On Cool Change  our Moody 45DSe we are lucky to have a Dual Fresh Water System on board that presents one of the best fresh water systems available.
What is a Dual Fresh Water System?
A… Dual Fresh Water System… …provides two completely independent fresh water supply systems.
Each system has its own tank, fill, vent and pick up leading to a dual filter system. If there is ever any contamination or delivery problem in one system, then a turn of valves puts the second system on line quickly.

With the dual fresh water system one can:
* Turn both tanks on,
*  Isolate either one tank from the other, or
* Turn both tanks off!

With a self-tacking headsail it's simple...
... when you go about the headsail moves across from one side of the boat to the other on its own.
There are no winches to grind. And there's no rushing around deck on whilst tacking
Tacking Cool Change is as easy as turning the the wheel!
The obvious advantage of a self tacker is that it makes it incredibly easy to sail.
It's no problem to sail single-handed or with an inexperienced crew.
The smaller headsail does not get caught and damaged on the guard rails so it lasts longer.
And there's no more heading up front to skirt the sail.
Now what about performance?
Does the Smaller Headsail Result in Compromised Performance?
... not when the self-tacker is part of the design from day one.
 On Yachts designed with the self-tacker in mind, it is part of a high-aspect rig with a large mainsail. In addition a smaller headsail offers a better shape... the jib is flatter so the yacht points higher.
When tacking you don't need to let go or even loosen the jib sheet. This means the jib sheet stays taught and there's minimal flapping of the sail.
The result?...
...speedy tacking with no fuss at all!
On Cool Change, my Moody 45DSe the self-tacking headsail is intrinsic to the overall yacht design as opposed to an after-thought option.
Moody boats are designed with the mast stepped further back and a high aspect rig plan.
This means a beautifully balanced yacht that's easy to sail.
With a self-tacker you have just one jib sheet.
The sheet goes from the clew of the sail to a stand-up block mounted on the self-tacker track (see picture).
The sheet then feeds up to the mast, back down inside the mast and back to the cockpit winch.
 When tacking the block simply slides from one side to the other as the bow goes through the wind.
Look at the You Tube video to see how simple it works.

Angle of Vanishing Stability
There is a lot of mystery about what exactly the Angle of Vanishing Stability represents. In short it gives you an idea about the stability of your Yacht. How stiff or tender she will be in a heavy sea.
A vessel is said to be:-
• “stiff” if she strongly resists heeling and
• “tender” if she heels more readily:
Ideally the AVS for vessels should be more than:

Once capsized, many vessels become stable in the inverted position. 

The angle of Vanishing Stability
As the boat heels more, RM decreases, until RM (righting movement) is zero. The boat can invert!
Righting moment curve for flat water.

The above diagram tells us that if a boat heels far enough, it becomes stable upside down.
The point where this occurs is known as the Angle of Vanishing Stability or AVS.
Boats will not normally heel past their AVS. Obviously, the wind could not make this happen, the sails are under water and the only way for this to occur is for the force of the water to push the boat over.
A vessel which inverts will remain inverted until a wave rolls it past its angle of vanishing stability, then it will return to the correct orientation.
Therefore the higher the AVS is the more stable and resistant to staying inverted it will be.
Cool Change, my  Moody 45DSe has an AVS of 180!
For more info on Stability click here...

Cool Change has an impressive 600 liters of fuel on board via two separate fuel tanks of 300 liters each.
600 liters of diesel significantly extends her motoring range many hundreds of nautical miles beyond other boats in her class. When becalmed or when a storm is threatening Cool Change can motor vast distances to reach more favorable conditions for sailing. With fuel capacities like that Cool Change does not have to constantly look for ports with fuel to fill up.
Furthermore Cool Change has a simple two-way-lever valve to allow the switching of the fuel source from one tank to the other with a simple flip of the lever – even while underway!

I had the pleasure of being asked to deliver a beautiful and almost brand new Hanse 495 from Pittwater/Sydney NSW to Southport in Queensland - A passage of approximately 394 nautical miles along the stunning east coast of Australia.
My able crew consisted of the owner Dr Nick Robson and crew Ross Turner and Mark Andrews, all experienced sailors.
While Neptune (the god of the sea) was extremely kind to us with smooth seas, Aeolus (king of the winds) seemed to be too concerned with our wellbeing. However, we managed to have a few occasions of great sailing. Once we had the beautiful “Phantom” Asymmetric Cruising Spinnaker flying. The Gennaker pushed us along in an exhilarating fashion just past of Port Stephens and beautiful Broughton Island. We also had a very pleasant night sail interspersed with motor sailing and motoring.
Each of us had prepared a pre-cooked evening meal and the culinary surprises were sensational. We were treated to meals such as Beef Stroganoff, Green Curry and the unavoidable Spaghetti Bolognese.
Breakfast and lunches were supplemented by fruit, breakfast cereal and sandwiches.
We had the preventer set up deployed whenever we were sailing at more than 130o to the wind and never had any need to put in a reef.
Again, arriving at the Southport sandbar did not present any challenges due to the excellent conditions we’ve encountered all the way.
Phantom is an extremely well presented vessel and has been set up superbly for cruising by the owner Nick Robson. A 320 Watt Solar panel set up provided ample of additional charging. Also, unlike most sailing trips, all four of us had daily long showers due to the luxury of the almost unlimited water supply provided by the onboard Spectra Water maker, producing consistently some 40 to 50 liters of water per hour.
The on-board Espresso Coffee machine did round up the immense luxury experienced on board by all of us.
Even though we had very pleasant conditions all the way, we all complied with our self imposed safety rules, such as:
• Always wearing a life jacket and being clipped-in at night.
• Wearing same life jacket when foredeck work was required.
• Never go forward at night without at least one other person in cockpit and only for valid reasons – clipped-on and wearing a life-jacket.
• Access to PLBs for each of us during night watches.
Our night watch schedule for the first night was in pairs 3 hours on, 3 hours off;  which we changed  to single watches  2 hours on and 6 hours off on the second night. Both schedules worked well in the mild conditions we had.
Arriving in Southport we took a berth at the Southport Yacht Club and Nick Robson professionally docked the boat in some very testing conditions. E.g. the tide was running out and this created quite a strong current right at our berth.
After a change of clothes we embarked on a great breakfast at one of the nice eateries at Southport.
The next morning at high tide, Ross Turner took the helm and guided Phantom through the South and North Channel of Southport all the way up to Sanctuary Cove, where the boat will spend the next week for the Sanctuary Cove Boat Show.
I am already looking forward flying back up to Southport with Nick on the 1st of June to take over the boat once more to sail her up to the Hamilton Island via Keppel Island and Percy Island.

Having a BBQ on board a vessel makes cooking a joy especially when you have a set-up that is not only convenient and efficient, but also provides you with excellent meals when anchored in a secluded anchorage.
We have opted for a Weber BabyQ over the conventional stainless steel BBQs traditionally offered for the boating fraternity.
Not only does the Weber BabyQ outperform any of the significantly more expensive stainless steel options (approx 1/3 of the cost), it provides us with great flexibility on where on board we do use our BBQ. For example, when we are in a protected bay, we simply put it on the bathing platform (see picture), or on the back railing. On a rainy day we position it in the middle of the cockpit table. Many of our sailing friends have now too changed to a Weber BabyQ on their boats for all the above mentioned convenience and performance.