I could perform surgery, but there is a list of other - “now in hindsight I’d wish I’d done differents”, shaped by eye, leaks, slightly miscalculated the mainsheet post/jib ratio, “invented” my own removable pot (plastic vegemite jar) which has been more trouble than its worth, etc, etc. I just want to patch up the old girl until I need to salvage bits.
Bigpat - Yep, right and right, he’s been very helpful - good guy as you say. But mainly what’s improved my sailing out of hand has been time on the water and just experimenting…major problems being 1) setting the foot of the main too tight, 2) getting the slot wrong, 3) having the main too close to the centreline. I did buy a Craig Smith IOM rudder for my M which is more of a spade shape than the semi-elliptical rudder pictured - and with decently trimmed sails and a less tweaky rudder I can even tack!! Bonus. Anyways I also acquired another M - a modified GB Jive, with great rigs etc - and what I’ve learnt is that my Steve Baker M is faster in all conditions than the Jive, but the Jive I could make go in any direction ‘out of the box’… far less tweaky. So I’m getting there with time and making notes and thinking…cheers!