kinardly

First of all, the "diesel" aircraft engines you refer to do not burn No. 2 diesel, they burn Jet A kerosene or the equivalent which is rather more similar to No. 1 diesel, which is blended in with No. 2 when necessary to prevent it from coagulating in temperatures below freezing. As an aviation alternative to 100 low lead gasoline, AKA "Avgas", Jet A's chief advantage is it's available in more countries where the use of tetraethyl lead to inhibit detonation is prohibited. Tetraethyl lead is a highly toxic and environmentally harmful additive only tolerated in the US private aviation fleet because of the low quantities and economic impact to a sizable constituency of owners. Gasoline for marine purposes doesn't have lead so there is less environmental pressure to eliminate it from marine applications.

Slight thread drift but I do not get the mentality that you absolutely have to get a head start on a career at the age of twenty or something. I went to college on a Navy scholarship and that financial support was important enough in its own right but the prospect of going out and doing something crazy, exciting and maybe just a little dangerous was as big a factor in my choosing to go that route. Most of my friends in college pitied me because I was committing to six years post graduation and wouldn't be able to land that junior management trainee position in corporate America and begin accumulating the trappings they were so fixated upon. Of course, then the Vietnam thing came along and all of a sudden the same friends were banging on the door trying to get into an officer candidate program. As it turned out I had plenty of time after my service to position myself in a rewarding and worthwhile career and was probably better equipped for it.

Somebody stole a wet suit and the top section of my daughter's Laser mast at the club five years ago. It ain't right! Maybe I should re-file a complaint with the club?

LOL, that was probably my famous ability to make electronic devices go stupid with only my presence. For the record, the Centurion 47 I visited had electric primary winches or I agree, the headsails would require a bit more athleticism than a husband and wife team would want to muster when out of sight of land.

Damn! Feels like the end of an era.

Amen to this! A bigger load from a high speed alternator is mandatory if you use your engine at anchor to charge your batteries. Otherwise, the engine doesn't get up to proper temperature and you get glazing of the cylinder walls with loss of compression. At that point you have to tear down the engine and either re-sleeve or at least hone the cylinders. Ask me how I know.

LOL. I spent a summer learning to fly the Navy way in Kingsville, about fifty miles inland from Corpus Christi, so just far enough to prevent any possible beneficial ocean influence. We were flying the TA4J, two seat version of the venerable Douglas Skyhawk which, due to the engine's intakes being right behind the pilot's head, forced the crew to keep the single plexi canopy closed to prevent objects from being sucked out of the rear cockpit and damaging the engine. The climate control system doesn't provide any cooling until you spool the engine up to 80% RPM just prior to takeoff and, during instrument training we sometimes had to sit in the marshal area for up to 20 minutes waiting for an ATC clearance. One time my instructor in the front seat started to faint and we had to return to the ramp and shut down. I heard that BMW engineers didn't believe American cars really needed a good air conditioning system until some of them paid a visit in the summer to the company's US headquarters in Houston. It do get hot and muggy there, for sure.

Our 8# (2.5 gal) aluminum tank was last topped up three and a half years ago and we used the two burner-small oven Eno stove probably less than two dozen times since, twice just to warm the main cabin. Just before our two week cruise this August I took the tank for filling and learned it was out of certification, thus couldn't refill. It was too late to get a new one ($216) at West Marine so we decided if push came to shove we would cook everything on our grill using disposable bottles. Well, that tank never ran out and, based on advice here on SA, I called around and found Ferrellgas would recertify the tank for another 5 years. Cost: $16. Now here's the cool part: Of course I had the tank refilled at Ferrellgas and it took all of 0.8 gal! I am absolutely amazed. The tech told me stoves and ovens don't use that much gas. The big consumer is heaters. I have to say propane's energy density is way better than our old CNG system. Energy density and availability world wide are major considerations for cruising and I think propane beats everything but diesel with none of the smelly and smoky residue problems.

I have fond memories of towing FJs up to the Gaucho Regatta for my son's HS team and watching the action from the end of the jetty. Great venue.

We had a series of used Benzes with names like Bismarck ('85 500 SEL), Thumper ('59 190D), The Brick ('83 380 SL) and The Turret ('90 500 S). Thumper was my son's car. It looked cool and there was no way he was going to race it.

Why do you think that Volvo should be operated at only 2200 RPM? I have a 30 HP Volvo MD 2030 in a 15,500# (empty) performance cruising sloop of 39'3" LOA and the owner and engine manual call for fast cruise at 300-500 RPM under full throttle performance or 80%. At full throttle my engine can make 3650 RPM on my tach. At a touch over 3,000 RPM I can maintain a little over six knots against a 15-20 kt wind and sea state with a 70 amp Balmar alternator and sail drive with Gori folder and I've done it for multiple hours. That's with the boat loaded for a long coastal delivery. An old 40 HP Perkins 4108 or Westerbeke equivalent would probably run at 2200-2400 RPM with the same performance.

Well, speaking strictly for myself, I got up and drove out to the lighthouse for a look at the conditions off Coronado Roads and saw breaking waves just east of Zuniga Jetty. We're a household only crew and neither my daughter nor wife was having any of it and, after a couple of phone conversations with my son in law, we decided two guys in a forty foot boat thrashing around with 115 others was a bad idea. It barely got over 20 kts inside the bay but we never got the word the course was shortened.

I can't fathom London's mayor making a statement like that. So he never had to do something like cut a piece of tangled string off a baby stroller axle, open a balky Fedex pouch, lift a flake of paint to examine a possibly dry rotted porch board or whittle a walking stick to size? Geez, a screwdriver would be more of a weapon than a Swiss Army knife. BTW, I use a piece of thin piece of bungee chord in a loop that goes over my wrist to secure my sailing knife when I'm using it up on deck. I would never hang anything around my or a child's neck, especially when on a boat.

That's interesting. I think the default for most boat owners here is to run out and buy a light #1. That was my plan but others have advised, since I'm almost always short handed in a boat with a fairly powerful main, that a #2 would be a better first buy. Saturday was definitely a #2 kind of day although I've done fairly well in the softer racing events with a good #3. Crewing on other boats in our class, they always have the #1 up but there will generally be five or more crew.

Dangerous stuff, that paragliding.