When we bought our Wauquiez Centurion 40s, Taistealai, for ocean cruising, starting with the ARC this year, we had a number of criteria in mind, but first and foremost we wanted a boat that would be manageable by two. Nothing too big or heavy, yet substantial enough to cross oceans reasonably quickly and be fun to sail. Most importantly, our budget had to leave enough over to prepare her properly. After a couple of demo sails we ruled out roller reefing mainsails. Maybe it’s my racing background or the design of yacht we tried, but we found the performance disappointing and the reduced size of mainsail seemed small for the boat. There were compromises we were prepared to make, but we did try to adhere to the principles of keeping it simple, manageable and repairable in the middle of nowhere or be prepared to do without. I had been advised that it’s best to leave a considerable part of the budget for a refit; this is probably a bigger chunk than you might initially think, so these were wise words. Make your estimate and double it would be my advice! Also increase the time you think it will take to do the refit as jobs are often more difficult than expected largely owing to the restricted space. Checking the bottom Your yacht has to take you safely for many thousands of miles through mixed weather conditions and one of the most important aspects is keeping the water on the outside. Steering gear and stern glands can cause difficulties and need to be checked. Aboard Taistealai instead of a stern gland we have a saildrive unit and our manual tells us that every seven years the rubber seal needs to be replaced. You may be told that these rubber seals last a lot longer than this, and there will be boats sailing around with seals two and three times the recommended age, but I didn’t want to take any chances – I thought we would look very silly sitting around in a liferaft because we had not changed it. However, this was a much bigger job than I had anticipated, involving the engine having to be split from the drive and moved forward. Although I will tackle most things on a yacht, this was a time to call in the experts. It made sense to do it during the winter refit we planned while the boat was on the hard as it avoided an additional lift. The cost was fierce, but we feel much happier now it is done. The next job was checking the rudder bearings and keel. Both got a clean bill of health from the surveyor, but after the report into the loss of the yacht Cheeki Rafiki last year we had another good look. Our seacocks were also checked and the seawater inlet one replaced on the leg of the saildrive. Some yachts look like a colander under water, they have so many seacocks. One thing I … Continue reading ARC weather man Chris Tibbs prepares his boat for ocean cruising