First-time buyer

[michaelstalone]

Hey all,

I just bought an ‘87 Precision Daysailer 1. It’s in great condition, and it’s ready to sail. I’m wondering if there’s anything I should know/do before I take it on the water or shortly thereafter. Something I’m really curious about: I’ve read on here about cutting holes in the seats to remove the old foam. Is that something I need to do? I’ve read through the posts, I’m just not sure if it applies to my model (is this an issue for all Daysailers?).

Any words of wisdom would be much appreciated!

[GreenLake]

Unless there's a condition that obviously needs fixing, because something's broken or not working, my "words of wisdom" would be to take your boat sailing -- preferably on a day with too little, rather than too much wind.

And to bring crew that either knows more than you do about sailing a boat like this, or someone who's just great dealing with any little thing that might emerge. Definitely not someone you need to "babysit" while perhaps troubleshooting something unexpected. And certainly not a partner who is not at least twice as enthusiastic as you about sailing. Wait until you know your boat, so you can deliver a good first experience for them.

The maiden voyage is truly a voyage of discovery: you will discover things about your boat and how it feels on the water that you cannot find out on land or by reading about it.

Usually, something breaks, or doesn't work as smoothly as you like. That'll give you a pointer as to what to fix first, and/or what you might want to pay more attention to the second time you take her out.

The kind of larger surgery (like digging out old foam and replacing it by pool noodles) can wait for the end of the season.

Pick your first (few) outing(s) so you have plenty options for bailing out should any of the hardware prove less solid than you think.

Did I follow my own advice?

Here it gets complicated. When I got the boat I had decent experience in a boat half the size with half the number of sails. So I knew to take someone along who knew (much) more about sailing that kind or boat, although not directly experience with a DaySailer. We kept to the shallow part of the bay, but the wind a few hundred feet from shore was a bit more vigorous than we anticipated. And, sailing away from shore we could see that the hill behind the boat ramp had blocked the view of a bit of a weather system -- with the wind blowing away from land, so when we decided to return, we had to beat back into the wind. That's when the port jib track ripped out of the deck.

"You steer the boat, I'll handle the jib sheet" - great to have friends who don't panic. That's what we did, and made it home with the mast down before the thunder started.

We would have never found that issue, because the track itself was fine. It had been removed for refinishing and not put back correctly, something only actual sailing loads were able to reveal.

We did have a couple of small, very small boys on the boat, but the nice thing about the DS is that they disappeared into the cuddy.

The second trip, or the third, was when the bow eye broke. Again, I wasn't experienced enough then to be fully self-reliant, so I called the same buddy who came down to the ramp and helped me retrieve the boat. Having something go wrong with precisely the things that are new to you (first time sailing with jib, first time attempting to retrieve the boat onto a trailer by myself) are always the hardest: you don't even get to have a mental baseline of what it would be like if it was working as it was supposed to.

But that's also behind my advice to not stress about anything that "might be there" before going out and finding out how to sail your boat (if you are new to sailing or to sailing a boat like the DS) and or actually getting to know your boat in operation. After a couple initial experiences, you'll have a much better idea!

Be a bit smarter than I was: check the weather, wind forecasts have become so much better! And try to sail into the wind as you set out, so you can drift home, if anything goes wrong. The other way around wasn't so smart (we were surrounded by beach, so worst case would have been to hit land half a mile away from the launch and wading home dragging a boat. So, in that sense, there was a built-in "out". Except we did not expect the weather system)

[tomodda]

Hi! Welcome to Daysailer World! Answering your questions, I definitely agree with GreenLake up above, but you did ask a very open-ended question. What do you need to know? Depends on how much sailing experience you already have. I'll chime in here under the assumption that you're not totally new to sailing, but transitioning from another boat. With that in mind, some things to know:

-The Daysailer acts more like a big dinghy, not a small keelboat. Mostly because it doesn't have a weighted keel! This means that where you place your own weight is very important (trim). For instance, if you sit too far back, you dig the stern in and go slow (upwind anyway, downwind is different). Sit too far forward and you'll affect your steering. Generally, sit in the middle, meaning get a tiller extender. Likewise, be prepared to hike. How hard? Depends how fast you wanna go

-You should sail the boat flat, 15 degrees heel at most. This for speed, not danger of capsizing - despite no keel, the DS has a lot of initial stability and is hard to capsize. You can get her up on her ear with no problem, green water coming over the coaming and into the cockpit. However, any further than 60 degrees or so and you're going over! Don't capsize her, this is a very hard boat to self-recover.

-Don't cleat your mainsheet, hold it in hand. Jib too, especially if wind kicking up. The DS is not as "twitchy" as - let's say - a Laser. But you still want to react fast to any changes, and cleating the sheets down is just asking for trouble. But by "fast" I mean seconds, as opposed to Hobie-Cat or Laser fractions of a second. Between holding the sheets and the tiller, you still have time to sip your beer And having a crew along definitely helps - the DS can be solo'ed quite well but 2-person sailing is definitely better.

-Downwind, this boat will plane, quite easily for a 17-footer. Sit back (move your weight aft) and enjoy the ride!

-Get a good vang setup as soon as possible. Not an absolute "must" have, but certainly the #1 "nice to have." Search on this forum for details.

Speaking of search, the search function on this forum is less than ideal. Use google instead, search: site:https://forum.daysailer.com +"Your Search Term".

Fair winds!

Tom

[Anstigmat]

It's hard to know the condition of your foam floatation... I can tell you I'm glad I swapped mine out. It made the boat a lot lighter and the old foam was absolutely saturated. It's an easy fix that takes at most a weekend assuming you assemble everything you need at once. 3 inspection ports (don't forget the fwd area under the little stowage thing in the "v"), about $13 each, a bunch of pool noodles, about $100 + or -, a cutting tool, dremel, screws... I'm glad I did it but I sailed a season before doing so and it was no problem.

The rest of the advice is more sound than I can give. I just completed a mostly restoration of mine and I'm happy I did. However, I'd have rather been sailing the whole time! Happily for the boat, Maine wasn't the best sailing location October - late May. Gives you a lot of time to chip away at projects.

[michaelstalone]

Awesome, this is all very helpful. I’ve been sailing a Laser, and I got the Daysailer to take the family out on or an occasional friend who wants to learn how to sail. Sounds like I can put of the flotation clean out project for the off season. I’ll look into the vang setup as well. I’m also curious about getting a roller-furling for the jib, but I saw a post about it and will start there. I’ll keep scouring this forum for help, but yeah, the search function is only semi-helpful. Thanks again for the wisdom. I’m excited to get out there, but I’m going to practice the rigging in my driveway a couple times first.

[GreenLake]

The search software on all small sites can never match what the big guys can do. Users here are pretty savvy as a rule, so using an external search engine is a good workaround over trying to "integrate" google search here (for which we don't have the resources). The forum search works well for single-word searches, and there's an advanced option to search titles only - that can sometimes give good results especially is someone used a descriptive title you happen to remember seeing).

The DS does not sail well under main alone, it forgets how to tack. I had a furler on a different dinghy where you could use that to "depower", but when I tried this with the DS, it wasn't the same.

But a furler may be a great option if you raise/lower sails on the open water, for example.

[michaelstalone]

So, make it a general practice to sail with the jib? I was thinking of single-handed sailing with just the main to start, then incorporate the main later. Or go “all-in” and single-hand with the jib?

(I’m getting used to the search features here)

[GreenLake]

The DS is not a Laser.

When you have only one sail, the only way to change the balance in your sailplan is by trimming sails or balancing your boat fore/aft in ways that make the center of effort or center of lateral resistance move a little.

With two sails, you can make dramatic changes by removing one of the sails. Look at my graphic on boat balance in the "Basic Concepts and Techniques" thread under "Seamanship and Boat Handling". You know most of that stuff, but balancing a boat with two sails will be a new challenge.

One of the adjustments I would make to any factory DS (other than doing a good vang) is to add ratchet blocks to both main and jibs. I'm partial to the Ronstan ones, not because I like the brand better, but because there was this test where their blocks had double the holding power than the competition. That means, they tend to work well even if the "wrap" is only a quarter turn. I also find their "auto" setting works perfectly, so no need to engage them by hand.

In very moderate, steady winds you may be able to get away with cleating a jib while single handing. Being able to dump the main should be sufficient to keep the boat upright, but I would not recommend that when there are sudden stronger gusts. People have managed to capsize a DS under jib alone (i.e. w/ main rigged, but spilled). From the Laser, your reflexes are probably trained well enough; the slower reaction of the DS would give you the extra time to deal with the second sail.

Best way to "single-hand" is to take a newbie passenger. They can usually be trusted with basic jib handling, and you gain a "third hand".

Totally essential for single handing is a tiller tamer - you'll find descriptions of my simple "bungee-tamer" all over this forum.