South Burlington, VT
We're back from a marvelous weekend on Valcour. Going there refreshes our souls. Here's some good pics
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| It was dead calm on the way out last Friday. |
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| Our view from the campsite. VT mountains in the background. |
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| Near full moon, can you find it in this picture? |
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| How in the world can all that stuff fit in the canoe? |
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| It fits just fine thank you. Still room for Libby and me. |
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| Whoops, see below. |
Driving back we had a crisis. On the interstate I saw in my mirror something fly off the trailer, and soon after that I saw smoke coming from the trailer. I did an emergency stop. The (brand new) wheel on the right side was too hot to touch. WTF? The bearing was cool. I added air to the tire thinking it might be low. We continued on at minimum speed.
The smoke returned as we got off the interstate. Closer inspection revealed the real problem. The fender was hotter than the tire. Then I could see that the fender was touching the tire. Then I found a broken spring. We called Jen and Pete for help and they came. We offloaded the canoe from the trailer, and then we could see that the leaf spring was broken. Pete made a brilliant suggestion: a 2x4 could lift the trailer off the tire. It worked! See the picture above, and note that half the spring is missing.
We got the trailer back to Jens, so now I just have to find a new spring.
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The question I have is how does the canoe still float with that load? Does it have any freeboard left??
ReplyDeleteTractor supply should have your spring.
Very good question Don. I calculate that the canoe has a 32 ft^2 cross section, a load of 100 canoe, 100 motor+fuel, 300 passengers, 300 cargo=700 pounds total means that it displaces about 4 inches of water. Given about 13 inches total height, we should have 9 inches of freeboard. If we cut the load in half, I don't know if 2 more inches of freeboard would help much.
ReplyDeleteBut freeboard does concern me. I refuse to go on the lake if winds are more than 12 knots. I'm thinking of making a cover that would prevent waves from coming onboard, sort of like a kayak.
Thanks for the tip about Tractor Supply. I was wondering where to shop. I'm going to oversize the new springs, based on the theory what weight in the canoe overloaded the spring. (We moved about 2/3 of the cargo to the car during transit, leaving 100+100+150=350 pounds load on the trailer.