Recent content by teep

This is apparently a feature. I am also a beginner (about forty hours on the water), but I don't think that the solution to this problem is to apply more rudder. I know that under a gust, it feels like the boat wants to turn into the wind and it feels like applying more rudder is the correct...

I wear a pair of very beat-up sneakers when sailing because the lake I sail in is pretty shallow (about 15' max depth) and has icky footing on the bottom. I wear shoes in case I wind up standing chin-deep in the water, trying to unrig the boat so's to get the mast out of the mud. (Not, of...

We had a bit of breeze this afternoon when I got off work. Weather says 4-7 mph, which seems about right for the non-gust parts. There was enough to move the boat around pleasantly, get it to where I had to hike out of the boat three or four times, and generally provide a nice hour and a half...

Half of the pictures I have seen of people sailing Lasers have the people with their butts hanging out over the side of the boat. The other half of the pictures I've seen of people sailing Lasers have the boat on its side with the sail flat on the water OR the person sitting real far forward...

You and me both. I'm not flipping the thing over quite so much these days and I don't drop things anymore on tacks, so it's time to figure out what all the controls do.

Temps in the high 80's with upper-level humidity. There's enough breeze in the evenings (4-7 PM) to move the boat around gently but rarely enough that I have to hike out of the boat to keep it level. *sigh* There will be more wind in the fall.

Mine seems to hold okay with the existing line and cleat arrangement, but I'll keep an eye on it -- it's one of the plastic ones. Like the mainsheet is not enough? I've been putting it in the footwell area and it starts out fairly tidy but turns into a rumpled pile of line in two or three...

*heh* Right now, there is quite enough performance as soon as the wind picks up beyond a gentle breeze. The boat isn't the weak link over here. That'd be me. Oh, sorry. I was referring to these directions: http://www.sailtoronto.com/PDF/Laser%20Rigging%20Basics.doc -- It looked to me like they...

I just got a used Laser here two weeks ago, never having sailed a boat before in my life. It's been very educational so far and I'm having a blast despite total newbie status. Anyway, the sail has the texture of a flannel sheet and there are some smallish wear holes on the front of the luff...

That looks like a pretty handy setup. The only thing I can see missing is that in PA (where I live), you have to red flag or red light (if it's dark out) the tail end of loads that project more than 4' beyond the back bumper of the vehicle.

This is advice I could have used yesterday. :) The tree leaves were flipped to the pale side and bigger branches were moving in a sort of boiling motion, but it wasn't steady. I rigged the boat in manageable steps during lulls, but once everything was together, I was out of my league. (I got...