Proa building blog
The spring refit is finally completed! We’ve done many small things to improve Proasis, the bigger projects include:
In preparation for the upcoming season we are busy with the typical spring refit and some updates we were planning for a while now. Aside of a new bottom paint and the repair of a dent left by a yacht 2 years ago we finally get a larger leeboard! In addition we cut another hatch in the bow compartment and built in a wet deck for the anchor, chain and other stuff. The wet deck is much like a self draining cockpit, the floor is well above the water line and drain holes allow any water to flow back into the ocean. Because of that the hatch cover does not need to be water tight and is therefore much easier and cheaper to build.
Proasis will get navigation lights (not as easy as it sounds for a boat that travels both ways, maybe this will become another post!), a fully reworked wiring and two additional windows for 360° view from inside the cabin. We hope to hit the water by mid of may.
Sad but true: we have already winterized Proasis. We need to do some work on the bottom of the hulls anyway and I (Henrik) will soon go back to the Marshall Islands for half a year (make sure you stay tuned, updates will follow!).
We had the great advantage of using an electric winch and some nice custome made trolleys to pull her up the beach this time. The task was done very quickly and didn’t took many people.
After some delay we finally managed to modify our new sail for the reefing system. We have designed an innovative system using a long zipper parallel to the trailing edge of the sail. In strong winds the aft part of the sail is simply zipped of. It works well so far but time will tell whether this is manageable in high winds and swell or not. We will keep you posted!
Our new sail is finally ready to take it out on the water! So far we are very pleased with the shape and the performance. The reefing system is not yet installed, testing the shape first was more important. It will follow later, stay tuned!
Covid has slowed down our progress one more time but the new sail is finally taking shape! We hope to take it out on the water nex week.
We’ve started to make a new sail for Proasis. This time with a better cloth and improfed shape. We will also try an innovative system to reef the sail (reduce sail area in strong wind).
While proasis is still in the water (we will keep her wet for this winter) we moved back to the workshop to work on some improvements:
The new sail will be made next year but all other bullits are tackeled now:
We are proud and honored to get the opportunity to advocate for climate action as part of the delegation of the Marshall Islands at COP26 climate conference in Glasgow. We had two very nice events where we presented the achievements of Waan Aelõñ in Majel (Canoes of the Marshall Islands) in gaining climate change resilience by reviving the traditional outrigger canoe.
A recorded video of our session is here available on demand (requires free registration).
The Marshall Island Journal (local newspaper of the Marshall Islands) has published a nice article about the successful collaboration between Waan Aelon in Majel (WAM), Proasis and the Low Carbon Sea Transport Project. WAM has just launched a slightly smaller version of our Proasis with sustainable fishing in mind. Kommol tata for the great work!
