Teak has always been a primary material for boats of all sizes, for many reasons. It's beautiful, it's incredibly weather resistant and heard wearing, it's tolerant of maintenance lapses, and did I mention that it's beautiful? It's also always been expensive, and it also has a tendency to grow in po …

We've been banging on about the wisdom of finally replacing your boat's old and worn chain and wire, and offering a spoonful of sugar to help the process along. The response has been very encouraging, and as TravelLift operators across the country hear "ladies and gentlemen, start your engines!" it' …

We get to talk about cruising with cruisers a lot here at Edson, and fortunately sometimes we even get to go do it. I recently got to spend some time cruising in the Exumas and came away with a ton of thoughts about various things as well as a strong desire to get back there soon. Anchoring is …

Whether you plan to do one of the many major distance races on the 2023 calendar, or plan to stretch your boundaries with a bigger offshore passage this year, making sure your steering is well-prepared is a key consideration. We've put together our best passage prep tips, tricks, and know-how&n …

A couple of posts ago, we alluded to the effect that a different size wheel will have on steering. In addition to practical considerations like making it impossible to move around the cockpit or having the wheel clang against the floor or cockpit seats, changing the wheel diameter will affect the lo …

When I first started racing on big boats, the coolest boats all had gigantic wheels, preferably sunk deep into the deck. Getting the helmsperson outboard as far and as comfortably as possible was the goal. On our family's classic C&C 34, good luck seeing the jib telltales or anything else forwar …

For any number of reasons (some of which will be the subject of subsequent posts), you may want to change your sailboat's steering wheel. While this is actually more straightforward than a lot of other boat projects you might do, there are a few parameters that you need to account for to both g …

Our friends* at Captain Q posted a video of a staggeringly nice Ted Hood boat last week, and a few astute commenters caught a great but easily missed detail on the quadrant. Leaving aside how urgently this steering cable looks like it needs replacement - the strands show obvious rust and I …

What a great show at Annapolis this year, and this coming from a reluctant boat show participant. With Thursday morning and pack-out time as notable exceptions, the weather was fantastic which brought out big crowds. Normally, there's a formula of x = crowd size * crowd quality, where "x" is a const …

Wheel brakes are a huge convenience. With a well balanced sail plan, your wheel brake can mind the helm while you adjust the jib trim or grab a snack from the icebox. There are, however, common things that brakes get used for for which they aren't really suited and will cause premature wear - someti …