LUCIE had a long 2015 season, participating in three big events, all in different waters: The 6 Metre World Championship in France, the Panerai Museum of Yachting Regatta in Newport, R.I., the St. Francis Yacht Club 6 Metre Invitational in San Francisco, Calif. LUCIE sailed in all conditions, from less than five knots of wind up to 25 knots in wind gusts. We learned a lot about LUCIE and how she behaves in these different conditions, all with the same boat setup and mostly the same crew. Knowing this about LUCIE, the crew designed a plan for the off-season and we are focusing on a few areas that we believe will advance her even further.
The 2016 season plan has LUCIE going to Switzerland in July to participate in the 6 Meter European Championship. Prior to this, LUCIE will be participating in a trial event in Newport, R.I. in early May. During this time, we plan to take a more analytical approach with data recording, supported by the team at DOYLE sails. In a few weeks, we will temporarily equip LUCIE with data gathering and recording devices.
In the meantime, we are working on some maintenance and improvement issues. At the end of last season, we started noticing some deterioration on the spreader attachments on the mast, some of the welds were suspect, and the overall integrity of the fittings started to slide. Working with one of our favored metal fabricators, we started the process of replacing the bronze wings of the spreader attachments, but once the mast bands were cleaned up we decided to replace them as well, so all new spreader attachment hardware it is; these pieces of hardware are most essential to keep the mast where it is supposed to be, so all of this work is well worth it. At this point, the new bands are being fitted and all old fastener holes in the mast have been filled, bunged and trimmed.
We are also giving more trim control to the aft cockpit for the coming season, we are therefore adding two small trim shelves in the aft cockpit, to improve handling of the vang and cunningham. We will also route the outhaul from the boom back to the aft cockpit. There will be a lot of load on these two trim shelves, so we went the extra length to built them with a locking miter joint and attachment under the deck.
Photo gallery of the work being done:
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