Emergence From The Chrysalis
August 12, 2007
Caterpillars are ugly, or at least many folks think so. Butterflies are beautiful, a fact that very few would deny. Until a caterpillar spins its silk chrysalis and goes through that magic transformation of nature, it just doesn’t look quite right. The same thing is true for a boat. As you commission a sailboat for the first time, until the mast is actually on the boat it just doesn’t look right. They look like a powerboat that suffered some horrible accident in the womb. When it comes time to step the mast, however, that caterpillar turns into the most beautiful butterfly a sailor could ever see.
After several false starts, the day finally arrived when Makara would get her wings. That is not just a figure of speech since a sail works much like an aircraft wing except it is vertical instead of horizontal like on a plane. Monday August 6th was they day. We drove to Annapolis the night before so we could be ready early that morning for the big event. We were blasé about the whole affair - not. To be totally honest it seemed like I didn’t get a lick of sleep when I woke up next morning.
We arrived at Jabin’s yard about nine o’clock just as Makara was making her way into the yard. Thom and Scott brought her over from the commissioning dock at Wagner Stevens for the event. It was an overcast, misty morning in Back Creek, almost surreal as she slowly motored and docked. The more we see her, mast or not, the more her graceful lines strike us. When you fall for a boat the way we did for Makara you just can’t help those feelings.
As usual with things like launchings and mast steppings, they do not always go as planned and the riggers were not going to be on hand until after lunch. While the excitement was a bit damped by yet another delay, the event was still on for the day so we took the opportunity to take care of some other Makara related business while in town. Several stops were in order.
The first stop was North Sails to finalize details on the soon to be produced “canvas”. “Canvas” sounds so much more nautical than Dacron so what the heck we’ll use the term in the figurative sense. The next stop was the graphic artists that will render our hull art. Makara needs her name and homeport on her hull to be legal as a federally documented vessel. There is nothing in the regulations to prevent it from looking good as long as the letters meet the minimum requirements for visibility. We also picked up some color samples to match the signature Passport gold accent stripes and the blue we used for the boot stripes (yes it is blue not black as it appear in the pictures). Finally, we needed some “canvas” supplies for our boat seamstress activities with our Sailrite sewing machine. In this case, “canvas” is Sunbrella fabric. Winch covers I think? I am sure I will get the word on that one when pressed into sweatshop service. Oh joy!
When we arrived back at Jabin’s after our chores, the riggers were just preparing to lift the mast. Good timing. We hurriedly parked, grabbed the still and video cameras and went into documentary filmmaker mode. In case we have not made the point before Makara’s rig is not small, nor is it the biggest, but the stick is still huge (nearly 70 feet!).
As you can see in the picture to the left, the mast dwarf’s the riggers. It is a stiff cross section, beefy for its height. It has a good structural safety margin as far as I am concerned. The crane operator handled the stick with the grace of a ballerina and slowly, very slowly moved it to the lift dock where Scott had positioned Makara.
The rigging operation entailed a multitude of people. A mast this size is serious business and the riggers we not taking any chances of being short handed in the muscle department. Fortunately not much muscle was required as the crane operator and his spotter were unbelievably skilled.
Once over Makara the crane did a dance of extensions and tilts until the mast was perfectly vertical over Makara. The method these riggers used was to get the mast vertical and stabilized by pinning it against the end of the crane that was padded. It was amazing once they accomplished that. It was very rigid and could be moved and dropped from a stable position. They then aligned the mast with the mast collar and partners (hole in the deck where the mast goes) and down she went. Again verrrrrry slowly. Three to four riggers were focused on the drop and insertion of the mast, with one eventually going below to “catch” the mast and make sure it set properly on the mast step sitting on the keel of Makara.
While it seemed like a long time, kind of like a traffic accident, the entire operation was actually quite short. I looked up near the end of the process and the sight took my breath away. Makara was now really a sailboat. The mast was even more impressive standing up in the boat. Once in place the work to set the rigging and stabilize the mast began a process that would consume a good deal more of the now sunny and blisteringly hot afternoon.
For us, it was the yet another step in the fulfillment of our dream. Makara had her mast and was a big step closer to finishing her commissioning process. This event was very import in many ways beyond the mast itself. We had purposely held off sail production until our friends at North Sails could actually measure the rigging. We learned along time ago that every boat, even those of the same make and model, has small (and sometimes big) variations from the specified design measurements that can cause all kinds of mischief if you build the sails to a specification rather than the actual boat. With the mast on North Sails could accurately measure our boat and start cutting Dacron. Sails should be available mid-September so stayed tuned. As soon as the sails are ready we are taking Makara for a sail and no one better attempt to stop us!
If you are wondering why “Dacron”, our sails will be very heavy duty woven cruising sails. We decided against more high tech laminates. Just our preference, nothing wrong with laminates in general. Our intended use patterns, cruising style and experience with sail repairs and such are more in line with woven Dacron type sails than laminate sails. We do, however, have some nice little features built in such as an overhead leach cord that we can tighten from the mast even when the sail is reefed. It would take a circus performer to do it from the end of the boom on Makara! As mentioned before Makara’s headsail is on a furler, but her staysail in hanked. The main is set for three reefs. And yes, the winch covers, dodger, bimini etc. will match the UV shield cover on the headsail…”Sunbrella Linen”. After all, it wouldn’t do for Makara’s ‘threads’ not to match.