tophatyachts.com

Fellow Top Hatters,

If you must move on, and some do, please post under this subject a photo of your new stand-in top hat, what ever form it may take!

So here are some photos of Malaprop post Marinka Mark 2 Tophat. She is a rival 34 deep keel. She won a two handed division AZAB race in 79 and her sister ship won the 76 OSTAR on adjusted times, coming in 23rd on Wild Rival. That was one of the roughest races with I think 126 starters and 76 who finished, with two lives lost. She was sailed from England to Vanuatu in the early 80s by a young lass and then to Australia. She has a 30 hp YM yanmar with 300 hours on her and fairly new sails, standing rigging and a Almast furler made in Tassie, which I think is a very robust and good furler. I have put a 50 litre Waeco cooler in her that slides out in the galley and she has a two burner origio metho stove with an omnia stovetop oven which does a great job for baking, bread, cakes etc. and takes up no room. I have a ST2000 autohelm and a fleming major windvane. I am just about to install 2 100w solar panels for her 3 battery bank with a sunsaver duo regulator that can top up two battery banks - either 50/50 or select 90/10 charge into each. The fridge has a dedicated 100 Amp battery which is isolated from the house battery by a solenoid so it can't drain the house battery. Otherwise electrics are fairly basic with all on circuit breakers and i had a sparkie install the 240volt system. She is a sweet sailing boat that is very well balanced. I like the chart table and quarter berth. Cheers Peter

Very nice Peter, you must rattle around in there after Marinka

So, I've just listed Pelagian on EBay. Reason being I took pity on a motorless Albin Vega which was on the Pile moorings in Brisbane river. She'd just sailed out from Sweden - well, over two years, and the motor had died coming up the Brisbane river. I think the owner's enthusiasm for sailing further died with the diesel, and at a guess they were down on cash. Well, I had a Yanmar 1GM10 sitting in the garage doing nothing, so my next move was a no-brainer...

The motor's in, Boat's got Australian ID, rego and insurance and is settled into Manly Marina, but there's a lot of work to do, which is part of the reason I got it... She's almost able to be mistaken for a Top Hat so I don't plan to jump ship from the Forum...

Meanwhile there's a good Top Hat for sale...
Cheers, Rod2

Hey Rod, Interesting to see the Albin Vega. I often will walk past those boats near the gardens and see who has come in. There is an Albin Vega sitting in Bundaberg that has twice survived flooding. I am curious on what type of windvane you have on her. They are a good boat so all the best with her and may see you in the Manly marina when we sail down in a month's time. It would be good to see some of the other boats people now have. Cheers Peter

Hi Peter, I'll be in the boat at Manly Qld from @ 18-24 October. The Windvane is a Windpilot Atlantic. The company is still active but this model is no longer in production. Guys on the boat said in 28 days sailing to Galapagos Is they only steered for 2 hours. No tiller/wheel connections and it doubles as an emergency rudder. The photo shows a spin down nut which locks the rudder gear in place when you want to use it or adjust it. I 'm not an engineer but this system is so simple and easy to set up I'm surprised that its not in continuing use. There are a few pictures/film clips on line which give more info.
Cheers, Rod