Once all the frames had been installed on the keel (see our last update), it was time to break out the laser level again and go around, truing up the…
Ben Meakins
Best bilge cleaners: how to clean an oily, smelly bilge
Ben Meakins gets down and dirty in the pursuance of the most effective way to clean oily, malodorous bilges
Dual-purpose cockpit table
When I bought Crusader, my Aqua Star Ocean Ranger 33, the table arrangement in the wheelhouse/saloon left a bit to be desired. Although the table itself was a beautiful piece…
Is an umbrella really the most useless thing on a boat?
David Weston shows that nautical wisdom can be proved wrong
Cockpit table for a binnacle
Stuart Carr enables onboard alfresco dining with a table mounted on the binnacle
Clever anchor ball storage
A bright idea means Jeremy White’s anchor ball is never forgotten
Anchor Ball from a giant Lindor box
Ron Stark chocs up a successful means of hoisting a black ball day signal for a vessel at anchor
Black Friday PBO subscription offer – 50% off!
We’re offering a great deal for a subscription to Britain’s biggest-selling boating magazine! Get 50% off if you subscribe before the end of the weekend! PBO is full of practical…
DIY mast climbing device
John Gardner devises a hoist to take the strain out of going aloft
A pump for bone-dry bilges
Norman Eastwood assembles a bucket pump to remove the final few bits of water from his boat’s bilges
Rocna hard place
David Berry describes the unexpected problems he faced after purchasing a Rocna anchor for his Moody Eclipse, Aderyn Glas
3. Sailing a Secret 20
We took a trip to Brightlingsea to sail a Secret 20 while ours was in transit
Navtex: obsolete or essential?
Has Navtex been superseded by smartphones and the internet, or does it still have a role in modern sailing?
The great UK antifouling test for cruising yachts
20 antifouling paints tested in 13 UK locations: which works best where you keep your boat?
PBO Tested: B&G Vulcan 5 chart plotter
Ben Meakins takes B&G’s new compact 5in multifunction display for a trial sail
PBO tested: Henri Lloyd Elite Racer Smock and Salopettes
One immediate thing that jumps out is the light weight of the oilskins. They are by far the lightest oilskins I’ve ever owned – and thus the least constrictive to…
Great progress on PBO’s new project boat!
PBO's Secret 20 kit-boat starts to look boat-shaped in short order
Refurbishing a Yanmar 1GM10 water pump
The Yanmar 1GM10 is a great little engine, which starts first time and runs reliably: but there are one or two design flaws. The worst is that the raw water…
1. Sharing our Secret!
After approximately 11,232NM at sea, our new project boat was craned off a container ship and transferred to a freight-forwarding warehouse in a rainy, grey Southampton Docks. Quite a change…
2. The designer writes…
My ancestors were all sailors, and apparently my first words were ‘da-da’ and ‘boat’. I lived on the East Coast and as a boy sailed the Blackwater, the Crouch and…