Practical Boat Owner

Published by TI Media Limited Practical Boat Owner is Britain's biggest-selling boating magazine, trusted and respected by all its readers. A source of useful and helpful information for both power and sail boat owners, PBO helps you get the most from your boat acting as a forum for interacting with like-minded individuals.

Practical Boat Owner

A new way to go boating

No kill cord or lifejackets were worn during fatal powerboat crash • News and current affairs from the world of boating

Orca sink yacht in Strait of Gibraltar

Pip’s Vendée Globe funding challenge

Repair service

Liferaft guidance

Geoff Holt is motoring around the UK

Major fire at Cockwells’ boatbuild site

DIARY DATES

Regional news • News from your cruising area

Grassroots sailing club £4m bid to save centre

Letters • Sharing your boating thoughts and opinions

SEADOG OF THE MONTH

Grinde 27 circumnavigation

Cream tea carnage at sea • The crew’s ‘scone mad’ on a Thames barge

Dominant minimalism • Every yachtsman’s a superyacht owner

Playing with coloured sails • Maintaining an hourglass-shaped balloon and ratcheting up the log numbers

Seaworthy dinghies for less than £500 • For low cost traditionally-styled GRP trailer-sailers, consider the Foreland and the Otter available at bargain basement prices

Boats for restoring under £20,000 • Duncan Kent picks the best sub-35ft sail and power boats to look for when aiming to undertake a restoration on a budget

Common replacements

30 WAYS TO GET AFLOAT • From tall ships to small dinghies, you needn’t own a boat to sail. Ali Wood looks at the options, and how skippers can also find crew

Need crew?

FREE ACCESS TO OVER 130 ISSUES

IZIBoat: simple sailing • Rupert Holmes sails an innovative catamaran design intended to widen participation in sailing among those with little time to get on the water in more conventional craft

Sail the Atlantic with strangers • Would you sail across the Atlantic with someone you’ve just met? Ali Wood meets the cruising crews who’ve done just that

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New gear • Rupert Holmes previews the latest marine products

NEWS IN BRIEF

Tried & tested • The PBO team tests the Buoycatcher-Max and Aquafleece Robe

What’s inside your liferaft? • Short of time to get their liferaft professionally serviced, Andy and Julie Pag decide to carry out an inspection themselves

Five top causes of engine failure and how to prevent them • Jake Kavanagh talks to Sea Start marine engineer Nick Eales about how to avoid the five major causes of an engine breakdown at sea

SEA START

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How to maintain masts and rigging • A sailing rig is put under huge stresses and strains so regular inspections of spars and rigging are vital, as Simon Jollands explains

SURVEYOR’S RIGGING TIPS

KEEP A LOG

LOOKING AFTER WOODEN MASTS AND ROPES

WASHING ADVICE

When the ice melts • Dena Hankins and James Lane troubleshoot a faulty fridge on their 30ft yacht by overriding a non-functioning printed circuit board

Troubleshooting a faulty refrigerator

Practical projects • Your great ideas and tips

Ask the experts • Got a question? Email pbo@futurenet.com

Replacing tatty old headlinings • Roger Hughes replaces old vinyl headlinings with easy-to-clean white PVC ‘planking’

Vital passage plan • Cruising guide author Robert Bailey explains the importance of not being completely dependent on electronic chartplotters

River Yealm

1,500 miles without a...