When we first found “spirit” she was propped up on a half a dozen oil drums with timber wedges. This worked but she deserved better.
We always take her out of the water every winter intending to do all sorts of things to her but sadly don’t get round to much more than the essentials i.e. engine service, anti-foul, bit of a clean.
The first winter (2005) we sailed her back up to Hesketh Bank where we bought her see Waves behaving badly. Since 2006, however, we have had her lifted out at Rhyl Yacht club. It is a great club to be a member of and they really try hard as a membership to make it a success.
Anyhow the first and second years we couldn’t really afford a cradle so I asked a long time structural engineer friend of mine (Andrew Allan) to design an economical alternative.
You can see the result below. All the structural timbers are 47mm x 75mm with galvanised straps to prevent them springing out. She didn’t move an inch and Rhyl actually had storm force winds twice that first year. Spirit actually weighs over 8 tonnes but she sits on her keel and so long as we have her restrained pretty verical, we only have to worry about the wind forces.
This is our new cradle
