Guidelines for evaluating and installing wet exhausts Issue 2 : Sept/Oct 1998 The most popular sailboat exhaust system today is a wet exhaust system which includes a waterlift muffler. This system off...
In which the technical editor makes certain confessions and beseeches forgiveness from his wife … Issue 3 : Nov/Dec 1998 I was guilty of contempt. Never a good thing, in this case it turned out ...
For offshore or coastal cruising, this Mark Ellis design is still popular eight years after the last one rolled off the line Issue 3 : Nov/Dec 1998 The original Niagara 35 design, the “Mark I Model,” ...
Prioritize your upgrades Issue 3 : Nov/Dec 1998 At Good Old Boat, we recently received an email letter asking us to list some good old boats and put a price on what it should cost to upgrade them. Whi...
Years of salty experience alone don’t make the sailor; it takes competence and safe practices Issue 3 : Nov/Dec 1998 The term seamanship conjures up mental images of a professional sea captain roundin...
Issue 4 : Jan/Feb 1999 It was a small victory. The first thing after breakfast I left the small bay where I’d been anchored. Winds were as predicted: from the southwest. A high to the east and a low t...
Issue 5 : Mar/Apr 1999 The wind had shifted overnight. A sea was starting to run into the anchorage from the exposed direction, so we decided to leave. We finished the breakfast dishes and pulled in t...
Behold the next generation of sailors Issue 5 : Mar/Apr 1999 Spring is a time to contemplate beginnings. Sailors in the higher latitudes throw off tarps and start preparations for another season. Some...
Standing Rigging Issue 6 : May/Jun 1999 The most important rigging maintenance tool is a good notebook. I also recommend the use of a tension gauge. There is some trial and error involved in the initi...
Issue 6 : May/Jun 1999 A popular national sailing magazine recently published its picks for the eight best boats of the year. The “pocket cruiser” candidates were priced between $80,000 and $117,000. ...
Issue 8 : Sept/Oct 1999 Nothing exceeds like excess. It’s not an original line, but I’ve forgotten where I first heard it. It is interesting to speculate on the origins of excess in our culture and on...
Issue 10 : Jan/Feb 2000 While normally thought of as a downwind technique, it is possible to sail wing-and-wing as high as relative wind abeam. Not only is it possible, it is quite desirable to do so....
Issue 10 : Jan/Feb 2000 In a recent conversation, a Good Old Boat reader recited the “one thing leads to another” litany. You know the drill. “I took this apart and found that . . . which required tha...
Issue 11 : Mar/Apr 2000 People are exposed to a lot of “media” these days. More so than at any other time in our history. There is so much material being pushed at us that it is appropriate to ask, “W...
(With apologies to Joshua Slocum) Issue 12 : May/Jun 2000 In the March 2000 issue of Practical Sailor editor Dan Spurr describes how he came to sell his Tartan 44, Viva. He concludes that he has lost ...
Issue 13 : Jul/Aug 2000 While most of the rigging on our boat was very satisfactory when we bought it, the whisker pole and mast pad-eye were not particularly reassuring. The pole was a small-diameter...
Issue 13 : Jul/Aug 2000 It was quiet in the marina. I was up the mast attending to a recalcitrant anchor light. A U.S. Coast Guard boat with two large outboards idled into the entrance and up and down...
Issue 14: Sept/Oct 2000 Good Old Boat magazine is about cruising sailboats 10 years old and older. When we started this magazine we decided to define a cruising sailboat as any boat with a head, galle...
Issue 16 : Jan/Feb 2001 There was very little wrong with our 1976 C&C 30, Mystic, when we bought her. The raw-water pump impeller was about to fail, the mast wiring needed to be replaced, and the ...
Issue 16 : Jan/Feb 2001 I recently wrote a short biography in which I mentioned that I had sailed halfway around the world twice. In all fairness, in the context of this sailing magazine, this does no...
Issue 17 : Mar/Apr 2001 One of the peculiarities of the magazine business is that the deadline for the March issue is January 1. Nothing personal; even if you are married to the editor, it is still Ja...
Issue 19 : Jul/Aug 2001 Several years ago we defined the niche for this magazine as “cruising sailboats more than 10 years old.” We elaborated by saying that, for our purposes, a cruising sailboat is ...
Issue 18: May/June 2001 Arecent issue of USAA magazine carried the story of a National Guard rescue attempt that occurred during “The Perfect Storm.” Not the Hollywood version; the real storm. The 106...
Issue 19 : Jul/Aug 2001 Ron Bohannon is a fussy guy. The world needs fussy people, those more inclined to say “that’s not good enough.” Ron looked at the lifeline stanchions on the market and said he ...
How to lift your engine with a spherical air bladder Issue 27: Nov/Dec 2002 AS I WAS GROWING UP, I SUSPECT SEVERAL COACHES SAID, OUT of earshot, “Now there’s a boy who doesn’t know what to do with a b...
Issue 19 : Jul/Aug 2001 Should you consider doing this work to a wooden boat? A 1996 editorial in a sailing magazine I rather like, spoke favorably of the sheathing and glassing of Mustang’s hull and ...
Auxiliary motor borrowed from a fork-lift truck; batteries from golf carts Issue 20 : Sept/Oct 2001 It was the kind of day that couldn’t figure out if it wanted to rain, be foggy, or grow dark. Rainbo...
Issue 20 : Sept/Oct 2001 Seventy percent of the earth’s surface is covered by water, and more than 99 percent of the earth’s human population is on the remaining land. That makes the water a very spec...
Issue 21 : Nov/Dec 2001 Not all lids are made with a locking mechanism. The lids on our cockpit lazarettes come to mind. These lids are large, heavy, and awkward. Dick Thews must have grappled with th...
Issue 21 : Nov/Dec 2001 I missed that piece of American popular culture. I was out of town. Still, I bought a record in a Navy exchange somewhere that had Marianne Faithful wailing that well-known Mam...