Launch!

Got back to the boat Thursday at about 11h00 after going home Wednesday night... Immediately set too in polishing the topsides..... 2 complete coats of Poliglow later and the shine was back!.... I am very pleased with the results.... could definitely do with more coats yet, but that'll have to wait until a calm day when she's afloat.... I then painted another coat of antifoul on.... plus a further coat around the boot topping, the bows, front of the keel and the skeg... I was nervous about putting masking tape onto the newly poliglowed topsides, but all was well.... I finally, by about 17h30, masked off and painted the stern.... in the same colour as the coachlines.... looks terrific.... really needs another coat after flatting this one, but its a good start, and looks soooo much better than it did before.... While all this was happening, I fitted the two propshaft anodes (two this year as last years had all but dissappeared when she was lifted - admittedly it was a smaller one) During the evening, I set too in servicing the seacocks.... the blakes were easy (except one where the bolts were a bit hard to get at) and soon greased and pinched up.... the others without exception weren't serviceable... they couldn't be taken apart.... I removed the first one entirely from the through hull fitting to see if I could apply grease through the main pipe fitting, but couldn't really get enough on to make it worth doing, so just checked the remainder by ensuring that the pipes were healthy, double clipped and that the seacock turned freely... the one that had been worrying me turned out to be nothing more than a slightly rusty handle... the seacock body was corrosion free and it turned perfectly.... I will however start a programme next lift out of replacing all these seacocks with serviceable ones... perhaps 3 or 4 at a time.... they are expensive, and there are 10 of them! Day break, and I was ready to be lifted back in.... the yard however weren't going to be ready until early afternoon, needing to move other boats and with other commitments already made, so I fiddled.... as it worked out, this was fine, as I got several other jobs done... I fitted 3 stainless U-bolts that I have previously bought to make three strong harness attachment points in the cockpit (these are 10mm diameter, so should be up to the job!), finally used the sikaflex to reseat the cockpit speaker (another job that had been niggling me, worrying about it leaking into the wood core of the hole - needlessly, the wood was as dry as a bone), sikaflexed the plug hole in the heads washbasin which was leaking slightly and finally fitted the new reefing lines.... these are a new set of lines that go up the luff through the existing cringles, so that the main can be reefed from the cockpit.... it entailed fitting two eyebolts onto the gooseneck (to capture the lines and prevent the reefing cringle pulling ever downwards towards the deck when reefing) and leading the lines back alongside the leach reefing lines and through the same clutch port.... the line I have used is 6mm.... I'm not sure if it will be strong enough, but time will tell, and besides, I still have the reefing horns if it fails.... and secondly, its a bit too thin for the clutch which doesn't 'grab' it, so I need to whip it to the existing leach line to capture it.... Finally, after I had offloaded several tons of tools and other junk while the car was close by, she was lifted.... while she was in the air, Peter, the yard foreman kindly stopped for his lunch to give me time to scrape the small areas under the cradle pads and stick some antifoul on, plus antifoul the bottom of the keel where she had sat on blocks, and then they popped her in... I nervously ran straight below to check the integrity of the seacocks and the new anode bolts, but all was well..... I motored her the 100yds or so to her berth, and a combination of 25kts of wind up the chuff and being out of practice, gently nudged the pontoon on the bow.... no harm done, other than to my pride.... Soon had her secured, filled the water tanks, and washed up properly for the first time for a week (previously only been able to rinse before you all say errgghhh!), checked everything over again, reattached the shore power, and departed... Maggie is back in the water, and ready to go!!!!!! yeehhaaaa Although, no sailing this weekend..... M has a footy tournament Saturday morning, and birthday party to attend on Sunday, and besides, the forecast is rubbish!

Nearly there....

Just got home after 3 more days on the boat getting jobs done.... Monday, managed to get a primer coat on the hull..... it was nice to see her back in a single colour, although the primer was a silvery grey, so she did look a little washed out!.... was finished by 15h00, so then spent the next few hours until it got dark scraping and polishing the remains of the silver coach trim strip off the side of the hull... I managed to nearly finish one side, after SWMBO had made a valiant start a few days previously.... Tuesday, spent pretty much the whole day cleaning the remainder of the silver trim off.... a combination of kitchen scourer pads, WD40 and a blunt screwdriver.... was finished by 15h00, and then got a hull cleaner and cleaned the topsides... I couldn't believe how much muck came off..... she looks white again! Wednesday, started by painting the coach stripe in a blue to match the dodgers and sailcover..... after masking off, painting and then removing the masking it was midday, despite starting at 08h00.... I then got the first coat of antifoul on the hull..... she looks so much better for it, and it is starting to make all the hard work seem worthwhile to see he looking so fair... Along the way today, and while waiting for drying times, I removed the hull anode..... naturally the studs where completely corroded and rusty, so had to remove them.... another £14 for two studs, which I had to Sikaflex into place.. (another £9)..... but the anode went on well, and its nice to see everything gleaming.... still need to fit the shaft anodes (decided to fit two this year), but thats only a five minutes job.... I finally also sanded the stern down in preparation for painting (with the same paint as the coach trim)... but rain stopped play, and I couldn't paint it... Back down tommorrow morning with only a few jobs to do.... apply the Poliglow to the topsides, paint the stern, fit the shaft anodes, service the seacocks and apply another coat of antifoul.... Everythign else can wait until she's back in the water!

plans

SWMBO and I were discussing today our plans for a getaway on a boat towards retirement age.... original plan was to aim for when I am 55 to 60..... so a good few years... We both agreed today that earlier would be better.... the only constraint is while the kids are still dependent...... But we are now hoping to aim for 50 instead at the latest..... have decided to downgrade to a smaller house at the time, and basically go as soon we can have a budget of £6k per annum through to 65 after selling the house, buying a smaller one and chucking in savings and buying the boat that we'll do it on.... Dreams eh.... aren't they great!.... esepceially when they are shared!

rudder post

Previously I'd speculated about the rudder post and its sheath of epoxy.... Well, forgot to mention that I got to the bottom of the mystery... Along each side of the trailing edge of the skeg, a stainless plate about 1" wide and the length of the skeg has been attached, with the purpose of holding a 'flap' of stiff material in place to close the slot between the skeg and rudder...... The additional material on the skeg is to fair into this metal fixing... so no structural concerns.... I just need to remove the metal strip and fairing next season.... its not neccessary on a cruiser..... Also, found a couple of osmotic blisters on the rudder.... the hull is fine, absolutely no sign at all...... i've dug them out now...they were tiny, and will fill them before priming, and take another look next season to see if its worth removing the rudder and taking it home to strip the gel off and dry it out properly.... suspect its so minor that its not worth it.... and they may even never reappear.... they were only 2mm across anyway...

aching arms part 4

Phew...... Whole boat was scraped by Saturday evening.... Retired for a quiet (very) night at the local Travelodge as per SWMBO's demands.... slept like a baby! Sunday, and back at the boat by 08h30..... pootled around and did a few bits and bobs until the reasonable hour of 10h00 before starting to sand.... (the boat yard is below a bick block of waterside apartments - and it was Sunday morning after all!) So, the sanding began..... I had bought a new sander for the job.... it was cheaper to buy a new one than to get the service bits (new velcro disc) for the old one.... ridiculous... By 15h00, I had sanded the whole boat..... really looking good..... very very pleased with myself.... a very smooth finish across the whole bottom.... So, a total of 5 days of scraping and sanding....... bloody hard work.... glad It doesn't need doing every year!!!!!!! I then power washed the thing clean, and went to shower while it dried.... I was somewhat dirty.... in fact, when I got to the shower block, I burst out laughing at myself when I looked in the mirror..... a perfect white area around my mouth from the dust mask, and a pair of white spectacles from the safety glasses.....and every where else completely 'smurf' blue..... I did look remarkably like a panda.... After a much needed shower I went back to see that the boat wasn't going to dry in time for any paint, so decided to abandon ship for the day.... All the while this had been going on, SWMBO had been attacking the prop and prop shaft with a brass wire brush and wet and dry sandpaper... it is now gleaming..... she then set to removing the silver coach line set in a small recess along the topsides.... initial efforts were with an hairdryer... didn't work, so then WD40 and a household pan cleaner did the trick..... by the time I had finished sanding she had removed pretty much all of one side.... sounds painfully slow, which it was.... Other success was, rubber ball related.... during last summer M dropped a small rubber ball down one of the cockpit drains and it had wedged in the pipe.... I was planning to remove the pipe to get the ball out, but in a burst of inspiration, while I had the pressure washer out, I stuck it into the through hull from below...... whoosh..... the ball shot out, flew 20' into the air... and the drain was clear! I also nipped in to the chandlers on the way in Saturday morning and bought a tin of antifoul primer..... I decided that getting the hull so fair, and then risking the antifoul not binding would be daft, so for the sake of £40, am going to do it properly.... Next challenges are to finish removing the silver sticker, to clean the topsides, to degrease/de-polish the topsides, to apply the poliglow, to prime and then antifoul, to paint the stern properly, to paint the coach line in the same colour as the stern.... I also need to work out what order to do all these in... Finally, I need to service the seacocks, replace one of them, replace the anodes and then launch her!

aching arms part 3

Just got home after another 1 & 1/2 days of scraping.... 1 side finished, and half way down the second side..... back again tommorrow morning..... Optimistic, that i'll be sanding by Sunday! We are stopping at a Travel Lodge tommorrow evening..... SWMBO just won't sleep on the boat while its out of the water!

bit of time off

Managed to get tommorrow afternoon, and all day Friday off work, so more scraping coming up...... SWMBO is coming along at the weekend, so thats 2 hands to get the jobs done.... she's volunteered to set too with scrubbing the topsides, and then using Farecla G10 to get them perpared prior to using the Poliglow cleaner and then polish to get a real shine.... (that'll be a job for the future yet I suspect....) Also on the list (for SWMBO should she get that far - or me otherwise!) is to gently wet and drying down the painted stern in prep for a re-paint, and also cleaning up the prop..... a gentle wirebrush off, and then wet and dry in increasing grades until it reaches a fine shine! More piccies to come soon!

aching arms part 2

Yet another day of scraping...... from 11h00 until 16h00 this time.... Managed to get about 2/3rds of one side completed, and one side of the keel.....

I know it looks messy, but actually its now quite a smooth finish.... a quick run over with a sander will get it pretty flat..... The patches that can be seen are test applications of the antifoul (Compass cheapo again - worked well last year, so trying it again!)... I wanted to make sure that it will apply properly over the different finishes present....... Reckon I'll have taken 40Kg of antifoul of by the time i'm finished!

aching arms!

Got down to Maggie at 10h00 this morning, and after a bit of setting up time, had the scraper in my hand by 10h30....... I then scraped..... and scraped..... and scraped..... by 16h00, i'd had enough..... and had scraped about one third of one side...... this is one hell of a job..... Maggie is not sporting a nice combination of white, red and green.... it appears that there is a green epoxy coat over the white gel, and then about 20 layers of antifoul over that..... I wouldn't ordinarily have bothered, but it is definitely starting to flake in places, and there is distinct evidence of 'craters' where it has previously been ignored and the antifoul done straight over the flaked bits... so the bottom is a bit rough..... especially as the antifoul is 5mm thick in places!!!!!!!!! I'm hoping that all my hard work will result in a nice smooth finish, and hence be both aesthetically more pleasing as well as a bit quicker..... if nothing else, i'll have removed 40Kg of old antifoul! Along the way, I scraped the rudder support, which had previously been of concern as this is where the surveyor had found soft expoxy... he had dug it out in one or two places and declared that under the soft epoxy was sound glass, so nothing to worry about, just not very tidy...... I scrapped a lot of this back, and discovered a 'sheath' of epoxy about 2 to 3mm thick... it had in some places not bonded well to the boat and hence was just asking for water to be trapped behind it, and in others hadn't set properly, hence the soft bits..... I haven't completely removed it, as I've got enough to do as it is.... but it did come off the bronze foot of the rudder support in one big chunk, so now there is a step in the surface to the rudder post of about 2mm..... I need to decide what to do with it all.... its only cosmetic, but boy will it be a big job to remove it all...... maybe its next seasons task... i'll just scrape the old antifoul off this season and remove the epoxy sheath next season..... maybe its there to stiffen the rudder support up a bit.... in which case, a few extra layers of glass might have made more sense.... or maybe it was just there to fair the thing up given her racing pedigree... who knows....

prepping

Marina confirmed yesterday that Maggie was coming out, so she should be on the hard now..... Also, Poliglow turned up..... good job... ordered it at 18h00 Monday, arrived at 10h00 Wednesday.... Have dug out various sheets of sandpaper, wet and dry, paintbrushes, rollers, scrapers etc etc....... all set to get the boat ready for another season.... Be interesting to see what sort of condition the hull is in.... ie how much fouling, and more importantly how the anodes have stood up to nearly a full year in the water.... While she's out, I've got a few jobs to do...

1] Repaint the stern (it was hand painted, and rather messily in two tone - and its going to be redone much more tidily)
2] Polish the topsides and apply Poliglow
3] Scrape the hull back, and antifoul
4] Replace Anodes as required
5] Replace one seacock - that is probably OK but a bit corroded, so better safe than sorry
6] Check the stern tube
7] Remove M's bouncy ball from the cockpit drain (don't ask!)

Only job that is going to be a real ball ache is scraping the hull back..... there are years and years worth of antifoul on there, and its flaked in a couple of places and really needs doing..... I'll see how easy it is.... would ordinarily use a paint stripper, but firstly the hull is epoxy coated, and don't want to risk damaging it, and secondly and more importantly, I can't afford the paint stripper as it is quite expensive... so lots of scarping coming up..... starting this weekend no doubt..... as the baot goes back in on 30th, i've not got a lot of time.....

lift out

Hoping that Maggie will get lifted today or tommorrow as they are forecasting a bit of a breeze for later in the week... if she isn't lifted today/tommorrow, it could easily be next weekend before she's lifted....I'll need 3 weekends out to get the jobs done, and don't want her out of the water until mid April! Looking at the long range forecast, things might start cheering up weather wise in the next couple of weeks...... Been and fetched the kicker.... looks like it'll do the job..... antifoul has arrived.... paintbrushes and rollers bought.... sandpaper at the ready...... scraper dug out of the depths of the garage.... I'm starting to get 'nearly sailing again' fever!

Heating

Should have added to my earlier post.... I think i've found an Eberspacher, complete reconditioned, with loom, pump, exhaust, air intake and switch for the unbelievable price of £120..... All i'll need will be a fuel tank take-off pipe plus the heat ducting pipe, y piece and outlet face plates to complete the package....

lift out

Flippin lift out tommorrow has been delayed... Several boats on the hard have had work delayed by weather, so they are running a few days behind.... Maggie will now be coming out early next week... Mind you, still got the day off tommorrow, so will go down to boat and get a few jobs done.... and then down to Kent to pick up the new vang.... Antifoul was delivered today.... or rather wasn't.... as usual, not in when the courier arrived, so another trip to DHL! I've gone for good cheap Compass antinfoul again.... worked fine in the last 12 months, so will use it again... and at only £29.95 for 2.5L tins, its a lot cheaper! Not sure if I've already mentioned it, but I am going to try 'Poliglow' to restore and polish up the topsides.... better get that ordered... So..... boat out soon.... back in last week in March, and then the season begins... Can't wait!