Shelter and comfort and ease seemed to be high priorities amongst those who, like us, had no interest in racing and were not exactly in the first flush of youth. The rig itself is a great start. A doghouse seemed in order, and lots of help with steering during passagemaking (both electrical and wind). Simpler things like good ladders which will attach anywhere. The problem is that these things can't be bought - they have to be built or rejigged.




Similarly, electrical systems are now not as they were in 1977. If you are going to have such things as navigation computers and auto-helms, you are going to need to beef up your charging options: wind, solar, shore power and so on. You are also going to need a bigger battery bank. And marina life means shore power and the kit to use it - hence the mains circuit and the safety systems that implies.

  

    

We don't like gas. Many people do, but we decided to join the Kerosene community. (Our previous boat didn't have gas either). It is a large undertaking, and surprisingly expensive, involving where to site the heater and how to shoe-horn in a decent sized cooker, where to put the pressure tank and how to make it safe, and where to store Kerosene and starter fluid (Meths).

 

 

There were several problems with Kiao Fang's main water tank when we got her. It was under the main cabin floor, and hid the bilges, and the floor joists were shaved to make room for it. We ripped the tank out - it now lives in a Gentleman's Motor Yacht in Glasson - and put in three bespoke polypropylene tanks under the master bunk and in the fore-peak. The price we paid was that filling is a little more tricky, but we now can see the bilges, clear the strum box, and the water system can stand a leak in one of the tanks or pipes without losing the lot.

 

The foredeck and its fittings were in a poor state. Below, the chain simply dropped down beside the mast, corroding it. We rebuilt and strengthened the fore-mast and fore-deck and added twin rollers, new winch, a solid cleat and chain lock, underpinning the lot with a marine ply deck plate which at its centre is over an inch and a half thick (3.75 cm).

 

Having done this we could install a proper drained chain locker, with washboards so you can get to a chain knot if need be.

 

The fore-mast had suffered, as had both sets of mast steps. We removed the steps, made new support plates of double thickness, through bolted and welded them, and doubled up on the couplings to the hull. At the same time we split and reinforced the foremast.

    

Kiao Fang's keel is encapsulated, which is great from the point of view of it not needing keel bolts, but the down side is that it is glass-fibre. Very heavily laid up, for sure, but not lumps of iron nonetheless. We were aiming to add yacht legs, so we knew that we would take the ground occasionally. We therefore built a stainless steel keel-shoe to toughen up the base, and flared it to protect the toe if we touched.