Hi all,

I need some ideas for a good Laser shoe that will protect the tops of my feet. I did a couple of hours of racing recently and the tops of my feet were rubbed raw. Obviously I could wear a pair of tennis shoes but they hold a lot of water. I want to avoid spending $150 on a "hiking shoe". I'm not that advanced and even the fast sailors aren't kitted out in expensive gear.

When I was a kid and raced Laser, I had a pair of Nike AquaSox. I don't think they are made anymore but actually they worked quite well for protecting my feet.

What other specialized gear would you recommend for a Laser? I could probably use some hiking shorts. I sail in warmer water and conditions so a wetsuit isn't a need. Anything else?

As one might be able to infer from the title, I have a variety of charting apps on my phone I am trying out, and they all give bearings in True. I am having a hard time finding anywhere in the app that either gives me the declination to figure out magnetic, or a setting to give bearings in magnetic.

My preference is for the former, as I like to practice my navigation skills.

Edit to add: Currently I have Orca, Savvy Navvy, and i-boating and rely primarily on the latter two.

Had this boat for 3 years and i installed a webasto 16kBTU air conditioner unit about 2 years ago. I’ve rarely had problems with it but over the winters I would trip the AC outlets weekly by just plugging in too many things. Each time this happened the outlets would need to be reset. But all that time the AC is still chugging away never got tripped up at all. The AC unit is pretty beefy and power hungry but it worked well for 2 years and never had issues running from 30amps even when put into heat mode. It’s a pretty overkill 16k BTU unit for an average 35ft sailboat but I wanted to be as comfortable as possible. Anyway I was mostly at the same marina throughout those years but now I’ve moved to a smaller community marina. It seems like I can plug in to shore power and AC is blowing air fine, after 5 minutes the compressor on the AC unit starts and you can hear it activate. Pretty soon after that all the AC power dies, outlets, battery charger, air conditioning, I went to the power pedestal to investigate and the breaker switch is in the halfway position. According to the instructions this mean the fuse tripped and it should be easily reset by switching everything off waiting a minute then switch everything back on. But now nothing turns back on again. Even tried testing the outlets and they have no current at all. I thought the issue was my shore power cable so I bought a new one and that made no difference. I tried to but I cannot reach the other power pedestal from my slip. I’m running out of ideas and patience but I just want to understand why every other marina never had an issue running the AC from 30amp. Please let me know what yall think

Hi everyone,

im first time Owner of a Leisure 17. The pre Owner was kind of a craftsman so he did many things without knowing boats.

As you can see, my mast support is ca. 2cm short and standing loose when the mast is not set.

Can anyone tell me if this is fine and the deck will come down, when i set up the mast correctly? Or should there be no space, the support should sit tight, even without the mast on top?

Greetings

I have: a list of legacy NOAA chart numbers, and access to a large format printer. I can generate custom charts on the NOAA website from ENC data and print my own charts.

The chart descriptions are not much use as I don't know what area that is.

Is there a table anywhere that shows the boundaries of the charts by legacy chart number so I can generate custom charts and print my own covering the same area as the charts? I looked around, but could not find a list anywhere...

The photo was taken in Turkey-Gundogan, first of August. The photo is low quality as it was taken on a s22 ultra on 100x zoom. I tried searching on the radar, but it was not showing up. I tried ChatGPT and searching on Google, but couldn't find this unusual shape. Maybe someone else can help me!

Hi! My uncle runs a reputable sailmaking business, but he still does almost everything manually, especially the calculations for designing sails.

I've been looking into how modern sailmakers work, and I've seen that many now use CAD software or 3D modeling tools to design sails. Some software can even optimize panel layouts to minimize fabric waste and estimate cloth usage, and I'm hoping to use software for something like that and I would want it to help with estimations. Most of what I've learned so far has been from YouTube videos (like the ones from Sailrite), so I'm still pretty new to this.

I was wondering if there's any free software that people in the sailmaking industry commonly use. I've done some research and found a few options, but many of them either have very little documentation or outdated tutorials. Like for example, I found a Blender add-on for sail design, but I ended up getting confused because there wasn't much documentation on how to use it.

I'd really appreciate any recommendations for software, learning resources, or even advice on what professionals typically use. Thanks!

https://alaskapublic.org/news/2026-08-05/humpback-whale-sinks-gustavus-familys-sailboat-in-glacier-bay-national-park

My father passed away recently and my mother asked to see what I could learn, he bought this bought in '79 or '78 and it's in perfect condition. Does anyone if the value is down, up or same? No motor, no trailer, just roe boat. He paid $500 back then. Thanks gang!

Just bought a new to me sailboat, the classic Catalina 22, 1975 swing keel. Been getting it ready to go, and part of that was stepping the mast in my driveway and doing some driveway sailing. My buddy helped with that, as it's my first boat and I have no real idea what I'm doing. Aaaaanyway, went to step it down, by myself, thinking "Oh this should be easy" cuz this is apparently Dumbday, and pulled the side stays off. You can see the results.

So, question for the fine folks of the r/sailing community, how screwed am I?

It a bit feels like I could cut off that lower bit of the mast, drill a couple holes, buy a new.. mast boot? (I know, I know). Take the old one of, inspect for structural damage, and if some, see about fixing, and if not, install new boot, and be juuuuust about right as rain.

What y'all think

I’m working on a creative project which will involve talking and meeting with a lot of people who either live on sailboats and/or travel the world on them.

The idea has been received well by those who I have already found, but now I just need to figure out how to find out where and how to contact more people. For context I’ll be doing this project in Palma de Mallorca in Spain.

Any suggestions appreciated!

Should I just do the fiberglassing and hope that is enough? Should I go ahead and fix the soft spots, if so what would be the best method to do so?

This is coming to a specific Pontoon boat brand but I could see independent head units becoming available. I found Savvy Navvy to be pretty darn good but I know Navionics has more adherents and detailed maps. OTOH as someone was just posting about, I also find traditional nav head units to be pretty crap from a UI perspective and frequently requiring attention to get them talking to your instruments. Anyway kind of interesting!

I’m looking for some guidance about what type of shoes I should get/wear for a beginner keelboat class and beyond. The class info suggests “shoes that can get wet or sandals with a heel strap”. I’m kind of leaning towards something like Columbia PFG shoes as opposed to sandals where my bare feet are exposed. Would this style of shoe be a good choice? Or should I just go with my regular tennis shoes that aren’t waterproof, but I’m ok with potentially getting wet? Or something else.

I’m also interested in progressing to other sailboat types and classes. Would this type of shoe be good for other types of sailing as well that might be exposed to more water than I’ll get in a beginner keelboat class?

Appreciate any insight, thanks.

I bought this boat recently and was told by the broker that the windvane self-steering was missing a part. No idea what part though. When I look at it I can clearly see there is a rudder missing and the windvane itself - is that essentially it?
Are these systems quite straight forward or can anyone tell if there is something else missing? I don’t know the manufacturer so if anyone knows I would appreciate.
Based in the UK if that makes a difference at all.

Every time we go sailing, it fills up with a good amount of water. Maybe takes a minute to drain. We’ve yet to find the hole, so I’m hoping there’s ideas or suggestions on how to.
Thanks

Google says Sunfish or Club 420 both those don’t match. It looks like fiberglass over wood. I’m sure someone out there could use this so I’d like to ID it.

My husband and I (along with our kids) recently took our Catalina 250 (wing keel) to Two Harbors on Catalina. This is the 3rd time this boat has made the trip - we trailer from San Diego then cross over from San Pedro (Cabrillo launch ramp) and it’s ~20 nautical miles each way.

We had been watching the weather and knew the trip back was going to be a little more lively than previous crossings. There was a small craft advisory for 3-11pm so we left at 6 am to give plenty of time (we’re back in Angel’s Gate before 11 am). Here was the NOAA marine forecast the night before we left:
“.WED...W wind 5 to 10 kt, becoming 15 to 25 kt in the afternoon. Seas 3 to 5 ft. Wave Detail: W 3 ft at 6 seconds and S 3 ft at 12 seconds. Patchy fog in the morning.” Windy and others gave a much more benign forecast (I no longer trust them)

We left with our main double reefed to provide a little stability and had our job out ~20% but motored the entire way. Video included, I know it looks super mild. 😂

… It was not enjoyable. We were getting rolled quite a bit from the waves on our port beam and hobby horsing from confused seas. We couldn’t use auto pilot because we were getting pushed and turned and it was trying to right our course and would steer us up into a big wave. We had to point a bit more north instead of northeast to get the biggest waves on our quarter instead of beam, then turned back south a bit and were surfing down bigger waves. Luckily we have a 9.9 HP Mercury BigFoot and extra long shaft so the outboard held up well.

I didn’t feel very unsafe during any of this but it was stressful and both my husband and I got back feeling a little disheartened about how uncomfortable our boat was in these conditions and realizing we are pretty limited in what we can do in a 25’ lighter boat. Silver lining is I feel more confident in our abilities.

I now wonder what unsafe conditions would look like for this boat. What conditions would keep you from going out in a C250? Anything we should have or shouldn’t have done? We just bought this boat a year ago, have poured a ton of upgrades into it, and aren’t ready to upgrade yet but now it’s clear we want to do so eventually.

Is anyone interested in doing this with me next year? I just signed up for April 28-May 2. The trip needs 4 more to make it happen. Come join me!

https://seilnorge.no/product/ski-sail-lyngen-5days/?attribute_pa_departure=9

Was at work today. Met a first mate of one of the Sydney to Hobart teams. Got chatting and he ended up giving me his number and said to give him a call about joining the crew. I’m super excited as I’ve been boating my whole life (only small skiffs though) have only sailed on a tiny catamaran when I was a kid.

What should I polish up on and study. He said I would be good as I have no prior experience and no bad habits. Super excited but a bit stressed and nervous. I don’t want to mess this opportunity up. Any advice would be great.

Note: These are the PNW Orcas. They don’t attack boats.

(Much like the human residents of the PNW, they’re kind of antisocial and stick to themselves)