The cover story
Reuse is better than single use
If you’re new here, the goal of this is site to highlight the amazing capabilities of our society that can be directed to a higher purpose. Instead of mindlessly stumbling through a high consumption lifestyle that seems determined on unraveling our social and natural systems, the content here attempts to profile more sustainable alternatives.
Before we go any further, let me get this out of the way: recreational watercraft create unnecessary negative impacts. The materials to build and maintain the vessel, plus the fuel and emissions to move it (and its crew) all leave the environment worse off than it was before. It’s with this in mind that my intention is to minimize the damage left in our sailboat Daystar’s wake, including her winter cover.
The cover serves an important purpose to protect Daystar’s outside surfaces from the worst impacts of Chicago’s nasty weather while she’s on land during her off season. In other words, a winter cover cuts the outdoor exposure by about half. And a boat that’s better protected will need less maintenance, resulting in fewer toxic chemicals and wasted materials to repair weather-damaged surfaces.
While many boats in Chicago are left uncovered outdoors during the winter, most boaters who choose to protect their investment shrink wrap their vessels with single use plastic film. While it is possible to collect and reprocess used film into new wrap, the vast majority gets landfilled or incinerated.
The alternative is to purchase a reusable cover that can survive multiple seasons. Cruising the online forums, it seems common to get 10-12 years before restitching a reusable canvas cover is needed, with a few claiming 15-20 years before the materials are degraded beyond repair and must be discarded. The cover’s metal frame will likely outlast the boat. That was enough to convince me to go with canvas for Daystar.
Daystar’s “cover story” began when I purchased the boat in December of 2021. The yard owner showed me a practically new Fairclough cover and frames that had been abandoned in his storage warehouse. He offered me a reasonable price to take it off his hands. We both knew it wouldn’t fit Daystar exactly. But I took the chance, as opposed to starting from scratch and commissioning a custom cover.
Fast forward one year and Daystar had completed her first season on Lake Michigan. With her mast removed for the winter, my helpers and I hastily cobbled together the metal ribs and spine of the frame. While the parts were marked with their prior locations from the donor vessel, Daystar’s proportions were quite different. This resulted in a frame that was unnecessarily high towards the rear.
Once we managed to hoist the bulky and unwieldy canvas over the frame, it was obvious the cover was poorly matched to our vessel. The bow was decently fitted, but the stern hung awkwardly, billowing in the slightest breeze. I’d also underestimated how badly the ribs would shift, with several simply dropping out of their sockets on the spine and crashing to the deck.
Regardless, this would have to suffice, as winter was upon us and there was no time to rework the mess. I tightened down the frame as best as I could, and ran a spiderweb of lines under the cover in an attempt to settle the thing down. And made a promise to fix it for next season.
Which brings us to fall 2023. Not only was the cover still not altered, but the yard refused to take down Daystar’s mast. The boat would be stored with the spar and all its rigging in place, meaning a bunch of holes would need to be made in the cover in all the right places. Time to get to work on the cover. And fast, as we’d delayed the boat’s haul out to early November.
1. Adapt the frame to actually fit the boat
Instead of attempting to frantically install the cover’s metal frame with a thunderstorm bearing down on my crew, this year I picked gentler weather to be on deck for that operation. In addition, I decided to work alone, allowing me to take all day if needed, rather than feel obligated to rush.
Last year the spine at the bow pulpit had slipped backwards, causing the whole cover to shift out of place. To prevent a recurrence, I cut a slit in the frame with my angle grinder, inserted a stainless steel hose clamp, and tightened the clamp around the pulpit tubing. A short piece of foam pipe insulation should prevent any abrasion. Another piece of foam was used to protect the genoa furling foil from rubbing on the frame.
Working from bow to stern, I methodically marked and cut each pair of ribs to reduce the height of the “tent”, while still allowing clearance for the boom. This was a multi-step process since the large diameter pipe of each rib had been reduced with a short insert at the upper end to accept the connectors which joined the ribs to the spine. That meant grinding off several rivets holding the inner section to the outer piece, cutting the rib to length, drilling new holes, and re-riveting the inner piece into place.
While I was happy with the frame overall, I wasn’t thrilled how it had to sit aside the mast instead of being exactly centered. Figuring this was more of an aesthetic issue than anything to interfere with the cover’s function, I let it go. The only alternative would have been to cut a section out of the frame and somehow support each end of the spine at the mast. Given the giant slot in the mast for the furling sail, I didn’t feel it was worth the hassle. The frame would sit to the starboard side of the mast.
The last step before calling it quits for the day was to secure the ribs down to the deck. Lesson learned, I wasn’t going to allow the frame to jump around this year. Instead, a combination of ratchet straps and sturdy lines pulled each pair of ribs firmly in place. I also ran a continuous 1/2” line from bow to stern on each side, a clove hitch securing the rib just above the “elbow” to keep them from twisting out of place. I felt great, though it was getting dark by the time I gathered my tools and headed home.
2. Alter the cover to fit the frame (and the hull)
This next part of the project would take another week, due to manpower and weather. It began early one morning watching a video from Sailrite, known for their ample catalog and excellent DIY content. Only a few minutes into the 3 1/2 hour-long tutorial on making a canvas boat cover, I was overwhelmed by the complexity and had nixed the idea of doing my own alterations. Here’s why:
I have limited sewing skills
We have a typical household sewing machine that isn’t suited for heavy canvas or really big projects
We have no room in our house that would fit a 25’x25’ piece of material
I’d still need to purchase supplies like zippers, velcro and UV stable thread
Winter is coming, soon
Instead, I studied the process of templating for the cover from the video, and vowed to find a local craftsperson who could execute the alterations. This would turn out to be a very good plan. And though it would be expensive, the total cost (including the initial purchase) would still be less than half that of a brand new cover.
For the templating, again I chose to labor alone. I purchased two rolls of 25’x10’ 3 mil poly painters drop cloth and some double sided tape at the local home center and went to work. Starting with the frame, I applied blue painters tape and a short length of double sided tape to several spots on the spine and each rib. Sailrite’s advice was to tape the templating film in place while you trimmed and marked your openings. The other piece of wisdom was to pick a windless day. I followed both. By time the daylight was fading at the boatyard, I’d made a template for the front half of the cover, carefully marked, removed and folded the film and stuffed it in my backpack so I could cycle home in the dark.
At home the next day, I spread out the canvas in the only location large enough to do so - the vacant double lot behind our house. On top went the poly template, held down with rocks to prevent the whole thing from blowing away. Once I was satisfied with the layout, I started cutting the canvas with a sharp utility blade guided by the template and a drywall square. There was no going back at this point! Thankfully I had some help flaking the cover once the surgery was complete.
You might be wondering, where’s the back half of the cover at this point? “Jeff only said he was templating the front half!” Well, patient reader, I had decided to use the back half of the cover as the template and mark it directly on the boat after cutting the front half to the poly template.
For this operation, I recruited two helpers to join me at the boatyard, roll out the trimmed front half and hoist it onto the frame. Once I confirmed the slices were all made in the right spots, we hauled the back half onto the frame and zipped it into the front half.
For the next hour or so, I fiddled with the floppy folds of canvas at the transom, trying to find some semblance of order that would allow the material to drape cleanly from the peak of the tent to the waterline. I’d envisioned a triangle that would extend from the ridge down to the outboard corners of the stern railing. At the railing, the cover would continue down to wrap around the lower edge of the transom at the waterline, while smoothly continuing to each side of the hull. From top to bottom, the cover would meet in the middle where it would be laced shut with reinforced grommets. It was a lot of 3D contouring to ask two dimensional material to conform to.
Grabbing folds of material, temporarily clamping them together and pulling them into place, I marked with chalk where various points would meet in the final cut. At the time it felt wholly imprecise and I wasn’t confident the alterations would turn out to be accurate. Worst case, the back of the tent would remain open to the elements, defeating the purpose for all of this. Or more likely, the sides would meet, but the cover would still be loose and baggy.
Satisfied as much as I could be that my marks were reasonably close, I traced the waterline on the canvas, dropped the entire thing back to the ground and drove home with my helpers. I spent a few more hours that evening translating chalk hieroglyphics on canvas into cut lines and a simple drawing on paper.
3. Hand off the cover to the professionals
The next afternoon I paid a visit to a local marine canvas shop. One thing about having an old boat in the city is that I’ve discovered how much craft is still around. This firm occupied an unassuming space entered through an alley. I like low overhead and don’t need to pay for a fancy storefront, so this made a terrific first impression.
Once inside, we laid out the marked up pieces one by one, talking the seamstress through the marks and drawings. I felt like these folks knew what they would be doing, and they promised to be practical in their approach. It was Thanksgiving week, so unfortunately the work wouldn’t be done before the weekend.
A little over a week later I received a call - my cover was ready! I couldn’t wait to see the results and get it installed, as more cold and wet weather was forecast to be coming. For late November, we were definitely lucky to have a day in the low 50s with light wind. My son Edward was kind enough to join me for the pickup and test fit.
4. Install the cover, for real
Leaving the canvas shop around 4PM on the last day of November, we knew we didn’t have much daylight left. But within minutes after arriving at the boatyard, we’d rolled out the flaked cover pieces, hoisted them up and over the frame (one last time!), zipped them together and tied all the little velcro sleeves where the rigging peeks through the cover. Best of all, the pieces weighed substantially less without the extra material!
The biggest relief was how great the stern looked! Both sides met perfectly in the middle, with the lower edge of the canvas tucked neatly under the curve of transom. Edward can attest to the fact that I danced a little happy dance and high-fived him in celebration. The only mistake was where I’d located the reinforcing patches for the exhaust & bilge pipes. Until those are moved, two tennis balls protect the fabric from being sliced open on the sharp protruding metal.
The bow was laced up next, standing on a tall ladder to reach above the anchor roller. I was confident from the earlier test fit that there’d be no issue there. I had to be confident in my helper that I wouldn’t fall off the ladder in the process.
Finally, the lower perimeter, which was already neatly laying against the waterline, was laced down with a few lines crossing under the hull to the opposite side. What a difference from the tangled mess of rope that I’d strung last year in an attempt to gather the extra material! By this time we’d been working under the glow of the nearby streetlights for only 45 minutes. The drive home in traffic would take just as long.
If you’ve made it this far in the article, I hope you’re impressed with what we accomplished (in concert with some real pros) to adapt what we had. Sure, it’s just a boat cover. Some are nicer, and some are, well, definitely trashy. Most are single use plastic. This one fits Daystar perfectly and I’m relieved she’s out of the weather under a reusable cover until next spring.
