edition of our newsletter, TRADITIONS

TRADITIONS
V O LU M E 1 , I SS U E 2
M A Y 2 3, 2 0 16
A report from the
Puget Sound
Chapter of
The Traditional
Small Craft
Association
2
ND
EDITION…A COUPLE OF REMINDERS/REPEATS
BY CLAIRE ACORD
First I want to thank all of you who
have given us feedback on the first edition, in general it seems to have been
very well received, so we are going on
with the dog and pony show for another
edition, and still planning on rounding
out the year with a recap edition in October.
messabouts though our parent organization. Many places such as Port of Anacortes and Northwest Maritime Center host
our events. In order for them to welcome
us, they require that there be added liability
insurance, and we are able to use these
facilities because of the national insurance
policy…but you know, insurance does not
I also want to thank those of you who come free, and membership dues are how
have signed up for membership in our we pay for it…so if you can, please consider signing up for a national membership
National
today (of course
parent
orThe
P
ALOOZA CROOZA IS a small-boat
you should also
ganization
Traditional adventure cruise for participants in the join the Puget
Sound Chapter,
Small Craft annual Pocket Yacht Palooza, and for
no
additional
Association.
other
small-boat
owners
who
would
like
fees,
just
check
Remember
the
box!),
click
to
share
in
an
overnight-cruise
experithat TSCA
HERE
for
the
ence.
Sign
up
NOW...full
details
HERE
chapters do
form. Thanks!
provide liability insurance
for
JUNE 11 POCKET YACHT PALOOZA
JUNE 12-15 PALOOZA CROOZA
FROM THE EDITOR
I remember a frustrated
comment from a guy with
a big boat. He said, when
it came to boats, it didn’t
matter so much what you
fell INTO, as what you
fell OUT OF. Big boats
require better life jackets
than little ones. Different
lights, bigger flares,
stronger pumps. And, if
you pay for your ride, then
count on just about the
Best
of
Everything. Somebody has your
back. The “Authorities” have
already been notified. But. What if you are
doing all this on your
own? What if the decisions
you make are truly up to
you—as much as any decision is free from ubermench
scrutiny?
Well, it seems that “where I
am going” often has more to
do with those decision points,
that “what I am going
in.” Case in point: I have
BY
Claire
DAN ROGERS
just completed about 200
miles of test-hops in my
own latest creation. Miss
Kathleen sprang completely from my imagination, and came together in
a very short time this past
winter.
No legitimate
designer.
No real involvement
by
“Authorities.” In fact, as
close as I got to an inspection, was when I
Continued on page 6
I N S ID E T H I S I S S U E :
SCAMPS, here, there
and everywhere!
2
SCAMPS continued
3
Boat Ramp Project
update
4
May the Force be
with you…
Electricity & trailers
5
Ins and Outs at
Bowman Bay
6
From your Editor
continued
6
G E T I N TO U C H
WITH YOUR
TSCA-PUGET
S O U N D O F F I C ER S
 President, CLAIRE
ACORD,
 Vice President:
MICHAEL BOGOGER
 Secretary:
MARTY LOKEN
 Treasurer: AL GUNTHEr
 Webmistrss: KATHY
LIU
 Newsletter Editor:
DAN ROGERS
V O LU M E 1 , I SS U E 2
PAGE 2
SCAMPs around the Sound, the Salish Sea and Surrounds
12 Months in the life of a very popular “Born & Bred” in Puget Sound small craft
by Simeon Baldwin
Oh the places you'll go! There is fun
to be done! There are points to be
scored. There are games to be won.
And the magical things you can do
with that ball will make you the
winning-est winner of all.
Friendships are made at SCAMP
camp that will last a life time.
Summer Solstice found SCAMPs
noiselessly gliding and sharing the
beautiful natural wonders of the
area.
Dr. Seuss, Oh, The Places You’ll
Go!
What a splendid magical vessel
the SCAMP has proven to be in this
wondrous Salish Sea. By my count
there are at least 16 active SCAMPers in the area, with at least as
many more still in the planning and
building stage. Not too bad for a
design that flew off the drawing
board of John Welsford late in 2010.
Worldwide, sail numbers have
reached into the four-hundreds and
SCAMP is now an International
One-Design Class, many built during SCAMP camps in Port Townsend.
That said, Puget Sound must
surely claim Fleet Number One
honors.
SCAMP #1 & Nord Vinden
Cozy Interior of Noddy
Skinny water exploring is one of the
many joys our fleet enjoyed this last
year.
Craft Island in shallow Skagit Bay
was an ideal destination for Josh
Colvin in his SCAMP #1, and Marty
Loken in his lovely 13’ canoe yawl,
Nord Vinden-What a fine ship SCAMP made for
slipping and sliding around
the harbor during the Port
Townsend opening day sailby parade in May.
Fun to build
Building a SCAMP is half the fun.
Terry Stoeser & Sköll
A superb and stable platform for
learning, the SCAMP excelled as a
teaching tool in Howard Rice’s
SCAMP Skills Academy weekend
held in Port Townsend last summer.
Javier & Crumpet
Javier Soto enjoyed the Skills
Academy and went on with newly
learned skills for his SCAMP
Crumpet’s maiden voyage from
Port Townsend around the south
end of Whidbey Island, to his
home in Orcas Island, a total of
95 nautical miles.
T R A D I TI O N S
PAGE 3
SCAMPs around the Sound...continued
day trip to the Discovery Islands in
BC, covering many trailer and ferry
miles, with some eighty sailing and
rowing miles on a serene and sunny
Salish Sea. Enjoy Dale’s Blog of the
trip CLICK HERE:
Arlie and Todd Blankenship in
their Humu simply enjoyed fishing
with their SCAMP and just mucking
about in Port Townsend Bay.
Red Lantern Rally
The second annual Red Lantern
Rally hosted by Port Townsend’s
own Small Craft Advisor Magazine
drew eleven SCAMPS to beautiful
Mystery Bay for a weekend of sailing, camaraderie, and fun sailing
games. The Rally is well documented in photos by Old Salt Pete
Leenhouts HERE
The Palooza Crooza was well
attended by SCAMP owners from
across the area as well.
At Fort Flagler—Crooza ‘15
Voyaging, the forte for this mini
microcruser, was enjoyed by “The
Pirates”; Derek Gries (Liberty 53),
Keith Naisman (Zephyr), and Dale
Simonson (Luna) as they cruised
north to Canadian waters on an 8-
Fishing on Humu
Shackleton
Brent Butikofer built his beautifully
detailed Shackleton and later enjoyed
the SCAMP Skills Academy. Click
HERE to read more about his late summer micro-expedition.
My own SCAMP, Noddy partook of racing out of Port Townsend in the annual Port Townsend sailing Association Shipwright’s Regatta garnering a trophy.
Also, Noddy was the smallest boat
to compete in the inaugural R2AK
Race to Alaska, Stage-1 crossing to
Victoria on Vancouver Island, BC.
PramParade
Messabouts, often including overnighting dried out on the upper beach,
tied to a dock, or anchored out, were a
definite highlight of the year for many
owners.
Pirates also enjoyed the Pull and be
Damned Messabout at Saddlebag Island in the San Juan Islands
Noddy Reaching into the Straits
SCAMP information and related
links:
SMALL CRAFT ADVISOR MAGAZINE
SCA MAGAZINE ON FACEBOOK
RACE TO ALASKA
TSCA–PUGET SOUND
TRADITIONAL SMALL CRAFT ASSOCIATION-NATIONAL ORGANIZATION
Photos in this article by:
Whaletown,
Cortez Island, BC
Keith & Zephyr at Saddlebag Island
Pete Leenhouts, Simeon Baldwin, Dale
Simonson, Marty Loken, Josh Colvin and
Brent Butikofer, all rights reserved 2016
V O LU M E 1 , I SS U E 2
PAGE 4
THE BOAT RAMP PROJECT...A PROGRESS REPORT
BY KATHY LIU & CLAIRE ACORD
There are tons of web pages
around the internet showing lists
and maps of boat launch ramps
in the Salish Sea, but…is the
information worth anything, or
is it just cyber rubbish? We
found so much information on
line to be out of date, incomplete
or just plain wrong. So, members of TSCA-PS have started a
project to list local ramps, showing current information, verified
by direct observation.
We have decided to begin by
focusing on ramps in areas
where our messabouts take
place, as those are the ones most
likely to be needed by our members.
And, who would know the details of a particular boat ramp
better than a regular user of that
ramp? This is where the local
knowledge part comes in, you
use a ramp…share your experiences with us. The links below
show what we have done already, and a template of the kind
of information we are looking
for. We especially would like
photos, both from shore and
from afloat, a picture being
worth a thousand words!
First, how to find this information on the TSCA-PS website:
Go to HTTP://WWW.TSCA.NET/
PUGET/INDEX.HTML
Click on the ‘Local Knowledge’
tab at top. Then go to an area
you are interested in. Currently
we have the following groups of
ramps available on-line:
WHIDBEY ISLAND features -- 13
launch ramps on Whidbey Island.
Parking: (availability, overnight?, other comments/
concerns)
Parking & other fees:
Restroom facilities:
Provisions for disposing trash:
Additional info (from website or
staff)
Local Knowledge: (as seen by
reporting boater)
Photos of ramp from land and as
seen from the water
DRIZZLE CRUISE AREA Seven
ramps from Brownsville - Gig
Harbor
Info last
whom;
MATS MATS BAY The first of a
series of launch ramps in Port
Townsend and around the Quimper Peninsula
When you review the existing
ramp pages you will see that not
all of the information is available for every ramp. That is
fine, some good, reliable information is still way better than no
information at all.
Again, this is the information
we are looking for.
verified
and
by
Location:
Managed by:
Ramp: (description of condition
and any other factors of value to
those considering launch at this
location)
Launch fees:
Improved ramp at Boat Haven,
Port Townsend
Please send your ramp information to the TSCA-PS webmistress,
Kathy
Liu
[email protected]
Photos Kathy Liu, all rights reserved 2016
Improved ramp at Boat Haven,
From Seaward
Photos were taken at 2:00pm May 21, 2016.
Tide was approximately 3.5'
T R A D I TI O N S
PAGE 5
MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU—PART II - TRAILER LIGHTING
BY JOHN
In part one we talked about 12
volt systems for boats. Since
many of us trailer our boats a bit
about trailer wiring would be
appropriate.
Like our boats, our vehicles
use 12 volt systems, so before
we talk about trailer lights and
wiring, some basics about the
power system for our trailer
lights are in order. In part one
we had a drawing of our 12 volt
battery and that drawing showed
the positive side of the battery to
+12 volts and the negative side
of the battery to "Ground". For
the trailer lights to work electricity has to travel from the positive
12 volts of the
b a t t e r y ,
through
the
light, and return to the battery through a
path
called
"Ground".
"Ground” is
first of all a
safety consideration to prevent voltage on
the exposed parts of things;
your car chassis for example, or
the surface of your electric stove
at home. The other application
for a "Ground" is to reduce electrical noise (useful for AC circuits & electronics). "Ground" is
not intended to be the normal
path for the flow of electricity.
The 12 volts should flow out of
the battery in one wire through
the light and return to the battery
in another wire. "Ground" is
just a way of saying 'this is the
common point of our system".
It is common to find trailers
where the framework of the
trailer is used as the return conductor to the negative of the 12
volt system. It makes sense
from a safety standpoint to have
the negative side of the 12 volts
connected to the frame of the
trailer but does not make sense
as the path for the electrical current to flow in.
Using the trailer frame as a
conductor of the electricity for
the lights has the advantage that
you only have to run a wire to
the positive side of the light and
just connect the other side of the
light to the frame where the light
is. That saves on cost of wire
and the job of running two wires
to a light instead of one wire.
Using the trailer frame as a conductor has some significant disadvantages though. First of all,
the frame is not as good a conductor as a copper wire. Second,
the integrity of the frame may
cause poor conduction of the
power to the light. But most
significant is that every point
where a light is connected to the
frame will be affected by corrosion or rust. Wires will be at-
ACORD
tached to the frame with fasteners
and weathering or immersion in
water will make the connection
poor over time. Poor connections
dim lights or make them not work
at all. Not good things.
A very best practice would be to
wire each light fixture with two
wires, seal the fixture to prevent
intrusion of moisture and run the
two wires all the way up to the
connector to the tow vehicle. The
only downside is a bit of work and
expense, and maybe a waterproof
junction box at the trailer tongue
end near the connector. The next
best practice is to run one or more
common negative wires (maybe
one down each side of
the trailer) and splice
into the wire at each
light. Splices need to
be carefully made and
sealed against moisture
with something like
shrink tubing that has
sealant in it. Crimp
connectors make very
good splices, but my
preference personally
is solder splices with
shrink tubing/sealant;
bullet proof!
For your trailer lights a good
choice now are LED fixtures.
These fixtures have become reasonably inexpensive, readily available, highly visible and most are
completely sealed preventing corrosion. In addition the bulbs very
rarely burn out.
Happy Trailering.
John Acord
T R A D I TI O N S
PAGE 6
RETRIEVING IN A SWELL—A TALE OF
EDITOR continued from page 1
BOUNCING AROUND ON THE EDGE OF BOWMAN BAY
BY RANDY JONES
Bowman Bay is a beautiful crescent
beach on the west side of Fidalgo
Island. The beach is loose gravel
with an old time one lane concrete
ramp useable at tides of 2 feet and
higher. The place looks great on a
post card but the ramp is unfortunately exposed to the westerly swell
coming in from the Straights of Juan
de Fuca.
steered the boat between the trailer
guides, killed the motor, and shifted my
weight to the transom. Clementine slid
on the trailer and just hinted at going
sideways. The boys hooked up the bow
strap and winched in with the next
swell leaving the bow about two feet
short of the winch stand. I shifted my
weight forward while the truck pulled
uphill out of the swell to where the
cranking
Dan Taylor’s Perfect Skiff after an exciting
would safely
return to the beach!
continue.
The
whole
thing
happ e n e d
quickly with
no
drama.
We
were
lucky.
The two foot
westerly
swell
running Saturday,
April 2nd towards
the end of our
messabout was
going to make
getting boats back
on trailers interesting. Tide was
going out.
No
adjacent
dock,
just a swell breaking on a slippery ramp.
First up was the largest trailered
boat in the group, my 1,500 lb Belhaven 19 Cat Ketch named
Clementine. I briefed the crew on
what we were going to try and
dropped them off at the dock which
is a short walk from the ramp. I then
dropped sails, pulled up the centerboard, and took the boat in alone at
low power with the confidence of a
captain with plans to repaint this fall.
Our driver backed the trailer in deep
to get the bunks wet then pulled forward to get the forward roller out of
the water. Our teenage boys sat on
the tailgate with winch strap ready to
go. I went straight for the trailer,
Next up, a
pair of 12
foot Scamps.
For these we backed the trailers in and
walked the boats over with a least one
person (bigger the better) on each side.
A couple people needed to wade in
pretty deep but the same technique of
half submerging the trailer and moving
the boat when the swell arrived worked
well.
Last up were a couple of longer but
light pulling boats. By that time we
had a small experienced crowd already
wet who were able to make short work
of it.
Lessons learned; you need a crowd,
people will get wet, large people make
the best human pilings, and things always work better when no one is taking
photos.
Find out more at
http://www.tsca.net/
puget/
Miss Kathleen
showed pictures to the Nice Lady down
at our local county courthouse. She
said, “It’s a nice boat.” I wrote her a
check, and I got my hull numbers.
Most of the time, things have worked
out, pretty well. Most of the time, I’ve
made it back to the pier/launch ramp
without undue hardship. I didn’t sink, or
even take on much water. I didn’t have
any docking “incidents” to speak of. I
even towed a couple different boats-indistress home, during these test
runs. All this has been working up to
The Big One. And, suddenly, the rules
seem to have changed. The upcoming
transit to the Montague Harbor Rendezvous is going to require about 50 miles
by water each way—depending upon
where I launch from and with whom I
tag along.
Suddenly, I’m secondguessing EVERYTHING. Heck, just a
couple days ago I ran about 30 miles
non-stop around one of our bigger North
Idaho lakes. Piece ‘a cake. But, the
Saltchuck! You’d think my boat has
been shrinking. Every time I consult the
charts and cruising guides, Miss Kathleen seems to grow frailer and less capable. Maybe you know somebody like
that?
The truth of the matter is pretty simple. Boats float on top. They’ll take
better care of us, than we’re likely to do
for them in a hard chance. The First
Law of the Sea REQUIRES us to render
assistance to the limit of our capability. If you break down, you can count
on me doing what I can to help. And,
I’m going to count upon the same thing
from you. There, see? I was just being
silly.
See you out there!