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Solo Sailor Does EVERYTHING Herself! (She's Done All The HARDEST Boat Projects!!!)
28 July 2024 · 1h 2m · 243K views · Luperon, Dominican Republic
What this video covers
Nicole, a solo sailor and writer, spent a year living aboard and rebuilding a Bristol Channel Cutter named Arta 2 at Tropical Marina, a DIY boatyard in Luperón, Dominican Republic.Watch She bought the boat after arriving in Luperón following an earlier passage from the U.S. East Coast to the Bahamas aboard a Columbia Yachts 26, which she then sold.17:36 The Bristol Channel Cutter required extensive structural work: Nicole ground the entire hull down to bare fiberglass to address severe osmosis blistering, beveled and patched hundreds of blisters with fiberglass cloth and epoxy, applied a barrier coat, and finished with Coppercoat antifouling.5:23 She replaced the bobstay chainplate with a through-bolted fitting, rebuilt the bow area, and addressed rudder damage from worm infestation — though a local South African craftsman named Craig handled the rudder repairs.5:18 The mast had sunk into its step and required cutting five inches of pitting from the bottom; Nicole built the upper standing rigging using Norseman fittings and left the lower ends loose to be cut and tuned after launch, when the hull settles in the water.19:51 She lived aboard throughout the boatyard stay, except two months off the boat after a knee injury.10:39 Setbacks during the year included parasites, dengue fever, and a tight budget.5:40 The rig-tuning-after-launch approach — waiting for the hull to reach its in-water shape before cutting and terminating lower shrouds — is the clearest technical takeaway from her rigging work.
Boats in this video
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