Well. . . not only did I purchase my boat ('89 Hunter 30) in November and didn't get the chance to do any sailing but I also had the unenviable task of figuring out how to cover the boat for the winter. I thought I'd save a few dollars on shrink wrap and cover the boat with a tarp I purchased myself. Unfortunately, due mainly to my inexperience and some brutal weather here in Rhode Island I cut off what was remaining of the tarp yesterday. It is still incredibly cold and I don't know when I'll get another chance to cover her up. The Wheel pedistal and winches are tightly wrapped with plastic and nothing is penetrating the cabin. The boat is only 3 miles from my house and I visit it often to check on it and sweep off snow. Should I worry about covering it this season or take a pass and do a better job next year? If she stays uncovered is there anything I should be checking or doing? For next year, is shrink wrap worth the money? I appreciate any responses. Thank you. Alan Eland
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Tony Z
Bib Bucks for the shrink wrap
Shrink wrap is real tough on the wallet but the boat will stay dry and clean all season. There are a lot of boaters that don't cover up at all. If you have any open cracks, holes, leaks etc... it would be wise to seal them up(make sure they are dry first). If you know that everything is water tight above deck and you don't mind cleaning up in the spring you may be able to get away with it.
Shrink wrap is real tough on the wallet but the boat will stay dry and clean all season. There are a lot of boaters that don't cover up at all. If you have any open cracks, holes, leaks etc... it would be wise to seal them up(make sure they are dry first). If you know that everything is water tight above deck and you don't mind cleaning up in the spring you may be able to get away with it.
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Ed Schenck
Also November, '98..
Hi Alan, I also purchased my boat, an H37C, in November of '98. It was on the cradle and I had it surveyed there, not seeing it float until May. But I was fortunate that the bad weather held off. I was able to check the winterizing and then cover it. And I used cheap blue tarps, then and now. My objectives were the helm and the cabin, especially the portlights and companionway. I made certain the tarps came down into the cockpit to cover the instruments. I do not cover the entire boat. I use lots of sandbags because of the wind, they rest on the tarp on the deck, next to the cabin sides. I also have lengths of six-inch drainage pipe running forward and aft of the mast. This removes any flat areas where water from rain or snowmelt might lay. I still quite a bit of water down the mast so I have to keep plenty of anti-freeze in the bilge. The problem is getting into the boat on those occasional nice days when you want to get some work done. Move the sandbags, strip back the tarps(two layers), and move that pipe.
Hi Alan, I also purchased my boat, an H37C, in November of '98. It was on the cradle and I had it surveyed there, not seeing it float until May. But I was fortunate that the bad weather held off. I was able to check the winterizing and then cover it. And I used cheap blue tarps, then and now. My objectives were the helm and the cabin, especially the portlights and companionway. I made certain the tarps came down into the cockpit to cover the instruments. I do not cover the entire boat. I use lots of sandbags because of the wind, they rest on the tarp on the deck, next to the cabin sides. I also have lengths of six-inch drainage pipe running forward and aft of the mast. This removes any flat areas where water from rain or snowmelt might lay. I still quite a bit of water down the mast so I have to keep plenty of anti-freeze in the bilge. The problem is getting into the boat on those occasional nice days when you want to get some work done. Move the sandbags, strip back the tarps(two layers), and move that pipe.
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John
Plastic Pipe Frame
Last year I constructed a rib cage out of plastic pipe using a 3/4 inch pipe for the center run and 1/2 inch pipe for the ribs. The center run starts at the pushpit and goes over the helm guard and the bows for the dodger and forward toward the mast. The center run has 3/4 inch crosses at close intervals, about 16 or 18 inches. The 1/2 inch ribs are inserted into the crosses with a reducer which is glued into the cross. The ribs are not glued; however, rather, they are made into a bow with one end stuck against the aluminum toe rail and tied off by drilling a small hole through the end of the pipe. Because the rib is tied down and can't rise the bow is quite sturdy. Over this is a blue plastic tarp which will last two seasons. This setup is into it's second year and has really worked well. In the spring the disassembly is easy and the parts are stored in the garage ceiling. Under the lines from the mast to the sheet stoppers I place a slightly crushed aluminum can (soda or beer) to raise the lines off the deck and then the lines are tightened. This keeps the deck from becoming discolored and the tight lines keep the cans from blowing away. This works well in Pudget Sound and when it does snow it is usually the heavy stuff. The nickname for the blue plastic poly tarps here is "Northwest Roofing" because it is often seen on mobile homes, RVs, and houses with leaky roofs.
Last year I constructed a rib cage out of plastic pipe using a 3/4 inch pipe for the center run and 1/2 inch pipe for the ribs. The center run starts at the pushpit and goes over the helm guard and the bows for the dodger and forward toward the mast. The center run has 3/4 inch crosses at close intervals, about 16 or 18 inches. The 1/2 inch ribs are inserted into the crosses with a reducer which is glued into the cross. The ribs are not glued; however, rather, they are made into a bow with one end stuck against the aluminum toe rail and tied off by drilling a small hole through the end of the pipe. Because the rib is tied down and can't rise the bow is quite sturdy. Over this is a blue plastic tarp which will last two seasons. This setup is into it's second year and has really worked well. In the spring the disassembly is easy and the parts are stored in the garage ceiling. Under the lines from the mast to the sheet stoppers I place a slightly crushed aluminum can (soda or beer) to raise the lines off the deck and then the lines are tightened. This keeps the deck from becoming discolored and the tight lines keep the cans from blowing away. This works well in Pudget Sound and when it does snow it is usually the heavy stuff. The nickname for the blue plastic poly tarps here is "Northwest Roofing" because it is often seen on mobile homes, RVs, and houses with leaky roofs.
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Bob E.
Trade-off
Congratulations on your '89 H30. Hope you enjoy it. Covering a boat with tarps represents a trade-off. You minimize the risk of leaks into the interior and help protect the outside teak from weathering, but run the risk of damage to the gel coat due to abrasion of dirt between the boat and the tarp when the tarp moves in the wind. I have heard of boats suffering significant damage from a loose and flapping tarp in just one winter. So, if you live in a windy area and decide to put a tarp on the boat, try to arrange it so the tarp cannot touch fiberglass on the boat. I was considering building a plastic pipe frame this winter, but someone at my yacht club told me that every spring there are a bunch of broken plastic pipe frames going out in the garbage. The theory is that in extreme cold, the plastic snaps. So, this year, I left my boat uncovered (also an '89 H30G). I've just covered the pedestal and instruments. Only about half the boats in my yacht club are covered this year. Some of those already have the covers flapping in shreds. This is in Toronto, Canada where the winter weather can be fairly bad. In years past, I've covered my boat without providing a steep enough "pitch" to the tarp, and found that it's not good enough to have rain water run off the tarp; you've also got to have enough slope that snow will slide off. If you don't, the weight of the snow will make a little sag in the cover. Then, when that snow melts and refreeezes, it pushes the cover down a little further, etc. By spring, you can have a couple of thousand pounds of ice on each side of the cabin, and the tarp torn right though at the tops of the staunchions. Lifelines and staunchions can be damaged that way. I also once paid to have a boat professionally shrink wrapped. The snow load collapsed the weak frame that was provided. I've considered this approach a waste of money ever since. Next year, I may try building a sturdy frame and covering the boat with a tarp. I think that this has to be done with a bit of careful "engineering" and not just thrown over the boat. Good luck.
Congratulations on your '89 H30. Hope you enjoy it. Covering a boat with tarps represents a trade-off. You minimize the risk of leaks into the interior and help protect the outside teak from weathering, but run the risk of damage to the gel coat due to abrasion of dirt between the boat and the tarp when the tarp moves in the wind. I have heard of boats suffering significant damage from a loose and flapping tarp in just one winter. So, if you live in a windy area and decide to put a tarp on the boat, try to arrange it so the tarp cannot touch fiberglass on the boat. I was considering building a plastic pipe frame this winter, but someone at my yacht club told me that every spring there are a bunch of broken plastic pipe frames going out in the garbage. The theory is that in extreme cold, the plastic snaps. So, this year, I left my boat uncovered (also an '89 H30G). I've just covered the pedestal and instruments. Only about half the boats in my yacht club are covered this year. Some of those already have the covers flapping in shreds. This is in Toronto, Canada where the winter weather can be fairly bad. In years past, I've covered my boat without providing a steep enough "pitch" to the tarp, and found that it's not good enough to have rain water run off the tarp; you've also got to have enough slope that snow will slide off. If you don't, the weight of the snow will make a little sag in the cover. Then, when that snow melts and refreeezes, it pushes the cover down a little further, etc. By spring, you can have a couple of thousand pounds of ice on each side of the cabin, and the tarp torn right though at the tops of the staunchions. Lifelines and staunchions can be damaged that way. I also once paid to have a boat professionally shrink wrapped. The snow load collapsed the weak frame that was provided. I've considered this approach a waste of money ever since. Next year, I may try building a sturdy frame and covering the boat with a tarp. I think that this has to be done with a bit of careful "engineering" and not just thrown over the boat. Good luck.
J
Jay Hill
Question about boat covers
Please excuse my ignorance of the subject since I live in a warm climate area and don't have these problems, but why couldn't one build a total boat cover out of sunbrella that is raised with the jib/spinnaker and main halyards? The cover would go from stem to stern to allow winter work to be performed. Obviously, for wind reasons, you wouldn't want the cover to go very high up the mast, but what about to, say, two feet above the sail cover? The lower ends could have some arrangement of cringles and d-shackles to attach to the toe rail (or upper lifeline for those without) with an overlapping "hem" on the outside of the toerail to keep water/snow flowing outside of the boat instead of in. (Infinite combinations of drawstrings, ties, shackles, snaps, or fittings could be used to attach the cover to the desired edge of the boat and to keep the overlapping "hem" from flailing around and beating the gelcoat to death.) Sunbrella comes in 60" widths as well and is not that expensive. Of course, by the time you add cringles every 12-24", d-shackles for every cringle, and extra heavy duty zippers with overlying Vecro'd flap, I suspect the entire cover would be costly, but it would be something you could use year after year with proper storage in the spring/summer. In addition, you could actually put a "door" in the sunbrella with a zipper so you could access the vessel and perform work when you wanted. If any shore power, even for an extension cord, is available, bring along a ceramic heater and put it in the cockpit seat (if you need to work on deck) or in the cabin. Obviously, a drop-light would also be required. In fact, if you left a drop-light with a 60 watt bulb turned on inside the cover but up on deck, it might keep the entire cover warm enough to keep snow from ever building up on the cover. This would allow a little bit more heat available when you showed up to work on the boat? Then again, if you wanted some daylight to assist in the lighting effort, you could spend some more bucks to install plastic windows in the cover in strategic areas where you would need light to work. (Anchor locker? Mast step? Companionway? Cockpit lockers?) So, what are the issues: Is the amount of area too large that high winds would put the vessel at risk of being blown off the stands/trailer? Is the cost of this not worth it? Does sunbrella not hold up well to cold/snow/ice/winter? Are halyards removed for the winter? Just curious, please let me know what you think. If it's viable, I'll market it!
Please excuse my ignorance of the subject since I live in a warm climate area and don't have these problems, but why couldn't one build a total boat cover out of sunbrella that is raised with the jib/spinnaker and main halyards? The cover would go from stem to stern to allow winter work to be performed. Obviously, for wind reasons, you wouldn't want the cover to go very high up the mast, but what about to, say, two feet above the sail cover? The lower ends could have some arrangement of cringles and d-shackles to attach to the toe rail (or upper lifeline for those without) with an overlapping "hem" on the outside of the toerail to keep water/snow flowing outside of the boat instead of in. (Infinite combinations of drawstrings, ties, shackles, snaps, or fittings could be used to attach the cover to the desired edge of the boat and to keep the overlapping "hem" from flailing around and beating the gelcoat to death.) Sunbrella comes in 60" widths as well and is not that expensive. Of course, by the time you add cringles every 12-24", d-shackles for every cringle, and extra heavy duty zippers with overlying Vecro'd flap, I suspect the entire cover would be costly, but it would be something you could use year after year with proper storage in the spring/summer. In addition, you could actually put a "door" in the sunbrella with a zipper so you could access the vessel and perform work when you wanted. If any shore power, even for an extension cord, is available, bring along a ceramic heater and put it in the cockpit seat (if you need to work on deck) or in the cabin. Obviously, a drop-light would also be required. In fact, if you left a drop-light with a 60 watt bulb turned on inside the cover but up on deck, it might keep the entire cover warm enough to keep snow from ever building up on the cover. This would allow a little bit more heat available when you showed up to work on the boat? Then again, if you wanted some daylight to assist in the lighting effort, you could spend some more bucks to install plastic windows in the cover in strategic areas where you would need light to work. (Anchor locker? Mast step? Companionway? Cockpit lockers?) So, what are the issues: Is the amount of area too large that high winds would put the vessel at risk of being blown off the stands/trailer? Is the cost of this not worth it? Does sunbrella not hold up well to cold/snow/ice/winter? Are halyards removed for the winter? Just curious, please let me know what you think. If it's viable, I'll market it!
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Ed Schenck
It's colder than 60W...
A 60 watt bulb wouldn't touch this climate. It was 4 degrees at 9 A.M. this morning. And any kind of cover would have to be secured on the deck or down the sides due to high winds. Once those NW winds come in at 40-50 knots they'll find any little crevis and then your cover is history, regardless of the material or construction. The best covers are heavy-duty canvas. You'll see them made to cover the boat with and without rigging. The Island Packet near me has a cover that goes over the boom with slits that are laced up at every shroud, stay, and stanchion. So his cover leaves everything up. Others have covers that only fit when all rigging including stanchions are removed. In either case the canvas comes three or four feet down the sides with line going under the boat to secure it tightly. My next sewing project is a canvas cover where I can leave the rails up but will work with or without the mast/boom.
A 60 watt bulb wouldn't touch this climate. It was 4 degrees at 9 A.M. this morning. And any kind of cover would have to be secured on the deck or down the sides due to high winds. Once those NW winds come in at 40-50 knots they'll find any little crevis and then your cover is history, regardless of the material or construction. The best covers are heavy-duty canvas. You'll see them made to cover the boat with and without rigging. The Island Packet near me has a cover that goes over the boom with slits that are laced up at every shroud, stay, and stanchion. So his cover leaves everything up. Others have covers that only fit when all rigging including stanchions are removed. In either case the canvas comes three or four feet down the sides with line going under the boat to secure it tightly. My next sewing project is a canvas cover where I can leave the rails up but will work with or without the mast/boom.
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Gary
Go look in the photo forum
Go look in the photo forum under the amazing title of "Winter Cover" and you can see photos of my 29.5 covered with a material somewhere between canvas and Sunbrella. The only "frame" (other than the boom) used under my cover is a standard 2" x 6" x 12' piece of lumber. email me at hunter@usinternet.com if you have any more questions after the PHOTO FORUM. PS: Well over half of the boats in Minnesota have little or no winter cover, just those of us who hate to see our "babies" cold have them.
Go look in the photo forum under the amazing title of "Winter Cover" and you can see photos of my 29.5 covered with a material somewhere between canvas and Sunbrella. The only "frame" (other than the boom) used under my cover is a standard 2" x 6" x 12' piece of lumber. email me at hunter@usinternet.com if you have any more questions after the PHOTO FORUM. PS: Well over half of the boats in Minnesota have little or no winter cover, just those of us who hate to see our "babies" cold have them.
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Bob E.
Mast down for winter storage
There are two problems with designing a winter cover based on the mast being up over the winter (relying on halyards, boom, etc., for support: (1) most cranes hired by yacht clubs can't and won't lift a boat with the mast up, and (2) it could be a bad idea to store a boat on its cradle with the standing riging up. When a boat is in the water, shock stresses on the rigging caused by windage are moderated by the "give" inherent in a floating object. On the "hard" there is no such cushion and the standing rigging could take a beating over a windy winter (or so I'm told). A travel lift that might be available at a marina could lift a boat with the mast still up, but most yacht clubs don't have access to that type of equipment.
There are two problems with designing a winter cover based on the mast being up over the winter (relying on halyards, boom, etc., for support: (1) most cranes hired by yacht clubs can't and won't lift a boat with the mast up, and (2) it could be a bad idea to store a boat on its cradle with the standing riging up. When a boat is in the water, shock stresses on the rigging caused by windage are moderated by the "give" inherent in a floating object. On the "hard" there is no such cushion and the standing rigging could take a beating over a windy winter (or so I'm told). A travel lift that might be available at a marina could lift a boat with the mast still up, but most yacht clubs don't have access to that type of equipment.
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A.J. Wortelboer
2inch pvc
I store with the mast down. For the ridge of the structure I used 2 inch pvc which basically runs from bow to stern at all stantions I insert a "T" fitting. At that point I run more length of pipe at a slope down to get me to the top of the stantion then a 45 elbow down to the deck. This is done to all stantions from bow to stern. One wrap of plastic electrical tape at the top of the stantion near the 45 elbow is all that is needed to help hold the makings of a "truss". This assembly has kept my 30 Hunter covered for the last ten years. I use to use the plastic tarps and they would stay good for several years, but where they rub the sides of the hull it will dull the gell coat. I have since made the investment into canvas tarps which is much better and is less abbrasive to the gell coat. The ends of the ridge pipe have a 45elbow and length of pipe that I drilled and run a small line through to be lashed to the mast which is resting on the pulpits. At all pipe fittings I have numbered the parts to aid in the assembly year after year.
I store with the mast down. For the ridge of the structure I used 2 inch pvc which basically runs from bow to stern at all stantions I insert a "T" fitting. At that point I run more length of pipe at a slope down to get me to the top of the stantion then a 45 elbow down to the deck. This is done to all stantions from bow to stern. One wrap of plastic electrical tape at the top of the stantion near the 45 elbow is all that is needed to help hold the makings of a "truss". This assembly has kept my 30 Hunter covered for the last ten years. I use to use the plastic tarps and they would stay good for several years, but where they rub the sides of the hull it will dull the gell coat. I have since made the investment into canvas tarps which is much better and is less abbrasive to the gell coat. The ends of the ridge pipe have a 45elbow and length of pipe that I drilled and run a small line through to be lashed to the mast which is resting on the pulpits. At all pipe fittings I have numbered the parts to aid in the assembly year after year.
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Ed Schenck
Different here..
Bob E. wrote about leaving the standing rigging up over the winter. At the several marinas I frequent on Lake Erie I'd guess 50 to 60 percent leave the mast up. Our mast is stepped at the keel and is a bear to remove. I'd agree that it is preferable although it costs more to haul out. Our marina even has some owners of H410 size boats INSIDE with mast up. Big $$$$!
Bob E. wrote about leaving the standing rigging up over the winter. At the several marinas I frequent on Lake Erie I'd guess 50 to 60 percent leave the mast up. Our mast is stepped at the keel and is a bear to remove. I'd agree that it is preferable although it costs more to haul out. Our marina even has some owners of H410 size boats INSIDE with mast up. Big $$$$!
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Gary
Don't wear it out
You can wear things out and cause much damage by taking them apart and putting them back together as easily as damage occurs by using them. Over 90% of boats here leave masts up as marina's have travel lifts that allow it. Good idea to send someone up to inspect for wear and tear every now and then but save a bunch of work and leave it up. I can show you boats that have been on a cradle with the mast up over 20 years and with (masts down once or twice for various reasons) a good cradle and periodic inspection life is simply grand.
You can wear things out and cause much damage by taking them apart and putting them back together as easily as damage occurs by using them. Over 90% of boats here leave masts up as marina's have travel lifts that allow it. Good idea to send someone up to inspect for wear and tear every now and then but save a bunch of work and leave it up. I can show you boats that have been on a cradle with the mast up over 20 years and with (masts down once or twice for various reasons) a good cradle and periodic inspection life is simply grand.
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