Crazy Talk

Every once in a while, I play the lottery.  You know, your basic $2 Powerball ticket for $292,000,000.00.  I know I’m throwing my money away - 380,000,000 to 1 odds, but I always come up with the same dream.  I would order 40 aluminum masts made for the M-Scow to the original One Design specs.  I would also have 40 aluminum booms made to the old One Design drawings, which we still have access to.  Buying some cnc machines so I could make top and bottom mast fittings out of billet aluminum would also be ideal, as well as buying a swaging machine for all of the rigging.  Where would I put all of this stuff?

I would then buy a building for an M-Scow Museum where we could house new and used boats for sale as well as many M-Scow artifacts.  If someone were in need of replacement sleeves for the main halyard, or broke their gooseneck, we would have these in stock for purchase.

This is crazy talk, right?  Bottom line, winning the lottery to fund these crazy ideas is unlikely, but I think if we put all of our creative sailing minds together, we can come up with some new ideas to keep this wonderful class going.

I still remember John Harkrader asking what can we do to get more young sailors in the boat at the 2016 North Americans.  As your Commodore, I will work to get more young sailors into the M-Scow.  We need to have a new boat that can be available to sell this Summer.  Far too many parents of junior sailors think the M-Scow is dead because they think we don’t have a builder.  We do have a builder - Windward Boatworks.

Windward Boatworks took way too long to supply a boat for Ned Thompson.  The hull was made pretty quickly.  The problem was he had a lot of issues sourcing the parts that are no longer available.  The first boat was ordered some time around 2007 and was delivered in late 2016.  Not our best effort.  And it was missing parts that John Applegate and I have in inventory.  It is a stiff boat with a good shape.  When Ned has sailed the boat, he definitely was faster than us.

Part of my game plan is to identify the parts of the boat that are no longer available.  Ronstan no longer makes the gooseneck on the M.  We don’t have a supplier for the cast aluminum fittings for the mast and boom.  I have an inventory of many of those parts.  I am working with a local machinist who will make these parts with his CNC machines out of billet aluminum. He also has a game plan to solve the galvanic corrosion problem between the aluminum boom fitting and the Stainless Steel gooseneck post.

As of now, we are fortunate to have three benefactors who can pay for Windward Boatworks to make us a hull with splashboard, rudders, bilge-boards, jib Cunningham, and new bailers.  Once completed, we can bring it to New Jersey to rig it, sail it, and sell it.  This is a successful business model that John Applegate has done with used boats for years.  The goal is to sail it and sell it this Summer.  If you know somebody who would like to buy a new boat, please send me an email.

Thank you,

Tom Welsch
North American M-Scow Association Commodore