Are you happy with your boat? Few of us are, at least not 100%. There’s always something that could be improved or altered. There are also many things you can do to make your boat easier and safer to sail. If you have trouble finding crew, or perhaps you’re not in the first flush of youth and find the boat a little more difficult to handle as each season passes, following are some ways to make life easier on yourself.
Gear Up
There are plenty of ways to make a bigger boat easier—and safer—for a couple to handle. Few issues on boats cannot be solved by either hard cash or ingenuity. I started off by replacing all the 30-year-old blocks and deck organizers on board with new plain or roller-bearing items, depending on the application. This made a noticeable difference to the effort required to pull in the mainsheet without the help of a winch, for instance. You can also cut friction even more by identifying and changing inefficient line leads. I have sailed many boats with poor furling line leads that made it
