The Adventures of the Vessel Condesa

Clark February 11th, 2008

Back at home most people would just pop into Beds, Booms, and Beyond to pick up a new boom, but here in the hinterlands we fix things, because we don’t have a choice. Not only do we save ourselves a little money, but we help reduce the growing problem of broken sailboat booms overflowing the nation’s landfills. Here’s how:

First, we break a boom. This was due to pure laziness: using a vang when I should have used a proper preventer. Idiot!

Note the boom, now disentangled from the main sail, lying on the side deck. The inboard stub is still attached to the main mast. Also note that with a ketch we’ve still got another boom back there, but we’re crippled and this situation must be tended to at the next opportunity. See the dark clouds in the background? That’s the remnants of the squall that got us.

After arrival in Nuqui the Bond Girls deserted me after the kidnappings and left me to my fate with the terrorists. It was time to get to work. I selected an appropriate piece of mangrove timber and transported it back to Condesa.

While the piece of mangrove was fairly round, I had to debark it and make it rounder.

Note the look of determination on my face. The plane and I were one. After several hours and many trials, the shape was getting close. It also made a big mess:

Finally it was finished and ready for a ‘compression fit.’ I had already carefully hacksawed off the daggy bits of aluminum on either side of the break.

While this repair is a triumph of ingenuity, if I do say so my self, it is only temporary. Wood doesn’t like damp enclosed spaces, and our mangrove probably started to rot the moment I stuck it in there.

After crossing the Gulf of Panama I made my way to David, Panama, where my old buddy Domenic has settled and has a shop:

Domenic is English, so henceforth we shall refer to the material from which my boom is constructed as aluminium, which is what Sir Humphry Davy decided to name it after he discovered it, so we Americans can just suck it up.

Domenic took over from here, starting by riveting a stout aluminium sleeve inside the two broken halves:

And after that he heliarc welded the break:

Kudos to Domenic. It’s probably stronger than before. Domenic also fixed my broken outboard in his shop. It turned out to be a seized piston ring. It’s good to have friends like Domenic, who work for beer and homemade enchiladas.

The boom is now back in place and ready to head out of Panama this week for Costa Rica and points north. By the way, I made it all the way up the river to David on pure memory from eight years ago, and didn’t run aground once. Hoping for a similar result on the way down.

If only Domenic could fix computers. Mine is now on it’s way to San Francisco via FedEx.

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