QB and the Texas 200

07 July 2024     Editor    10 Comments.

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Skip Johnson sends in a report of the launch of his new proa QB, and running of the 2024 Texas 200. See the previous QB article here.

It’s been almost a month since QB (Questing Beast) and I ventured out on this year’s Texas 200; now that I’ve caught up with some of the other things in life it’s time to say something about the adventure from a proa perspective, I’d already written something for the Texas 200 website.

First off we only made the first 68 miles of the planned 153 miles. No fault of QB’s it was strictly operator error. First I tried to turn to port at about 5 mph with a clump of sea grass on the rudder which I thought I had shed and popped the cassette and rudder out of socket and cross ways across the stern of the boat. The only damage was to the carbon fiber pushrod which was bent over the gunwale.  The cassette/rudder assembly popped back into place easily and there was no apparent damage other than the pushrod. I was leery of using the rudder with the damaged pushrod and started sailing using the AD scull to steer which led to my second mistake.  While getting a feel for how the boat handled using the scull to steer I failed to realize we had entered the land cut and was shortly in the shoals on the lee side of the channel in a freshening breeze. I decided to spend the night there and leave at first light to catch up with the fleet.

The second day while we were slowly catching up the sails ahead of us we were caught by a wind shift that put us once again in the lee shoals of the land cut in a freshening breeze where we spent the rest of the day and night. After that it was a case of continuing to Corpus Christi and meeting family a day late at Snoopy’s restaurant to return to everyday life.

Along the way QB weathered a popup thunderstorm the first day that capsized a couple of boats and drove some others ashore. The only issue there was the drogue I first deployed and the anchor afterwards both held the boat at about 45 degrees to the wave trains rather than closer to head on. In both cases lines were fastened to a horn cleat on the side of the cabin within reach of the cockpit. Some sort of bridle arrangement is probably going to be required.

Before that in the snail race up the Laguna Madre in very light ghosting conditions before the storm we were a “fast snail” and overtook two boats in a ten mile stretch while none of the sails behind us seemed to be gaining.

The second day through the land cut and across Baffin Bay we started with full sail and took in one reef once in Baffin Bay and then another an hour or so later. Later in the afternoon once whitecaps were showing regularly we took in two more reefs and sailed on at 7-8 mph. The maximum speed the gps recorded was 9.1 mph which is slow in one respect but I was being very conservative on a first time out in open water.

General impression is that QB is definitely fulfilling its design requirements as a comfortable quick camp cruiser. It’s certainly comfortable, a silicone gel seat pad is a significant element in overall long term comfort for an 80+ year old butt. A lot of time was spent with weight as far to leeward as possible sitting on the seat pad on the food box to minimize wetted surface.

The to-do list is fairly short and is in the queue behind the list my wife patiently accumulated while I spent so much time getting the boat ready. First and foremost is just more sailing time to learn how the boat handles and to optimize the sail rigging. The side planks on the aluminum tube beams need to be either redone or replaced, they need to be stiffer and stronger. Planks were made from available material while I was waiting for backordered foam and were a minimalist approach ~ 3# each. New reinforced reef ratchet assemblies need to be made, one failed a week before the 200 and reefing was done through tied grommets at each batten location. The winch handle clipped into the end of boom worked well to reel in the sail.

I’ll probably switch to a cable system for rudder control rather than pushrod. Not because one pushrod was broken but there’s a conflict between the tiller arm and a cleat for the shock cord that helps hold the AD scull in place. I’d like to have a lighter AD scull with a slightly more flexible blade but probably not bad enough to actually make one. The existing scull works really well I can easily scull QB at 2 mph for an extended time and might be able to improve on that with practice.
The one problem with the scull that I hadn’t anticipated in the scull is worthless in shoal water. Works great in two and a half to three feet of water, very problematical in shallower water.

There’s a pinhole leak in the float, takes in about an eighth of an inch (3mm) a day not sure how I’m going to find and fix it, probably fill the float partially up and go from there.

Trailering cover need to have 3/16” shock cord rim switched to 1/4” the front edge starts to lift at about 60-70 mph on the highway. No rush on this one we are two miles or six minutes from our usual ramp. Trailer light needs to be replaced also when one screw holding angle bracket holding the light sheared off and shook light to pieces.

That’s it for now, it was a great trip, bucket list item for an old man. Now it’s just a matter of something to piddle with for a while.

Cheers,
Skip

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