Re: [Cal_Boats] Yacht 'Ropes' and Kinking,Samson double braid (Kevin)

--- On Sun, 3/22/09, Kevin O <fi… [at] yahoo.com> wrote: I am VERY disapointed in how bad it is fraying from the cleat on the fiddle block. I hope to make it last a year. Ha ha!Kevin, my problem with the New England double braid is just the opposite, that is wearing out the cleat on my fiddle block! The cam cleats are made of brass, and the line has worn a shallow grove and flattened the teeth on both cams, I keep having to use a little triangle file to sharpen the teeth on the cams so it will grip the line! The only thing I've been doing special with my main sheet is stretching it out, unhooking it from the traveler, hooking it to lines at the gooseneck, and covering up the mainsheet inside the mainsail canvas when I put Shpritz to bed. Jerry --- On Sat, 3/21/09, Gerald Sobel <sobel_solar@ yahoo.com> wrote: From: Gerald Sobel <sobel_solar@ yahoo.com> Subject: [Cal_Boats] Yacht 'Ropes' and Kinking (Scott) was Whine, Groan, Moan. To: Cal_Boats@yahoogrou ps.com Date: Saturday, March 21, 2009, 8:17 PM Ropes? Did I say a dirty word? If you go to some of the manufacturer' s sites (Samson?) they use the word rope. I think on the spool you can use the word rope, but installed on the boat it becomes a 'line'. Speaking of Samson, I was considering buying some 'Apex' line for new Genoa sheets (single braid, composite of Dacron, polypropelene and dyneema) but one of the internet chancelleries' catalogues (Defender) says that it is unsuitable for jib sheets. I dunno, is the stuff too slippery? I purchased some New England single braid "is it called Regatta Braid" and once it got a bit worn thru use you could hold onto it, and I love the way it didn't kink and flew thru the blocks on tacks, as opposed to the double braid which gets kinked and jams unless force fed. Sampson makes a light weight double braid (XLS Extra T) which is recommended for jib sheets which costs about the same as the Apex, but feeling some of it at WM it seems a bit stiff. I'm afraid it would kink up like my existing double braid. The Regatta braid ended up getting caught on something and shredding almost in two after a single months use, and I returned it to WM and got my money back (WM is great about accepting returns!!!), and I went back to using my original, very durable New England double braid I bought from WM years ago (ten years!). What I also don't like about about the all polyester braid, single or double, is it sucks in water and gets very heavy, a problem in light air. Anyone use the XLS Extra T, does it kink up like other double braids? Jerry --- On Sat, 3/21/09, Scott Sauvageot <rxnumbercruncher@ hotmail.com> wrote: From: Scott Sauvageot <rxnumbercruncher@ hotmail.com> Subject: RE: [Cal_Boats] Re: Time to stop your West Marine Whining (Davidand Tom) To: Cal_Boats@yahoogrou ps.com Date: Saturday, March 21, 2009, 4:43 AM I don’t usually weigh-in on these West Marine vs The Little Guy arguments. I will say this, however…… There is a great disparity between the quality and customer service levels of West Marine Stores. Until recently, I lived an hour north of Annapolis near a waterfront community called Middle River , MD. If I went to the local West Marine up there, they sold all sorts of fishing rods, beer coozies, trolling motors, and other powerboat accessories. Out of an entire huge store of boating parts, there was one paltry half isle of sailboat hardware. Most of the Lewmar and Harken gear was kept behind a glass pane, so you had to get assistance to get something you wanted to look at. Their staff was just the worst, mostly teenagers who had never set foot on a boat. I made a mistake of asking a question one day and I was told that I needed someone in the “Rope” isle and that someone in the “sailboat pulley” isle would be along to help me soon. After getting back in the car and driving the extra hour to Annapolis , I stopped at the West Marine down there, and the store was brimming with sailboat gear. Alas, they didn’t have the specific blocks I needed to fix my outhaul, but they knew enough to refer me to Fawcetts, the small private boating supply store that I now use as my primary boating supply center. Their help was on target and the person in the sailing hardware department explained the various hardware I needed and working load/breaking load of the various series of blocks. He also made good recommendations for racing cordage (which I ended up buying at Annapolis Performance Sailing). I have to admit that I like Fawcetts better, however, because I identify with the small business, and everyone in the privately owned shop knows me by name when I come in and makes me feel at home (like Norrm on Cheers). Their riggers are knowledgeable and are always happy to help me design the systems I need. I admit that I do price shop a little, and typically go in to Fawcetts with a WM price list form their website. If the price at WM is much better than the local stand alone shop, I go to WM to make the purchase. I’m not an “anti big business conspiracy theorist” but I grew up out in the country, and have always preferred the “corner store” to the mall. I tend to steer away from the maga stores and stick to the smaller shops where possible. Cheers, Scott S. Cal 25 #1651 Indefatigable Annapolis, MD From: Cal_Boats@yahoogrou ps.com [mailto:Cal_ Boats@yahoogroup s.com] On Behalf Of Fred Haas Sent: Friday, March 20, 2009 6:24 PM To: Cal_Boats@yahoogrou ps.com Subject: Re: [Cal_Boats] Re: Time to stop your West Marine Whining (Davidand Tom) Gents, This is a list that exists primarily to enhance our enjoyment of our old boats. That's why we participate in it. If I'm not mistaken, it was this very subject that drove Roger Jones off the list a few years ago. Like me, he didn't want to sign in to pick up the latest bitch. Plenty of that in the rest of life. I look at the West Marine situation from a slightly different perspective. For six years I had worked for Olympic Boat Centers, the largest Bayliner dealer in the world. I sold parts over the counter and all over the world. When I started at Olympic I encountered the poorest parts operation I had ever seen, including my 20+ years in the car business. By the end we were well respected and known in the Bayliner community as the place to go to get help with whatever your need might be. Our customers appreciated the fact that we could often undersell West, but what they really appreciated was our customer service. The local West store had had a couple of years of not paying attention to that aspect of their business and we were able to capitalize on it. All was for nought as we went out of business in a blaze of glory, sticking our unsecured creditors for $50MM and putting an entire organization out of work. I started working for West Marine part time last week, and hope to be able to recover financially. I think of myself as an expert in the boating hobby and an advocate of the concept of customer satisfaction as the ultimate driver of any retail business. I am mightily impressed by the corporate culture I have encountered. At every level the emphasis is on keeping the customer a customer by satisfying their boating needs. There is never-ending product and sales training, but always it begins and ends with satisfying the customer. I agree that "WM is here to stay," which has more relevance for me that it might have six months ago. And the first thing you have to do to stay around is make a profit. West is not a charity, it is a publicly traded company. Like any company it must be profitable to survive. If it doesn't make adequate profit it will not be able to stock product or invest in the people who make it successful. Customers will find fewer and fewer products to buy, and fewer people to help them make wise purchase decisions. They will wither and die. If they try to make exhorbitant profits their customers will vote with their feet and new smaller competitors will appear to capture the business they drive away. That is the nature of business. If you're unsure of this, check out Boater's World, which filed for bankruptcy this week. West may be the 800 pound gorilla, but so far, at least, it seems to me that they understand their business. If you find a better price on an item, West will match it. If you need something that it doesn't make business sense for them to stock, they'll order it for you. If you feel you're no getting the level of service you deserve, the store manager will anxious to hear about it and will try to resolve the situation. West spends a fair amount of their gross profit on training, a fair amount on merchandising to make sure the products in the stores are what the customer wants, and a fair amount on employee retention. Seem's like a reasonable way to run a business to me. Now let's get back on the water! Fred Haas 3-30 Nemesis Tacoma MBA University . of Michigan 1970 On Mar 20, 2009, at 8:42 AM, Chris Campbell wrote: Dan wrote: Despite our "whinning," WM is here to stay and we all end up there from time to time.