Newbie

Morning all.

Taking delivery today of a 75 Sunfish. Had been looking all summer and checked CL yesterday for the heck of it. Bingo!!

Really nice shape..especially for the age. ZPriced well but no trailer

Been surfing these forums since 2 this morning. Great site, good vibe. I'm on 2 other forums, one for a certain guitar brand and another for off grid small cabins and they are well moderated and populated by good people.

Seems like I got lucky finding this one!!

I sailed an O'Day 22 then 23 back in the 80's and enjoyed cruising...I kept time with a calendar not a watch....but hadn't sailed in over 25 years until I picked up a Hunter 140 for our small lake up in the ADK's. Probably shoulda researched that clorox bottle before buying!

Ill try and keep the questions to a minumum...Good search function on this site at Youtube is priceless....but you know how that goes.

Pictures in the next few days...along with the inevitable flurry of questions
 
Let's see if this works!!
 

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Seller replaced the mast with what he said was an older one w.an integrated pulley on top of the mast for the halyard. He claimed he had lost 2 halyards over the years due to chafing in the other versions slot.

Due to late arrival did not get to sail her but it was remarkably light and bobbed on the water nicely.

Needs a little work on rudder and center board but all in all pretty nice shape. He had original blue and white sail but it was pretty much shot.

Now I need to come up w.a name huh???
 
Welcome to the forum. :)

Either halyard system works well, and I've had both. The plastic cap is pretty much unbreakable, and while wearing-out can be expected, they're easily replaced.

Before I'd take her out, I'd move that gooseneck forward on the boom. Search "Geezer Rig" for a good place to start.

(Search is the magnifying-lens icon--upper right hand corner).
 
Garbanzoe,

Nice boat! What part of Central NY are you in? I am Cazenovia a littke south and east of Syracuse. I sell used Sunfish parts and gear. Let me know if you need anything.

Alan Glos
Cazenovia, NY
 
I'm up on Onondaga Hill....I'll be picking the boat up in Erieville Friday swinging right by Caz Lake...I've seen your dagger and rudder on CL here...when it was the only item that popped up when you entered Sunfish!

Not sure if it will happen but my plan is to leave my daughters tennis match, pick up the boat and head up to Star Lake. Probably not going to happen as I get in at 6:00 a.m. to office, her match is at 2:00 vs Jordan Elbridge @ Jordan Elbridge....so maybe I'll park at the Brae Loch for a spell :) and just spend the night at home and go up Saturday early.

I was going to PM you after a few weeks here on the site once all got to "know" me.
 
Ended up getting it delivered yesterday while I was out of town. My brother took it for me.

I'll be there today to get more pictures to post.

I've always felt it was bad luck to rename a boat, luckily past owner didn't have one....but I'm drwaing a blank.

Maybe after I sail it one will pop!
grumman on t100.jpg
grumman rudder.jpg

Funny, driving back from camp yesterday I saw a Grumman 15' w/sail rig.

Hard to say no at the price they were asking...

Missing mast, otherwise complete. I would have paid 4x more for the canoe itself.

So I go from 0 to 2 in one day!!! And don't laugh, that T-100 pick up has needed only oil changes and tires in over 170,000 miles, (no winter driving).


grumman 11.jpg
 
I "approve", but it's been many years!

I jury-rigged the rudder, with a 2-foot tiller and a four-foot tiller extension—all asymmetrical. :eek:

The tiller had a "fork", and the extension had two large "pins" (dowels capped with washers) to align with the fork. One pin is "captured" in a slot. It worked well, certainly better than the loosey-goosey connections they provide. :rolleyes:
Bob with graduation present canoe 1960+.jpg
 
As is the mast I'm beginning to find!! Some great suggestions regarding making a replacement on Skinnyhull on FB.

I'm heading up to camp to baptize the new Sunfish this weekend. I'll swing by the house were I bought the Grumman to see if they might have it.

BTW... Your bridge gave me some inspiration for a similar one at the house. For some unknown reason it never dawned on me to use the circular saw for the curved beams...so simple!!!


Quite a find on the canoe, the mast step and rudder with gudgeon are almost impossible to find.
 
1) It never occurs to anyone unless they are married to someone whose wife built theater sets, or whose Son had Middle School woodshop classes. The considerations for cutting the arc are saw blade diameter and material thickness. Here is a cut I made on some 3/4 inch stock using a 7 1/4 inch saw.

bottom plank curve.jpeg


One other tip is to make a shallow cut first, then go back over again for the full cut.

2) The Grummans had either a lateen or gunter rig, Capn Jack made his own lateen rig spars, then cut down a Sunfish sail to 65 square feet for his version of a sloop.

Jack stylin canoe.jpg


We were inspired to make a similar sailing canoe, starting with a simple gaff rig similar to what the Seminole Indians used, it is handy for going downwind and on a very broad reach. Paddle out early, sail back as the onshore breeze comes up.

Seminole canoe with sail on Biscayne Bay sm.jpg


CA5B7830-0B93-428E-885D-C1C645201A1A.jpeg


It was simple and it worked. Then I decided to make it very complicated and add a mizzen, leeboards, leeboard thwart, rudder, rudder lines, etc...

IMG_0907.jpg


We fabricated a cassette style leeboard thwart and used a Sunfish daggerboard. Steering was marginal. Also tried out using a Sunfish rudder, that was a mess. Eventually we found a Grumman leeboard thwart and leeboards. And then a Grumman rudder and gudgeon. What I learned was I took a simple 70 pound canoe and added a lot of weight, sticks, boards and strings and made a very complicated small boat that was not a good sailboat. We had a blast along the way though, and entertained "The Usual Visitors."

So ask the seller if the have the leeboard thwart, leeboards, and sail rig. And visit our blog to see what else we did to our Grumman 17 Double Ender SCOUT.

3) As for the halyard block, those were used for many years, and work great with 2 caveats. 1) If the eyebolt is chrome plated brass, the eye can pull open under heavy load and down comes the rig. 2) If you trailer long distances, tape over the eyebolt nut because they were know to vibrate loose and fall out.
 
I just joined today, and don't know the site at all, but this thread came up first when I searched for 'canoe'. Is there a separate forum here for canoes and kayaks equipped with sailrigs?

I've been messing with that all summer, using a ready-made Sunfish-style lateen sailrig from Sailboats-to-go on both my kayak and canoe, then adding modifications like a taller mast and a jib. They also sell all the components separately, like leeboards, steering oars, outriggers and mast-steps, so its great for DIY. So far as I can judge the result makes a pretty good sailboat, though I can't really compare since these are the only things I've ever sailed. Anyway I can go far out in Cayuga Lake on days when the few local Sunfishes I see are hugging the shore, and I can launch from any beach I can drive to. This is the rig I sailed most recently, though I'm still making changes almost every day.
1631301613638.jpeg
 
Had Sunfish never been developed (perish the thought), we'd still all be sailors. ;) This forum is big enough that we can take in an occasional "flyer"--so welcome!

No spinnaker or gennaker? :rolleyes: At first glance, it appeared (to me) that you have too much sail area, but then I noticed you'd added two amas, so your canoe has become a "displacement" trimaran. :eek:

All bets are off!

Sailing Canoes in general, don't point to windward very well. A Sunfish is a much better pointer! :rolleyes:

I'd lower the lateen sail to reduce the "tippiness" associated with canoes.

Leeboards aren't as efficient as one large daggerboard, although the windward leeboard can be raised to reduce drag on certain points of sail. We have a Dutch sailor on this forum who can elaborate on leeboard sailing so popular in Holland.

Some time in the 1950s, a double-masted Grumman canoe sailed solo across the Pacific! While there was ample space for provisions, he made island stops for water. There was no mention of capsize, but his two gunter-rigged sails would make dousing the sails an easy move when squalls intruded.

His biggest problem was with hallucinations!
 
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Had Sunfish never been developed (perish the thought), we'd still all be sailors. ;) This forum is big enough that we can take in an occasional "flyer"--so welcome!

No spinnaker or gennaker? :rolleyes: At first glance, it appeared (to me) that you have too much sail area, but then I noticed you'd added two amas, so your canoe has become a "displacement" trimaran. :eek:

All bets are off!

Is that bad?

I didn't make any special decision to add the outriggers; they are part of the standard sailrig I bought from Jim Luckett at Sailboats To Go - Our Mission: Extremely Portable Sailboats, who has been selling these add-on sailrigs for canoes, kayaks and inflatables for 20 years or more. I was paddling my kayak on Cayuga Lake in June and pulled up next to a guy who was setting up his moored 30-foot sloop for the season and watched and chatted while he was putting the battens into the mainsail, and then went home and googled 'sail on a kayak' and STG was what came up, so I just studied that site carefully and then ordered from there, and have since then been sailing most days through July and August. I practiced in tiny Dryden Lake that is too small to have waves, then moved back into Cayuga Lake with the sail, and started experimenting with different rigs, just based on what I read in books. For example, I made a "mini-sloop" using a Laser 4.7 mainsail that I also bought on-line. (In this picture the outriggers, leeboards and steering oars aren't mounted. Both the white and blue jibs are for something called a Sea Skimmer, formerly Sea Devil, also sold on-line by STG):
DSC04660c.jpg




I added the canoe because I wanted eventually to be able to carry passengers, but with the higher freeboard it also handles the bigger waves in the big Lake much better, so now I use only that in the big lake even for solo sailing. I chose the 11-foot canoe based on size: both canoe and kayak I can easily load and carry in the back of my PT Cruiser. I would only consider a Snark or Sunfish if its weight and geometry allowed me to conveniently load, carry and launch it this same way. From the specs I see on-line I think they are probably both too long and too heavy.

DSC04764.JPG


STG sells optional add-on wheels that plug into the same crossbar that supports the mast step, outriggers and leeboards, making it easy to roll the boats from car to launching point. In contrast, I have seen people complain on-line that the 150-pound Sunfish on a launching dolly is hard to handle single-handed. I want a sailboat that I can conveniently carry in my car and launch single-handed, and this comes before any other issues about performance, as long as it can sail upwind. That was Jim Luckett's philosophy for Sailboats-to-go, as he explains on his site. Actually he carries this much further, since all of his gear breaks down to 4-foot lengths and can be checked as luggage on a plane. Obviously I don't break it down that far, since I'm carrying an 11-foot canoe or kayak hull anyway.

DSC04766.JPG
DSC04640.JPG


Sailing Canoes in general, don't point to windward very well. A Sunfish is a much better pointer! :rolleyes:

I'd lower the lateen sail to reduce the "tippiness" associated with canoes.

Leeboards aren't as efficient as one large daggerboard, although the windward leeboard can be raised to reduce drag on certain points of sail. We have a Dutch sailor on this forum who can elaborate on leeboard sailing so popular in Holland.

Some time in the 1950s, a double-masted Grumman canoe sailed solo across the Pacific! While there was ample space for provisions, he made island stops for water. There was no mention of capsize, but his two gunter-rigged sails would make dousing the sails an easy move when squalls intruded.

Actually I raised the lateen sail just to get more headroom, after shifting to the high midships seat on top of the gunwhales, to balance my weight in the canoe, and the outriggers are keeping it stable enough for the sailing I am doing, including through 1 to 2 foot waves on the big lake, since the steering oars let me adjust the angle of attack for each wave. But anyway, the fact that you have an extensive body of prior experience with sailing canoes is all the more reason why this site (or some site) should have at least a thread if not a separate forum devoted to this topic, so people like me can find and exchange such information and experience. Jim Luckett started a group for STG on Facebook a couple of months ago, but it isn't very large or active yet, and so far the only content on custom rigs is what I've posted there in the last month or so. And I had to find out for myself by googling that there are other sailing-canoe traditions, including the Grumman canoes with the wooden leeboards, no outriggers, and a tiny little right-triangle sail that looks in the pictures like it's about 20 square feet, so Mr Garbanzo from Syracuse whose thread we are currently hijacking is not missing much, and could do better just by using any piece of aluminum tubing for a mast and hanging the 45 sq foot lateen from STG on it, along with some outriggers. (I'm guessing maybe the original Grumman sail was so short and tiny because they were selling the canoe with leeboards but no outriggers.) And also there was something else called a 'Folbot', like a break-down-able wood and canvas canoe, that also came with an optional sailkit, with distinctive curved wooden leeboards, that I also just accidentally found by googling. And its very interesting news to me that there is also this Dutch tradition of sailing canoes, which I would also be interested to learn more about.

I'm new to internet forums as well as sailing, and I'm not sure what the etiquette is on this, but it seems to me that we shouldn't have to hijack the thread of Mr. Garbanzo to discuss and learn about canoe sailing, just because he happened to buy a Grumman sailing canoe along with his Sunfish. There ought to be at least one good central place to learn about sails on canoes and kayaks in North America, like this site from the UK that I also found by googling 'sails on canoes': Solway Dory | The Home of Canoe Sailing. The system here calls you 'well-known member', and the previous poster Signal Charlie who also posted a bunch of pictures of canoes with sails in this thread is even called 'staff member', so isn't there something you folks can do to make this happen? I.e. make one little corner of your site or forum about canoe sailing, and flag it as such so that people like me can find it, and read what's there, and post in it and exchange information and experience? If somebody else has already tried the same things I am trying right now, it would be nice for me to be able to find out about that in advance. And conversely somebody else might want to try what I am trying right now, and might benefit from hearing how that worked out for me.

Sorry for ranting, if this counts as a rant (like I said, I'm new to internet forums). But it seems to me that this format where interesting but off-topic things get said in various threads that no one else can find later, makes it hard to use a site like this as a permanent searchable repository of useful information. A library has a card catalog, and books are classified by subject matter. It's not just like a bulletin board or chat room, where all you see is whatever is being posted or discussed today. I guess it was lucky for me that sailing canoes were being talked about in Mr. Garbonzo's current Sunfish thread, so there was a place where I could bring up this topic, but the next newcomer interested in this might not be so lucky. Us canoe sailors should have a little corner of our own somewhere that anyone interested in that can always find.
 

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As is the mast I'm beginning to find!! Some great suggestions regarding making a replacement on Skinnyhull on FB.

I'm heading up to camp to baptize the new Sunfish this weekend. I'll swing by the house were I bought the Grumman to see if they might have it.

BTW... Your bridge gave me some inspiration for a similar one at the house. For some unknown reason it never dawned on me to use the circular saw for the curved beams...so simple!!!

Garbanzoe,

I have an aluminum spar that might work as a mast for your sailing canoe rig. It is 2" in diameter and 8' 9" long (and could easily be cut shorter if need be.) Would his work? The diameter is the critical dimension. Let me know.

Alan Glos in nearby Cazenovia, NY
[email protected]
 
But of course your gooseneck also has to fit around your mast. I don't know the size of the Sunfish gooseneck, but the goosenecks for the Sailboats-to-go lateen spar sets I was suggesting are either 1-1/2 or 1-5/8 inch inner diameter, hence would not fit around a 2 inch mast. The STG 8-foot mast in two 4-foot sections is 1-1/2 inch OD at the base.
 
And also there was something else called a 'Folbot', like a break-down-able wood and canvas canoe, that also came with an optional sailkit, with distinctive curved wooden leeboards, that I also just accidentally found by googling. And its very interesting news to me that there is also this Dutch tradition of sailing canoes, which I would also be interested to learn more about.

I'm new to internet forums as well as sailing, and I'm not sure what the etiquette is on this, but it seems to me that we shouldn't have to hijack the thread of Mr. Garbanzo to discuss and learn about canoe sailing, just because he happened to buy a Grumman sailing canoe along with his Sunfish. There ought to be at least one good central place to learn about sails on canoes and kayaks in North America, like this site from the UK that I also found by googling 'sails on canoes': Solway Dory | The Home of Canoe Sailing. The system here calls you 'well-known member', and the previous poster Signal Charlie who also posted a bunch of pictures of canoes with sails in this thread is even called 'staff member', so isn't there something you folks can do to make this happen? I.e. make one little corner of your site or forum about canoe sailing, and flag it as such so that people like me can find it, and read what's there, and post in it and exchange information and experience? If somebody else has already tried the same things I am trying right now, it would be nice for me to be able to find out about that in advance. And conversely somebody else might want to try what I am trying right now, and might benefit from hearing how that worked out for me.

Sorry for ranting, if this counts as a rant (like I said, I'm new to internet forums). But it seems to me that this format where interesting but off-topic things get said in various threads that no one else can find later, makes it hard to use a site like this as a permanent searchable repository of useful information. A library has a card catalog, and books are classified by subject matter. It's not just like a bulletin board or chat room, where all you see is whatever is being posted or discussed today. I guess it was lucky for me that sailing canoes were being talked about in Mr. Garbonzo's current Sunfish thread, so there was a place where I could bring up this topic, but the next newcomer interested in this might not be so lucky. Us canoe sailors should have a little corner of our own somewhere that anyone interested in that can always find.
I once defended myself regarding a Marine Patrol stop, as our state law doesn't require the registration of kayaks--but I was given a warning to register my sailing Folbot. There was plenty of information regarding "decked" sailing canoes and kayaks on the Internet at the time--maybe 15 years ago!

I presently own two Folbot kayaks. Both are "retired", as recovering them with a vinyl-type material is not among my skills. :( I've retained two leeboards I had professionally made to improve the Folbot's inherently poor pointing ability. 'Also retained a Folbot flag, which is in high demand among Folbot's fans.

One Folbot has a metal frame that folds, and the other has a wood frame crafted from Folbot materials sold as a non-folding kit.

The metal framed Folbot was purchased with a sailing kit. After years of enjoyment, that kit was sold a few years ago. The buyer' father, from Maine, flew PBY amphibious aircraft in WWII's Pacific war--as did mine!

To answer WRT the creation of a new sailing forum listing for sailing canoes, I suggest you start a "Conversation" with Webmaster "Bradley".
 
I headed back up to camp Friday and swung by the house where i found it. Turns out it was her sisters that she had bought at an auction. Lady kindly called the sister who allowed me to come over...about 20 miles in NW Adirondacks. My heart dropped at the site of a very large homemade wind chime made from 4 2' pieces of scrap aluminum.

Luckily they were not the mast.

Turns out she knew prior owner....I was allowed to head there and searched the shed it had been stored in. Another20+mile side trip. No luck. As i was walking out of the shed I peered behind the rails for the ovhead door...VIOLA!!!!!

Complete set up. In hindsight it would have been easy to make one save for the square bottom.

WRT: Try skinny hull on Facebook!!
 

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