Life aboard is living large, in a small space. Every boat owner has found ways to make life in that small space easier, more comfortable, more convenient. The idea behind this site is to provide a place where these ideas can be shared amongst the boating community.
To participate, send your contribution to SmallBoatProjects at gmail dot com.
Please welcome new contributors Rich & Jeni, who sail their Tayana 37, s/v Ramble On. As their first contribution, here's a simple and effective (the best kind!) time and money saver:
Sorry for the lack of a witty title; I just don’t have the energy right now.
If you have a boat you probably like to be outdoors. And if you enjoy being outdoors, you probably also like to cook outdoors. Ergo, if you have a boat and you like to cook outdoors, then you probably have a barbecue mounted to your rail. If not, you have no idea what you’re missing. We cook outdoors a lot. In the summer it helps keep the boat cool by not cooking inside. Pretty much, if it’s not raining I’m Q’ing.
Jeni and I were going to “Q” the other night, in fact. And that’s why I have to say it was bound to happen eventually. I’m actually quite surprised it didn’t happen sooner. And if you have one of those cute little marine barbecues with the cheesy pressure regulator, if it hasn’t already happened to you it probably will. When I pulled off the cover to warm up the grill, plop. Glug, glug, glug. Off popped the regulator, and straight to the bottom it went.
“Hey, wanna order take out tonight?”
In two days we had our replacement regulator from Port Supply and upon further inspection I realized a small tab in the casting. I’m not sure if this was the manufacturers intention or not, but this appeared to be the perfect spot to crimp a stainless steel safety cable. A trip to the hardware store and $4 later we were back in business. A small carabiner on the other end clipped right into the rail mount handle. It’s as if it was meant to be by design, even though the manufacturer makes no mention of it in its instructions, nor do they sell some overpriced version as an “accessory”.
Needless to say, my regulator (and hopefully yours now) will not be going for a swim.
Our rail-mounted BBQ table (it's really a fish cleaning table, but Fish Do Not Fear Me...) was really showing its age. The plastic had suffered extreme UV degredation - the surface had turned porous and chalky. And with use, grease and other food stuff soaked into the porosity and then bacteria went to town, meaning that it was porous, chalky and spattered with black spots and streaks. Truly ugly. And unsanitary.
So, not too long ago when I went to a garage sale at San Juan Yachts (yup, the place that made the San Juan sailboats... now they are only making RIBs), I bought a scrap of Starboard for cheap. Then I cut it up with my trusty little table saw, copying the shapes of the pieces in the old table. I even used the same screws to put it together.
Not bad for $15 and a couple of hours work in the shop!
Mike and Rebecca on s/v Zero to Cruising have a suggestion for spice stowage that just might catch on...
Even though I have already devoted a couple of blog posts (1 and 2) to the subject of spice organization in the galley, you’d read here that neither of those ideas worked out so well for us. The solution illustrated below struck me as genius though. The plastic boxes originally contained Tic Tac candies and, in my opinion, are the perfect size for a boat. Maybe we should look for some of those when we head to downtown Port of Spain today?
By the way, relating to yesterday’s post, our vote for the island in the Windwards and Leewards with the largest number of good anchorages goes to… drum roll… Antigua! We’re definitely looking forward to visiting there again on our trip back north.
It's a great idea! The only thing I'd add is an additional label on the top of the containers, so they can be identified when they are packed in that too-small space you have reserved for spices...
Jason and Christina on s/v hello world have a project here that everyone is going to want to try: Manufacturing an essential boating fluid right on board! Read on...
We like the places that are more wild and remote. Places that don't have internet connections, mechanics or Qwiki-marts. Those are the places that are more interesting to us. This means we have to learn to be self-reliant. We have to troubleshoot our own problems and carry with us what we need. To that end, we consulted the ultimate in self-reliant sailors - Ken and Susan on s/v Bint al Khamseen, recently back from a two-year tour of the Pacific Ocean including Mexico, the south Pacific islands, New Zealand and a 40-day passage back to North America.
Along with fashioning an AIS receiver from a bear tracking device and hand-crafting a new rudder for their self-steering gear while anchored in an atoll in the middle of the frickin' ocean, they happen to brew incredibly good beer. Not good as in: "wow, that's really good for home brew". More like: "holy crap, that's better than beer any beer I can buy".
Having experience with Canada's sky-high liquor prices, mediocre beer and lack of civilization from which to buy said beer, we decided brewing our own was a better option. Before we left Seattle, we invited Ken and Susan over to teach us their brewing witchcraft. With their gracious permission, we're re-posting their boat-friendly, hop-a-liscious beer recipe.
Ken transferring the wort into the fermenter.
Making Beer Aboard Sailboats
Once you’ve got all of your ingredients, it’s a matter of making the wort, letting that ferment for 3-5 days, then bottling and letting it sit for another 2 weeks. Then drink up!
Shopping list (for a 1.5-2 gallon batch)
3 lb amber dry malt
1.5 oz hops (pelletized)
½ package Nottingham or Ale yeast
¼ cup corn sugar
2.5 gallon collapsible water jug
funnel
vapor trap
One step cleaner
Growlers or plastic jugs (that can hold pressure) for bottling and caps
Making wort
In a large pot, bring 1/2 gallon of water to a boil for a few minutes (kill off any microbes). We use our pressure cooker without pressurizing it.
Add 3 lbs. dry malt to simmering water
We use amber malt for a Manny’s knock off
Use light malt for a pilsner beer
Use dark malt for a more chewy beer (porter…)
If you use liquid malt, need 20% more than dry and less water
Stir while malt dissolves (don't scorch the bottom!)
Add 1oz of hops
Many varieties of hops...for a basic IPA use anything that starts with a C (Cascadia is a great one)...try different types for different types of beer
Use pelletized hops (non-pelletized versions make a total mess)
Simmer until hops are dissolved, turn off heat and add another ½ oz hops (for a good, hoppy aroma – skip if you don’t want it too hoppy)
Allow the wort to cool
You can do this quickly by submerging most of the pot in an ice bath or sea water
Decontaminate fermenting container
We use one step food grade cleaner – it’s a white powder that isn’t harmful if some is leftover
Mix one step cleaner with water and clean the heck out of the 2.5 gallon jug, funnel, vaport trap, nozzle, etc – anything that the beer will come in contact with while transferring or fermenting
Fermenting
In a 2.5 gallon jug, add ½ gallon of water
Add in the wort (get all of the hops!)
Add in another ½ gallon of water
Make sure this watered down wort mixture is at room temp (about 80F) before adding yeast
Add ½ of a 0.3oz pack of brewing yeast
We use Nottingham or an ale yeast
Different yeasts will change the flavor, so play around with them
Give the container a good shake to mix in yeast and oxygenate the wort, then burp out most of the leftover air
Add vapor trap and ensure air can escape
Leave the mixture to ferment until it stops bubbling (3-5 days depending on your temp – shorter in warm areas)
Bottling
This amount of beer fits nicely into 3 ½ gallon growlers
Can also use old soda containers – anything that was built to take pressure (so don’t use water bottles because they’ll explode under the pressure)
Clean your bottles, funnel, etc with the TSP solution mentioned above
Mix a solution of ¼ cup corn sugar with ¾ cup sterile water (sterilize by boiling then allow to cool a bit)
Add this sugar solution directly to the fermenter and mix around a bit for equal distribution
Pour into bottles (leave an inch of head in each bottle)
We use a funnel and strainer to try to get rid of some of the sludge
Allow to sit in bottles for 2 weeks – then refrigerate and enjoy!
Up north on s/v Letitgo, they now have fresh greens...
Our friends Dawn and Tom had heard of our previous adventure with sprouting and must have taken pity. So during our last meeting they gave us the Tube a 70″s looking contraption that make the art of sprouting easy.
On the first day after 12 hours soaking.
As we are all mostly vegetarians some by choice some by association. The need for fresh crunchy leaf is our reality. So after canning, bread making and yoghurt the long lost tradition of sprouting had to be revived. Sunflower was what we had in stock in the cupboard and we gave it a trial.
6 days later we have these amazing greens, phew… we are now “safe”. We will have our greens onboard! Coincidentally today is our son’s 15th birthday today! To symbolize your “birth” day *B* we celebrate the birth of our sprouts! What a gift….
Happy Birthday *B*!
Dawn and Tom thank you so much for leading the way and sharing your knowledge. You will travel with us forever.
Before we tell you how much we like The Tube, we need you to know that The Tube is no longer available. We keep its page on our site for those lucky enough to have one. We are sorry. The manufacturer shut down around 2005. We even asked if they would sell us the sprouting portion of their business. They never responded. It wasn't the best Sprouter - Easy Sprout has always been better, but we are sad that it is gone...
Brian over at Dock 6 has an offer you cannot refuse...
So there you are, invited for vittles on a boat across the bay. Being the good guest you are, you load a bottle or two and some cheese and crackers in a bag , jump in your tender and get gone. You arrive, climb aboard, and share out your lukewarm bottle, sweaty cheese and broken crackers.
Impressive.
Or say you want to go for a day sail with friends on your Siren. You can load a cooler and a grocery bag, and wine glasses and ice and cutting board and cutlery and then you don't have room for your friends.
Oooooh, dilemma- do we sail with our friends and leave the booze on the Dock, or take the booze and leave the friends? It's an awkward choice.
Here on the Dock, we've found the solution, thanks to the coolest cooler company ever, California Innovations .
Meet Product #78124-90-09, or, as we know it here on the Dock, The Porta-Bar. The Porta-Bar is a rigid soft-side cooler/picnic basket hybrid loaded with features.
Open the front facing zippered "lid", and the first feature you notice is the thin plastic cutting board cleverly attached to the inside surface of the lid with stretchy elastic bands at each corner, making it both secure and removable for cleaning.
Inside are three adjustable compartments. The walls are easily removed and reinstalled thanks to the velcro tape fasteners. Nestled inside these compartments are a tall bottle carrier,(Warm Bin) an insulated ice box/topload cooler (Chilly Bin), and a plastic bin with lid (Cool Bin).
The Warm Bin will fit as many as three 40 oz bottles of rum, or two 2 litre soft drink bottles, or a vodka bottle and a Clamato juice bottle or a bottle of wine, a couple of glasses and a baguette. This baby is versatile!
The Chilly Bin is cleverly designed. Inside the soft bag is a plastic tub, perfect for holding ice cubes in addition to up to 12 soft drink cans. To maximize cold life, the lid has a small velcro sealed hatch, perfect for quick soft drink extraction.
Above the Chilly Bin is the Cool Bin, perfect for storing lemons, limes, cheese, sausage, sandwiches, all sorts of snacks.
The handles are sturdy, the stitching reinforced and the fabric is easily cleaned. The only quibble, and it is minor, is the lack of a carrying strap. All in all, this is a pretty impressive package, especially at a retail price point south of $40. Like it? Want one? There is only one problem...
According to California Innovations, Product #78124-90-09 is No Longer Available. If enough demand is generated, they will consider putting it back into production. Fire them an email, let 'em know you saw it here and you want one, bad. Service@ca-innovations.com
Barring new ones rolling off the assembly line., my local Canadian Tire still has a few in stock. If anyone wants one, drop me a line, and I'll set you up.
UPDATE: I have sourced about a dozen of these, which I am happy to move on at $35 each plus shipping costs.
You know you want one (what a great gift!). If you send me mail at SmallBoatProjects at gmail dot com, I'll forward it on to Brian (note that he is in Canada - not sure how that complicates things...).
Rather than just replacing it when it failed, Paul on s/v Solacehot-rodded his BBQ grill:
Original Magma BBQ
Some of us have BBQ's on our boats, which after time, seem to not perform as well when new, and in my case had an annoying feature. Mine progressively produced less heat and had grill bars which allowed fluids to drip into a "catch tray" but often overflowed and dripped on my deck. In the end I couldn't bbq any way, because the heat from the element just seemed to die.
With the cost of new BBQ's being very expensive, I decided to rebuild the unit myself and hopefully save some money.
Two ring burner
So, first I "gutted" the heating element from the BBQ. Then I purchased a 5.5KW [that's 18,700 BTU/hr -Ed], two ring propane burner. This I purchased in New Zealand for about $30USD from a hardware store, but I remember that these where very common in the islands at most of their hardware stores. They use them to put large pots on to cook with.
Control valves for gas. Comes with burner.
Next I cut the end of the BBQ with a Dremel to open up to allow the valves of the burner to protrude through and allow gas hookup.
Next I purchased a BBQ plate with it's own raised ridges and channels for fluid to drain away from the meat. The BBQ plate was a generic plate and wasn't quite the right size for my Magma. I used a metal cutting wheel and cut to size. But to keep all fluids produced while BBQing, I welded a metal strip along where I had cut. The BBQ plate came with handles at the sides, which proved to be a bonus for handling the plate. Plate cost $15USD from the BBQ Factory Store.
Finally, I purchased a small 3KG propane tank along with a new regulator and hose. The tank had a bracket made for it so that it could be mounted on the railing close to the BBQ.
BBQ plate in place. Metal strip at front.
Finally, to "season" the plate, a coating of oil, was rubbed into the plate and the plate "cooked" to allow for the burn in. It is now important to heat the plate and then turn down the heat, because it actually gets too hot and burns off the seasoning. Cooking steaks is now a great success, with the steaks being seared on the plate with ease, rather than a slow broiling which use to happen. All guests have declared my BBQ steaks to be wonderfully cooked.
All fluids seem to "evaporate", including fats, so it is important to spray periodically with oil to keep the "seasoning" up. Otherwise the plate will just turn rusty.
Bottle to BBQ
Cost for the BBQ mods. $45USD and about a days work looking in the stores and the workshop work. A small piece of scrap mild steel strip I had lying around and a welding machine was needed in addition to the dremel and steel cutting wheel on the angle grinder.
Boat ovens are not known for their even heat distribution. Paul on s/v Solace shows us a way to make an improvement on that:
Most boat ovens are heated by propane and don't give an even distribution of heat. An idea heard from others was to place a pizza stone in the oven, which heats up and gives a more uniform form of heat distribution. We used a surplus pizza stone we had at home, and cut it to size so that there is about one inch of air space around the stone to allow for heat convection. The stone was cut using a masonry cutting wheel on an angle grinder and smoothed along the edges. The stone was then secured to the oven tray by four bulldog clips at each corner.
This prevents the stone sliding around while stored in the oven.
A ceramic tile can also be used for the same purpose, but we like the added bonus of having a pizza stone to do our pizzas on. Yum.
Look what my lovely wife gave me for my birthday! A new Dickenson SeaBQ!
This replaces our old Magma grill... actually, our second Magma grill - we used up the one that came with the boat. The "new" Magma was shot (again) and was going to need a transfusion of expensive parts.
To make the SeaBQ even easier to use, I plumbed it directly into the low pressure side of our propane system. We already have those two 20 lb propane tanks - why would we want to fool around with the small disposable cylinders?
Needless to say, my regulator (and hopefully yours now) will not be going for a swim.
To make the SeaBQ even easier to use, I plumbed it directly into the low pressure side of our propane system. We already have those two 20 lb propane tanks - why would we want to fool around with the small disposable cylinders?
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