From another '88 33.5 owner
You are certainly ambitious. I think the idea of all chain is a good idea, with the water holding tank also under the v-berth you will have some pretty substantial weight up front. I would see what kind of weight 250' of chain is, then simulate that weight (even people crammed up on the fore peak) with a full water tank to see what your water line was doing prior to going that route. You may find the loss of performance undesireable. Most windlass models today are made to handle chain to rope rode smoothly and without jams. Furler: We went with the Harken unit 1 last year and with some modifications got it down into the anchor locker . This allowed our new 150 genny to be cut right to the deck for added power, not to mention it keeps the deck nice and clean looking up front. The only tips I can think of are: if not already done, replace forestay (being 12 years old). Shaefer leads that go down on stantions that run the furling line outside them worked great for us. Harken (or similiar) hexa ratchet block in the cockpit makes furling and reefing easier and puts resistance on the furling line when you are pulling out sail with jib sheets. Make sure you wrap your drum in the correct direction (as this determines fairlead positions)to correspond with your sails uv cover (port or strbd). This sounds like a "duh" but you would be surprised how often it happens. We like our Index Powervang for several reasons. The 5:1 purchase lead back to the primary winch with a lewmar powercluth (splice larger diam. line to spectra line) is plenty of power to bring the boom down when a stiff breeze is aft of the beam. Being an internal purchase system, this is the best looking vang and matches the look of your boom and mast awesome. Very nice looking. Also, the locking collar replaces the topping lift. Just remember to lock the collar down before releasing the halyard. We brought the boom down on our dodger once or twice to learn this lesson. I have a picture of how this vang would look on your boat I could email you in you would like. My email is dougburgy@msn.com. Laptop: If you have a good dodger and aren't sailing in a real storm, and you haven't added any rope clutches to the port side of your companionway, that area makes a great mounting area. You can mount snap hardware or rubber feet to your laptop bottom and put a safety strap for major heeling. I was going to buy a weather proof unit but found this spot to be very protected. Another possibility in nice weather is to put it on the plexi companionway cover and "open" the cover until it "locks" it into place. Fuel gauge? With super easy access to view the tank with opening the lazarette it is not really needed, we decided. On a boat that burns a gallon every couple of hours and a 30 gallon tank, our biggest concern is how to use that much fuel before it goes bad. I would much rather have a gauge on my holding tank. Any ideas on this one? Sounds like you really get good use from your well equiped boat. Enjoy! Doug
