had quickly read out all the books I had with me and craved new stimulation.

In short, it was no longer fun - I saw no reason to make it into an obsession simply because of what people might think. And by the time I got back to San Diego after the stint single handing the Baja Bash, I had gotten EVERYTHING out if the trip I had sought.

Hope that clarifies.

Kind regards,

Glenn
 
#16 ·
Hello everyone - this is Glenn, the author of Breaking Seas.

The second reason for cutting the trip short was I did not desire or plan to do it alone. BEST CASE scenario would be to do it with a lover - an attractive female with no ties ashore willing to go the distance. Those who read the book will be able to fill in the details there.

Kind regards,

Glenn
Welcome to the forum, and nice post, Glenn. I recommend against posting "Female sailing companion wanted" on this site. That approach has been tried and always invites a slew of commentary. Who knows, though, you may get lucky.
 
#13 ·
As soon as I'm sure I've got a good enough internet connection I'm buying the Kindle edition. Looks good Glenn!
 
#14 ·
Thanks for the pointer David.

Thanks for the book Glenn, it's on my list for Kindle.
I can certainly understand the not wanting to do it alone aspect. I'm sure I could, but why would I want to?
Guess I'll have to read the book and see what boat has a leaky deck.
 
#18 ·
Come on guys you can do better than that. Sea Turtles!!!
Where is your imagination. I'm dying to tell you but right now there are 70 people logged in probably over a thousand hours of seamanship experience so I'm expecting more creative solutions.

Visualize this:
Your in the bilge of your boat. The boat is snapping around in serious seas.
You know you have about 10 minutes before you are on the rocks.
You see your impeller is shot, broken vanes.
You are furious with yourself and the store because they sold you 6 impellers that don't fit and you didn't check before you left.
It is unbelievably frustrating. The engine is in perfect condition it just needs water to keep cool enough.

Now captain what do you do????

To be fair I doubt I would have thought of his solution. But he did in the the most extreme conditions.
 
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#21 ·
Try sailing, perhaps? (grin)

Now, I've never sailed a Downeaster 38, though I did run a 45 south many years ago... While she certainly was not a stellar performer under sail, I do believe she would have been capable of clawing off a lee shore in most any conditions that that an engine would have been able to do so...
 
#20 ·
"It is unbelievably frustrating. The engine is in perfect condition it just needs water to keep cool enough.

Now captain what do you do????

To be fair I doubt I would have thought of his solution. But he did in the the most extreme conditions.
"

Me, I'd hook up the bilge pump to the raw water intake of the engine and open a seacock that would supply water to the bilge pump. Crack the **** (seacock, sorry censor software, didn't mean to offend) open enough to keep up with the engine requirements but not enough to flood the boat.
 
#26 ·
Finally a real sailor.
That is exactly what Glenn did!!
What a great idea especially since it worked for, I'm going on memory, a few weeks.
 
#27 ·
Now to grill Glenn.
Are you sure your leaks were hull-deck joint?
I read your book very fast so forgive me if I missed some stuff but did you remove everything from the deck and rebed.
Even some handrails or blocks mounted to the deck can let in a lot of water.

Also 5200 is considered the wrong stuff to use for bedding above the waterline.
You want something that stays soft and is not such a powerful adhesive.
The idea is that that a super adhesive like 5200 will not allow any movement and will actually cause things to crack someplace else and allow water in.
Someone will reference the appropriate thread for your next boat.
 
#31 ·
I'm not sure exactly where the water was coming in, except that it was not from the ten new bronze ports I installed. The deck and cabin top had plastic foam core. My theory was that this foam core was getting saturated somehow, probably from multiple sources, probably chiefly the hull-deck joint. Once the core got saturated, it "rained" inside the boat from hundreds of points! In the end, it seemed like the only thing left to be done was re-bed the joint, which requires pulling the deck off the hull with a crane. That, of course, requires taking the entire boat apart - rig, stays, lifelines, gunwales, EVERYTHING - in Mexico, and I was told it would not be any cheaper than having it done in CA, because the pace would be slower. Even after all that, there would be no guarantee of a dry belowdecks. I would not find out until I had sailed into the equatorial zone the following May on the way to the Marquesas and hit some rain squalls. Note: spraying the boat with a high pressure hose does not provide an adequate test. At sea, the boat is flexing and gaps open up that remain closed when the boat is tied to a dock.
 
#36 ·
Thanks guys. I live in Marina del Rey, surounded by thousands of boats, brokers, you name it. I am seriously considering getting back into it. With the economy what it is, the deals are incredible.

David - I think the solution is to look for a boat that has been sailed off shore in all kinds of conditions sometime over the last few years, and then hunt for signs of leakage. If a boat leaks bad, it's almost impossible for the owner to cover up ALL the telltale signs. There will be heavy mildew under the cushions. The bilge may show watermarks high up. The lockers will look like they've been filled with soggy mess - or are ALL the lockers repainted? Hmmm. My main point is the usual "hose test" will not tell you much. If ports or hatches leak, they probably only need some adjustment or a new gasket.
 
#194 ·
it's almost impossible for the owner to cover up ALL the telltale signs. There will be heavy mildew under the cushions. The bilge may show watermarks high up. The lockers will look like they've been filled with soggy mess - or are ALL the lockers repainted? Hmmm. My main point is the usual "hose test" will not tell you much. If ports or hatches leak, they probably only need some adjustment or a new gasket.
1. Glenn, Did the survey pickup on the leaks?
2. If a boat was not heavaly sailed or was recently refurbished is their any survey techniques that would expose the leaks. I'm sure you have talked to a lot of people about this.
3. You said you thought that the core was getting saturated from the hull deck joint. As far as I know the core material does not extent to the hull deck joint. It is solid at the very edge of the boat.
Is it possible that you had wet core from deck mounted items like hand-rails etc that leaked.
You can typically find hull-deck leaks by drips down the inside of the hull not by leaks directly over berths.
Course if you are healed enough and the hull-deck joint leaks it could drip inboard and not follow the hull.
 
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#37 · (Edited)
I don't think a leak in the hull/deck joint will cause saturation in the deck core unless there are other breaches into the core. I haven't done that project myself but I've seen and read about other DE owners doing the job (and you don't have to remove the whole deck, just the teak cap-rail). From what I understand, the "top" and "bottom" layers of fiberglass on the deck come together at the edges, completely encapsulating the core. The only place where there is "exposed" core is where the ports and salon window openings were cut. If the boat seemed to be leaking everywhere when it rained, that is likely caused by leaking fittings.

As far as the lee shore description, that sounds like a very tight spot. I hope I never experience that. Sounds like you did a great job in coming up with a way to get the engine going again. If I did find myself in that situation, I think I'd go about it by:

Getting the anchor ready, checking the chart to see if the reef comes up gradually or steep, or if there was a gradual slope anywhere nearby that might successfully grab the anchor if my sailing attempts did not work.

If the wind is up, which it sounds like it was, I would drop the jib before I reefed the main. Going with main and staysail, you can still point nearly as well as you will with full sail, if you have a decent breeze. And if the jib is old and fat, you will point better without it and it will be windage forward if it's flogging, pushing the bow downwind, toward the reef.

Remove everything from the deck that will cause excess windage, time permitting.

It's hard to resist the urge, but you can't chase wind angle with a full keel boat. That's fools gold, if you are going slow, you're not really pointing as high as you think. There is too much leeway if you don't have any speed through the water. I would maybe try to build up some speed off the wind a little, hopefully not giving up too much ground, then pinch up and let the large mass of the boat power through a wave or two, then fall off again and build up speed and repeat. That would be my best guess, boat speed off the wind and momentum, but you have to keep boat speed up or you are going sideways.

Not trying to second guess, just going thinking about what I would do in that situation, since I have the same boat and have a pretty good feel for how it sails. What you describe is a tough situation in any boat. Love the solution to getting the engine started, very clever. Years of problem solving in front of a screen may have saved your skin that day.
 
#48 · (Edited)
If the wind is up, which it sounds like it was, I would drop the jib before I reefed the main. Going with main and staysail, you can still point nearly as well as you will with full sail, if you have a decent breeze. And if the jib is old and fat, you will point better without it and it will be windage forward if it's flogging, pushing the bow downwind, toward the reef.

It's hard to resist the urge, but you can't chase wind angle with a full keel boat. That's fools gold, if you are going slow, you're not really pointing as high as you think. There is too much leeway if you don't have any speed through the water. I would maybe try to build up some speed off the wind a little, hopefully not giving up too much ground, then pinch up and let the large mass of the boat power through a wave or two, then fall off again and build up speed and repeat. That would be my best guess, boat speed off the wind and momentum, but you have to keep boat speed up or you are going sideways.

Not trying to second guess, just going thinking about what I would do in that situation, since I have the same boat and have a pretty good feel for how it sails. What you describe is a tough situation in any boat. Love the solution to getting the engine started, very clever. Years of problem solving in front of a screen may have saved your skin that day.
Damn, and just when I thought there was no greater piece of crap sailing to weather, than an Island Trader 38... (grin, bigtime) Just kidding, of course - I was favorably impressed by the sailing ability of the 45 I ran, considering the type of boat it is...

One of the things the Downeaster 38 is known for, is being underpowered... The standard factory install of a Faryman 24 Hp is woefully inadequate for that boat, IMHO, and it's still a bit surprising to hear of a situation where such a small engine made such a big difference... (assuming SERENITY had that original powerplant, of course) Presumably, Glenn had been making progress to weather to put himself in that position to begin with, and I understand there can be some current in the vicinity of Cedros... More than anything, this should be a cautionary lesson in the avoidance of a lee shore situation in an un-weatherly boat to begin with - but not having been there, and not having read his book, that's all conjecture on my part, of course...

Your suggestion to go with the staysail and main alone in such a situation, however, with a boat with a bowsprit and so much freeboard forward, is right on the money... That likely would have offered his best way out of that box, the much tighter sheeting angle and flatter cut of most staysails might have afforded much better progress to weather... Last year I ran a Valiant 42 back north from the Rio Dulce, and we were hard on a good NE breeze all the way up to Isla Mujeres, and then across the Yucutan... Not only did we make a roughly equivalent VMG under staysail and main alone, than when trying to carry the jib, it was a more comfortable ride as well, less punishing to the boat, and much less water coming over the deck...

Kudos to Glenn for his creative solution with the engine, but this is another example of the value of a cruising boat being "nimble", and weatherly, and being able to sail out of a tight spot... There have been a couple of threads here recently re windward performance, and I'm always a bit surprised to hear some dismiss the importance of such ability in a cruising boat... Engines so often fail at the absolute most inopportune moment, and one may not always have the time to futz around with McGyver-style fixes, you need to be able to sail your way to safety, if anchoring is not an option... I think it's not uncommon, that people get into trouble by wasting precious time attempting to get an engine running again in a dire circumstance, when the better initial response would be simply to sail your way out of danger...

And to Glenn, nice to see you show up here... Please understand, despite my initial post to this thread, I do not consider your trip to be a "failure" because you abandoned your plans to sail across the Pacific, and beyond. Obviously, in your case, you made the correct decision, for you... Again, your story should simply serve as a cautionary, informative tale in regards to The Reality not always matching The Dream, and the advisability of starting out cruising by taking an approach more akin to baby steps, than by jumping in with both feet... For some people, like the late Mike Harker, the latter approach worked out great, but it's certainly not a guarantee for everyone...

Best of luck with the book, and whatever path you choose next...
 
#38 ·
Thanks Argyle. You're right, there were lots of ways water could get into the core besides the hull-deck joint. I had already re-beded the teak caprails in late 2001 - after I put the screws back I filled the holes with epoxy & graphite - nice and black, looked salty, but a really, really dumb thing to do. Would have been hell to get those caprails off again.

The water off that part of Cedros was far too deep to anchor. Very rocky too. The only windage item on deck was the dink, and I wasn't about to toss that over! There weren't any jerrycans, bicycles and the usual stuff cruisers put on deck - I expected the Baja Bash to be tough going and be usually close hauled. What was stopping me were the swells - I remember them as high, steep, and close together - each one seemed to push me closer to the rocks, so that even though I was pointed maybe 30 degrees off the shoreline (60 off the wind) the swells (and leeway) were pushing me ashore slightly faster than the sailing was taking me away. It "felt" like I was sailing away from the rocks, but my trusty Garmin told another story - my track was taking me closer.
 
#39 ·
After reading this thread last night, I was motivated to download the book on my ipad. I read through approximately 30 pages last night before I had to put it down (it was getting late).

The first 30 pages went by incredibly fast as I was completely engrosed in the story.

Glenn - you will need to go on another adventure and write a second book! If you need some crew, send me a PM!
 
#41 ·
Glen, lets talk gear.
In your book you mentioned that you bought a W-H autopilot rather than the typical cheaper model.
I believe this is the website: Products
Which model did you use.
How did it perform.
Were their any limitations?
How much power did it take?
Any problems with it.
What spares for it did you bring?
 
#45 ·
Thanks Manhattan and Patrick! I'm working on a book for 2013 but it's a novel. I'm also looking at boats. There are some incredible deals, probably because of the economy. At the same time, I know what I'm letting myself in for when a boat is acquired! I may need to finish the next book first. Thanks again for your support!
 
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