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Tomfoolery is finally where it's supposed to be at Burlington Harbor Marina on Lake Champlain. There was a little excitement on the way north as one of the trailer brakes locked up. Fortunately, I had the wisdom to hire a pro to tow it up there and he just pulled off and rebuilt the brakes...

So it looks like the U bolts are there but not in an ideal position. Do you typically put a strap across the cockpit as well?

Does the TomCat have transom bolts for trailer tie downs or do you have to strap across the cockpit? Hopefully all of these questions that I should know the answers to will soon stop when the boat is at my backyard dock instead of two hours away! Scheduled to have it hauled up to Vermont at...

I know I should know this but... What is the practical minimum draft of a TomCat at which you can still use the engines? I’m looking at Lake Champlain waterfront property with seasonal fluctuations that might get just a bit too shallow in the late autumn. With a long enough dock I should be...

I threw a Hail Mary pass and texted a guy in the area who had done some emergency repair work for me on a sailboat 15 years ago. He called back today and said, with perhaps a bit of fear in his voice, that he remembered me. Said he was out of town until Monday and had two boats ahead of me...

The tank eventually filled aaaand... the fittings leaked. Setting up that winterization bypass is certainly one of the dumbest things I've done on a boat. Cost at least a week of cruising and unknown money as I now need to bring in someone who knows what they are doing. Should have just let it...

Pacific Coast101 - thanks for the steering alignment suggestion. Much easier than I expected, especially after reading the instructions. They can be found on page 11 here: http://www.boatsteer.com/assets/LiquidTieBar.pdf

Look at me using all those plumberly words like "bleeding" :) I ripped out all of my winterization bypass work that I spent a month installing a few months ago because I had a pesky leak once I filled the main water tank and turned on the pressure. I spent the better part of a day trying to fix...

I must have missed that part about using a mallet. I use a mallet a lot. Screens are in! (The big ones went in easy but, of course, I started with the little aft ones, thus the mallet) On to plumbing! Where'd I put the mallet?

Bugs are out and so am I. Time to put the screens in. This should be the easiest of all tasks. I see the butterfly clips, I assume those go on the top. I press in the screen and find there's a t least a quarter inch overlap of the frame and the window track preventing me from getting the frame...

In days of yore, when I was a sailor, I would take out each new boat (too many to count) and practice all direction approaches under power and sail, using a racing buoy as a target. Race committee got annoyed with me once (hey, there wasn't a race going on when I did it!) until I started...

I can't lasso a cleat with a dockline to save my life. Put a power cord or hose in my hands and I'll snag every cleat in sight. I think I'll just stow my lines and use hoses to tie up the boat. In other news... I finally got the windows open. Took mallet, a pry bar, a chunk of wood, a...

I've been off working hard for the past few weeks so just now finally got back ti important things like reading C Brats. Thanks for all the info. I decided a couple weeks ago that having the boat hauled all the way to Vermont would bypass way too much scenery and adventure so I plan to have it...

Early stages but I may be acquiring some lakefront property in a perfect TomCat area. Wondered if anyone keeps their boat on a lift. Anything special to keep in mind?

Sounds like an elegantly simple solution. Can't do it. Too little opportunity for mechanical mayhem and misadventure.

I never would have even thought to look. Thanks!

It actually works as a boat! Yup, you can take it out of the slip and cruise around. That was a new experience for me after so many trips to set it up, repair my repairs and figure out how everything works. I even sat at anchor awhile and just enjoyed the day. Of course that doesn't mean that...

I now have the ability to work remotely full time. My company also has very flexible hours so I have the potential of working early or late. This has the potential to send me off cruising full time (or as much as I want anyway) a couple years earlier than expected as I could get in a solid...

Congrats! Great cruising area as you well know. I hope to bring my TomCat up that way at some point. You will really enjoy both the extended season the boat gives you AND the protection from those nasty biting flies in the summer. My first cruise on my 22 was Door County followed a couple days...

The swing ladder definitely looks like the right idea but the bracket is different than mine. If I have to replace the bracket, do the bolts go through the transom and have washers and nuts on the other side that can be easily accessed through the hatch on the transom? I figured out how to turn...