When I was working for the National Grid I decided that I wanted to be self-employed. I’ve always loved sailing and fancied running a yacht marina. I was flicking through…
Alison Wood
Features Editor
How to service a marine diesel engine in 12 simple steps
It was time to service the marine diesel engine on our Maxi 84 cruiser. Knowing how to diagnose and fix engine faults is a useful skill for any boat owner,…
How an intercooled engine works
With an inter-cooled engine, the role of the seawater is to take away the heat from the freshwater. The seawater, or ‘raw water’, is a separate flow to the fresh…
Stuck up a 75ft mast in the middle of the Atlantic
Karen Parker had been sailing onboard their Oyster 56, Mistral of Portsmouth, with husband Chris and two crew, when their Code Zero headsail, designed for light winds, became jammed. With…
ARC+ yachts arrive in Grenada and injured crew transferred to superyacht
Alika, the largest yacht in the fleet, experienced sudden loss of steering on 21 November, throwing two crew off balance, one of whom suffered concussion and the other a serious…
Conquering the cold – from sea dipping to aquatic yoga and Wim Hof
“My grandfather taught me to enjoy cold water dips,” says Helena, shouting over the noise of the surf. “I used to do yoga with him at dawn, he was like…
Choppy start for ARC 22 as yachts set sail across Atlantic
The fleet departed Las Palmas, Gran Canaria yesterday for Saint Lucia on the 37th edition of the ARC, with over 800 crew taking part, in monohulls, multihulls and one motorboat.…
Maximus sets sail – Chichester to Poole shakedown
The day was finally here; time to take Maximus, our Maxi 84, from Chichester Marina to her new home in Poole. After many sleepless nights, last-minute trips to Force 4…
Passing planning for a shakedown voyage
With Maximus, our PBO Project boat ready for her shakedown voyage from Chichester to Poole, I turned my attention to passage planning. I dug out my old logbook and realised…
New electronics on the PBO Project Boat
The day was approaching for Maximus’s shakedown cruise, a two-day voyage from Chichester to her new home at Cobbs Quay Marina, Poole. Before then, however, we needed to understand our…
Launching the PBO Project Boat
Chichester’s Dell Quay boatyard had been Maximus’s home for two years – and felt like our second home too, since we’d acquired the Maxi 84 project boat. We’d spent long…
Upgrading electronics on the PBO Project Boat
Upgrading electronics on Maximus seemed like a huge leap in the first weeks of ownership. We were still discovering new leaks and lockers, choosing antifouling and scraping the bottom. I…
What is an in-hull transducer?
On our PBO Project Boat Maximus we need sonar simply for measuring depth, but the advanced electronics of fish finders and forward-looking sonar can show shoals of fish and give…
What is NMEA 2000, SeaTalk 2, STng, Simnet and other systems?
NMEA 2000 uses the CAN (control area network) designed originally for the automotive market, but adapted for the marine industry. The older version, NMEA 0183, allowed a GPS or chartplotter…
90 boats, 400 crew and a cat set sail across the Atlantic
PBO was at the start of the transatlantic rally to wave off the boats in Las Palmas, Gran Canaria as they set sail for Mindelo, Cape Verde. “It’s the perfect…
Transatlantic joy as Sweet Dreams sails again after tragedy
“John’s death was very sudden and unexpected,” says Roz Preston, a former special advisor to Tony Blair. “The first time someone asked me what I’d do with the boat, I…
Zeasar: the sailing cat
Cats have long enjoyed a relationship with sailors; living on trading, exploration and naval ships to control vermin, but it’s not often you see them on a 47ft yacht. Weighing…
Boat power management: How to keep your batteries topped up
Now we’d decided on batteries for Maximus the next conundrum was how to keep those batteries charged. Premier Marinas had kindly offered us a berth at Chichester Marina for the…
What battery capacity? Working out your boat’s power requirements
In order to work out your boat’s battery capacity you need to know how much power you’re going to draw, and this requires you to get your head around three…
Boat batteries 101: Which battery is the best choice for my boat?
We’d borrowed a lead acid battery from our marine electrician, Adam McMenemy, which would get the Maxi 84 afloat and through the lock to Chichester marina. However, now she was…