Went sailing today

I started this week by having another look at the wind instruments, I checked the continuity of the cables as far as the connection box in the heads, there seems to be no problem up to this point it looks as though the problem is either in the mast or at the masthead but I am not taking it down just for that. I finished sanding the forward cabin sole it is just needing the final coat of flocoat. With the lift out programmed for next Wednesday I decided to go for a final sail, with a Northerly 2 or 3 it was not too bad although some sunshine would have been been welcome.

The last photograph is the new waste to energy plant at Kemsley looks as though part of it has been built with 'Lego' bricks.

Short post this week

 I have done a little more sanding to the forward cabin sole however I am suffering from a bit of a low boredom threshold with sanding so I decided to fix an outstanding issue with the engine stop cable. Before I got the engine running I had replaced the original engine stop cable with a new one, the original cable was a bowden cable and it was getting pretty frayed, the new one is a solid Morse type cable but it did not have the usual ferrule at the end of the outer sheath and while the engine stop function worked perfectly well but when pushing the knob back in to reset the stop all that happened was that the outer sheath moved so the stop lever had to be reset by hand before restarting the engine, this all worked OK in fact it was probably a good way of immobilising the engine provided that you remembered to do the reset. On further investigation I found that the stop lever return spring was too long so that even in the stop position there was insufficient tension in the spring to return the lever. I started by removing the spring and cutting about three-quarters of an inch off it before forming a new eye on the end. Replacing the spring was a bit tricky as it is behind the fuel rack return spring but after some perseverance I managed to refit it.

I cut this much off the spring

Arrangement of the stop cable

As can bee seen from the above photograph that the cable connection to the stop lever does not allow for push pull operation. As a belt and braces I secured the cable outer sheath at a couple of points on the engine, the stop lever now works as intended no need for a manual reset. I had thought of fitting a stop solenoid but as can bee seen there is not much space and I am all in favour of keeping things simple where possible.

Back to sanding

 Not a lot to write about this week I am afraid I was hoping that I would be able to get out into the Swale for a couple of hours at least once this week but the weather has been atrocious on the days that I had available such is life. The first task this week was to finish applying the varnish to the the shelf etc for the bookshelf behind the dinette seat back.

Bookshelf

Cover for lower opening

Covering the lower opening and fitting the bookshelf does help reduce the noise from the domestic water pump which is mounted in the space below but as it is mounted on a fairly thin plywood bulkhead it is still quite intrusive, requires further investigation. For the rest of my time this week I have been sanding the new gelcoat on the forward cabin sole although I must admit that I have not been overly enthusiastic about it but having said that it is almost ready for the final coat of flocoat. I had been quietly pleased that the reinforcement of the heads sole had stopped it creaking however there was an annoying creak from the bilge access cover and after some investigation I found that when applying the gelcoat i had left a bit of a blob in the recess so that the cover was jamming when any weight was applied five minutes with some coarse sandpaper soon sorted it. That is it for this week I have booked for a lift out on the 21st October I was hoping to do it last winter but I was a bit late trying to book it and all space in the yard and the cradles were taken, so plan B was to do it in Marsh this year but the Chinese flu got in the way so hoping that it all goes according to plan this time.

Light bulb moment

 While I was in the shower contemplating the meaning of life I had a light bulb moment or should that have been a Homer Simpson 'doh' moment, the reason for the need to swap over the autopilot motor power leads had nothing to do with the motor having been replaced but the fact that the tiller that it operates on is mounted aft of the rudder stock so that the actuator needs to move in the opposite direction to give the correct rudder movement.

I started this week by making the shelf for the space behind the dinette and also a cover to go down at the bottom of the space which has an opening into the calorifier space, these now require varnishing which I have started and will add further coats next week. I then went on to clean up the bulkhead inside the space it had previously been lined with something possibly the same textured vinyl that was used on the remainder of the saloon bulkheads, the adhesive appeared to possibly be some form of latex which scraped off fairly easily. I gave the bulkhead a sanding and used some spray contact adhesive to secure a piece of the same grey van lining carpet that I had used for the rest of the headlining.

Cover for the opening into calorifier space

Bookshelf

The object to the right of the space is the autopilot fluxgate compass, I was thinking of moving it to the space under the shelf but to do that I think it will be necessary to pull the cable all the way back from the autopilot course computer and it has been spiral wrapped so it would be a lot of messing about, unless the cable can be disconnected at the compass but I very much doubt it. Next week I must really make the effort to finish the forward cabin sole and then the heads.

Autopilot

The aim this week was to finish tidying the wiring in the aft cabin locker the cabling to the autopilot actuator from the course computer included a chocolate block connector which i wanted to get rid of so I removed the actuator with the intention of renewing all the cables, however the cables to the motor and the clutch were connected directly to these items rather than to a terminal block and as I didn't want to go that far I removed the chocolate block connector and made a soldered connection for the extension cables these connections were wrapped in self amalgamating tape and the whole lot wrapped with spiral wrapping. The problem came when trying to replace the actuator, it is secured with a pin which is retained by a couple of 'R' clips but this is out of sight round the corner so it had to be done by feel, a bit of a struggle. I reconnected the cables and switched the autopilot on to test it and the rudder moved full travel in the opposite direction to that instructed, so after checking that all the cables were correctly connected to the course computer I consulted the manual which covered this very fault the instruction was to swap the two wires for the motor drive over which I did and it now works perfectly. The terminals in the course computer are all colour coded and they had all been correctly connected the only thing that I can think of is that the motor has been changed in the past I don't know but it works.

Autopilot actuator

Cables all wrapped

The job was finished off by wrapping the cables to the 12v/USB outlet in the aft cabin these require securing probably with some sort of self adhesive device. 

Cable to 12v/USB socket

I had hoped that I would be able to venture out into the Swale today and/or yesterday as tides are springs at the moment but unfortunately the weather had other ideas, it was much too windy so I finished up the week by measuring up for next weeks project which is to fit out the space above the locker containing the domestic water system against the saloon aft bulkhead, it requires lining and a shell fitting so that it will make a space possibly for books.

Next weeks project

Loose ends

This week I have been tying up a few more loose ends I started on Monday with replacing some sea water hose elbows on the engine, when I put the engine back together I obtained a hose connection kit from Parts 4 Engines basically a bag of short pieces of hose of the various sizes required but the engine has three hose elbows which unfortunately did not come as part of the kit so in order to get the engine running I reused the old ones. Judging from the paint remaining on them these elbows were the originals fitted to the engine when it was manufactured in 1988 and while not in tip top condition they did serve a purpose. In the meantime I had purchased some new silicone hose elbows with the intention of replacing the originals but best laid plans and all that it was not until I was looking round the engine last week that I realised that the original elbows were well past their sell by date, touch them and they left a black stain on the hands, they had perished. The new elbows just required to be cut to size and pushed on and secured with 'Jubilee' clips

Old elbows

New silicone elbows one on right cut to size

New sea water pump elbow

Gearbox cooling elbows

I spent quite a bit of time going through lockers and removing stuff that was no longer required offcuts of wood, all those short bits of cable that one tends to keep as it may be useful one day but never is and boxes that equipment arrived in that you keep in case it is necessary to return it, so things are looking a little tidier now but there is still more to do. I finished off the week by tidying the wiring in the stern locker in the aft cabin it is mostly connected to the auto pilot, it had been temporarily bundled up with cable ties for some time. I started by shortening a couple of over length cables and then bound them together with the spiral wrap.

Cables tidied and wrapped

There is still a bit to do the cables on the right which supply a 12v/usb outlet in the aft cabin need wrapping and the cables from the autopilot course computer to the actuator will probably be replaced with proper tinned cable before being wrapped the cables in the centre of the photograph are the anode bonding cables and there is not very much I can do with them

   

Housekeeping and some sailing

I have decided to leave the sanding of the forward cabin sole for a rainy day the main aim this week was to finish the internal clean and then start externally. I began by cleaning out the wet locker in the heads which was pretty grotty after sanding the sole, the interior is now looking fairly presentable. On Wednesday I went for a brief sail along the Swale as far as Milton Creek this was the first time out since I came out of hospital and so I was using parts of me that I hadn't used for some time. Basically most of my exercise regime has been walking whereas sailing involves a lot of pulling fortunately the weather was benign and the wind direction such that it was one tack out and one back usually with the predominant south westerly one way can involve a lot of tacking. Anyway all went well but I knew that I had done something a bit different. Today the plan was to clean up the exterior she was beginning to get that green colour that comes with external neglect so I set too with the hose and a scrubber, I use a 'Tough Scrub' available from Lakeland it is basically a foam pad with what I think is stainless steel wire anyway they are most effective in removing the muck and that lichen type growth that seems to have an affection for things fibreglass. My apologies for the lack of photographs but we all know what boats that require a good scrub get to look like every boatyard has a few lurking at the back of the yard. That is it for this week I hope to have something a bit more interesting to report next week.