C22 Strange and unusual noises under sail

[Bill]

I'm new to catalina sailing, and I had my c22 out last weekend for the first time. When I get moving pretty good, a metalic hum can be heard and it sounds like its coming from the keel. I loosened the cable that swings the keel down because I thought it might be resonance from the tight cable, but that didn't do anything. The faster the boat goes, the higher the pitch of the hum. Is this phenomenon explainable by physics, or is my boat haunted . . . Happy sails

 

[Don]

Swing Keel Cable Hum

The humming you hear is indeed the swing keel cable and is quite normal for this type of boat. Some people have slackened the cable to minimize the hum, but to varying degrees of success. It is just one of those things you have to get used to with this setup.

 

[jim]

hummmm ---- tighten the keel holder

I had a C-22 a few years back. On the port side, under the settee, you will see a bolt with a bar (tee). This is a keel holder. It serves two purposes. One is to keep the keel vertical if the boat turns turtle. The other purpose is hold the keel from moving under sail. Unfortunately many older swing keels needed the swing pin repaired. The hole has a bushing and it gets worn egg shaped. Not only does this let the keel wobble and make noise, but it really hampers the boat from pointing. It seems the best I could point wasn't much more than 90 degrees. Not much help in a race!There are procedures for doing it (replacing keel bushings) in a C-22 tech book. Join the C-22 association and I think you get this for $10 or so more. Look on Sailnet.com for associate information or on Catalina pages for links.