All Blog Posts (165)

After a few years of (hopefully) helping Newporter owners make changes to their boat I have had to scrap my thinking that the Newporter was a well built vessel.  Let me make that more clear.  When I was helping to build these boats the building technique used by Ack in the design and building of these vessels was considered high tech.  We had a naval architect come to our yard (in Leesburg, NJ) to look over our operation and interview the men on the job in his hunt for a boatbuilder to build…

Thank you for allowing me aboard!  My name is Captain Jack Moore.  While I am currently the Captain of a Contessa 39 known as Saltshaker, I was raised on a Newporter 40k junk known as Wu Wei from infancy.  I know as well as the rest of you that a N40Ks more than just a boat, but a island upon itself, a sailing work of art, and personally for me, a manifestation of childhood dreams and a place of meditation through work and maintenance.  I look forward to providing my…

We're kitting up right now to take off on a 4-6 week venture, end of this month.  Our first destination is the north end of Vancouver Island:  a lovely large cove named "Sea Otter" which has the bad luck to be on the receiving end of all the debris being washed up the outer coast of Vancouver Island.  There, we'll spend a couple of weeks with a team of volunteers collecting and sorting the debris, much of it from the Japanese tsunami, for recycling or landfill.  Toward the end of that time,…

Hello 

I have a  a lot of Newporter Paper products the PO had been collecting forever.

Magazines with Newporter articles, adds, letters form ack, brochures, all the eagles  

lots of classic doc out of the glory years.

If you want this let me know.

In addition I have:

• original brass fuller and winch (wire)
• Brass life line post and bases 
•  working woodfreeman auto P main board  just the case was…

Hull #36.

The boat is in Santa Cruz CA. It is being offered for sale. Link below has full specs etc.…

My Newporter currently is missing the cockpit benches and I am thinking of making the starboard bench into an L-shaped bench. I measured and I have 40" from the cockpit coaming to 2" short of the mizzen mast and then I can go aft along the cockpit coaming aprox. 60" which I think would work. The port side bench is going to have to be aprox. 16" wide by 60" long, 16" is all the space I have between the coaming and the door. It's just a thought at this point but I need to figure out what I am…

Showing a bit of progress. Replaced about twenty feet of toe rail and hull to a foot below the deck on the port side. New taft rails, cap rails and trim awaiting installation after painting. 1st pic from three weeks ago. 2nd two years ago. 3rd from yesterday.

I just finished painting the brightwork trim, and now my next project is painting the hull. All of the rub rails had been removed by the previous owner and what is left is a line of screw holes where the rails were, rather than bother with a new rub rail I am thinking of just filling in the holes and just painting that area, I plan on repainting the stripe and I will just paint over the area that the rub rails were.  From what I can see they don't offer any protection, the point of impact if…

Our marina Bar Harbor is closing for construction so we're getting ready to move the boat into a new marina by end of the month. This weekend and next week we'll be checking out the others - I've called several to verify that they have slips available for us. Contrary to years past when getting into a marina in Marina Del Rey required being on a waiting list often for years, there's nothing like that now.

We've been surprised to discover that getting liveaboard slips isn't even…

Started a big project that I've been planning for a while: converting the forepeak into "official" storage: Shelves in a similar style to those found in the cabin. Since we're intending to cruise (and the V-berth is the least comfortable area to sleep in underway) and since I'm 6'2" and can't even come close to sitting up in there, I had decided quite some time ago that the forepeak would be storage only. We've been stowing things there, but it gets messy easily. Adding some shelves and…

I will get to work on the drawing of the fiddlehead.  This will be a redeveloped drawing in that I have no blueprints that give it.  We had patterns of many parts and I'm sure a fiddle head pattern was used to mark the wood for sawing to shape.  Now that you are going to do some work on the other bulwark you should first mark and measure, and record, the position of the gammon.  Then do the repairs and then make the new gammon iron.  I'll speak to that process later.

I wrote…

Britton, 

Given my age and the fact that it’s been a l o n g time since I’ve worked on Newporters (and a lot of new technology has been preferred since then) I am unable to speak knowledgeably to your forward bulwark rot problem.  But I do have some things to say (always, but take it with a critical eye) from what I think I understand. 

First, about the repair you have done.  That may well take care of it, but for how long I can’t guess.  Is it strong enough?  I think it…

My first twenty-five years of boating was on workboats or “yachts” that were workboat built and workboat painted.  When I started working at Stowman’s shipyard I was on the “commercial gang” that worked on workboats.  Then I was transferred to the “Newporter gang” and stayed there, eventually becoming the rigger and demonstration/delivery captain.  We wore non-marking shoes and some of us wore Topsiders.  Those shoes had wavy slits across the soles and heels to give a good grip on…

Well, Greg started me thinking.  Do you know why a head is called a head?

It started innocently enough back in the old days.  Not the old days when I was a boy, but back in the beginnings of sailing off shore on long voyages where you could not wait until you got home.  Something was needed.  Now, for stand up jobs it was easy; just walk to a convenient spot at the rail and pump out your personal bilge.  But a real need for a place to sit didn’t take long to make itself felt.  The…

I am in the process of restoring hull #40 which is in such a state that I am starting from scratch on much of the interior. I was thinking of possibly stealing some room from the pilot house so as to give the head a little more space. What I am contemplating is pushing out the aft wall of the head and stealing about 18" into the pilothouse and in that space I would install a recessed sink into a small cabinet with a mirror above. Then I could possibly get a faucet that has a long shower hose…

Eddie, does this mean I don't have to make them for you.  MUF

Hi all.  Captain Clyde has been sending me a lot of good information about Newporters which I am going to put into the roster.  Thank you Clyde, good stuff.  But I still need information on boats out there that I don't have.  New owners, old owners, where the boat is.  We don't post the roster on the web site, it is only sent to owners.  Please send me anything you might have, or call me.   MUF

gmuf48@aol.com    909 561 4245

T just sent out the roster for 2013.  If you did not get one by E-mail it is because I don"t have you address or info on your boat.  Send E-mail address and info to MUF at gmuf48@aol.com