And on...
It has been a very difficult week on Osprey. The engine has been hanging in the companion-way since Wednesday. This makes it very difficult to get in and out of the boat via the normal route and I end up either flopping through the opening or painfully hoisting myself out of the overhead hatch in the V-berth. Tom being stronger and more agile than me does a better job of exiting than I do. The other awful part is that we have had to construct a polythene tent around the engine compartment which has essentially taken the galley out of service. The reason for all this goes back to the dreaded engine install which is encountering no end of problems. Even with low profile mounts the engine was too high to be properly aligned to the prop shaft. This has meant that the stringers (joists of wood glassed onto the hull) have had to be cut down. This has proved a monumental task as the stringers are made of a really hard wood (probably white oak) and encased in about a half inch of fiberglass. Scott and Tom cut down the stringers over the course of two days. Tom and I have been working to grind and fair the cut surfaces so they are straight and level, this has taken another two days of hot, dirty and dusty work (hence the polythene tent). At this point we are seriously questioning the wisdom of having a new engine - we are hoping it will be worth it in the end.
To make matters worse I have had to bail out and drive back to Maine as I am back to work tomorrow. I felt awful leaving Tom with such a mess on his hands but we have to do what we have to do. We hope that the worst is done and that the rest of the install will be a bit easier.
|
As it turns out I really did jinx us with my last post. Not only are we nowhere near where we left off last fall but have actually gone backwards in our quest to get Osprey ready for cruising. First of all I have to have a rant about the weather which has gone from bad to worse. Little did we know when we had side curtains made for the cockpit (see picture), that we would be deploying these to keep constant rain out. We got them made to shade us from the sun!! - something we have not seen for what seems like weeks. Today we have had a full on gale which is forecast to blow until Tuesday. Tom, has been rescuing boats blown off their moorings for most of the afternoon. Thankfully, our dock is fairly protected and our bow is pointed into the wind so we are quite snug and secure. I am very glad we are not out on an exposed mooring.
We had a bad week in terms of accomplishing anything on poor Osprey - in fact more things broke than got fixed. I think we are now paying for the relatively trouble free year of cruising that we had. So now we have to spend the time and effort to fix the things that could have gone wrong last year but waited until now. First of all, we did rebed all the chainplates but have discovered that half of them are now leaking. This is perhaps the good thing about all the rain we have had - we are finding the leaks now. So at this point we know which ones are leaking but really cannot figure out why, because we thought we had done a good job. Our plan is to redo the leaky ones again - but need it to stop raining long enough. The next disaster is that the ice box developed a leak. Again, it is a bit of a mystery how this happened. We thought we had pinpointed the problem to a small blemish at the bottom of the box. I layered on some fiberglass and resin, tested it for leaks and it seemed good to go. Tonight I fear it is leaking again **#@!!!! Other disasters include: my beloved electric kettle - wonderful for making my lifegiving cups of tea - gave up the ghost on us, something we cannot fix alas. So it's back to the little whistler on the burner. Tom lost the screen on his Freiling (very expensive, double insulated, stainless steel) French Coffee Press, blasted off by the dock hose when he was cleaning it - much swearing! We attempted to put a water meter into our fresh water system to monitor our usage. We had tried this two years ago but could not get the fittings for the meter to stop leaking - for some reason I thought that maybe this time around it wouldn't leak - well of course it did, so we had to take it out again - that wasted a whole day. At this point we are afraid to touch anything for fear of breaking it. This is not a good thing on a sailboat as all this stuff has to be maintained or it will bust at the most inopportune moment. The final sad note is that there has been no progress with the engine. We are not sure what the problem is - we assume that the new mounts have not arrived but they shouldn't have taken this long......
|
|
06/21/2009 | tim (twstannard att gmail dott com)
Stop whinging, worse things happen at sea.....
oh, hang on..... sorry, flippant remarks at 6am dont help, do they :o) Im sure things will improve soon |
|
06/22/2009 | Colin (colin at yachtemerald dot com)
Keep the faith guys! we.ve had similar chain plate prolems as well! pesky leaks!
Also had a problem with the engine mounts too soft and had to wait forever to get them changed. Keep going as I'm sure the first night at anchor will be worth it! slainte Colin and Nichola Emerald |
|
06/22/2009 | Snoodle Time (steven dott dettman att gmail dott com)
I found this on the web. it is an interesting article on rebedding with pictures. Hope it helps.
http://www.pbase.com/mainecruising/rebedding_hardware |
|
06/22/2009 | Mike Miller (sgtmikey73 att aol dott com)
Tom & Vicky
I started following your blog during the last year that I worked before I set off for my trip from Wisconsin to the Abacos. I chose many of my stops based on what I read in your blog. My blog is also on "sailblogs" and my boat name is Norma Fay. I am currently in North Carolina and I too am preparing to head south again in the fall. I hope to see you both out there somewhere. Don't get discouraged by the malfunctions. A lady I met in Guana Cay summed up boat maintenance perfectly when she said "everything on your boat is broken, you just don't know it yet." |
|
06/23/2009 | Vicky (Osprey2003 att aol dott com)
Skip, Steve and Mike,
Thanks for your comments - it's always comforting to hear from fellow cruisers in times of adversity. Only you know how difficult it can be sometimes and that it is not all tropical drinks in paradise! |
We continue to work hard to get everything back to normal aboard the good ship Osprey. I must say I wasn't quite prepared for how difficult it would be to get all systems up and running after shutting everything down for the winter. I think (but I hope I am not jinxing us) we are just about back to where we were when we left off. We had to flush and fill the water tanks numerous times to get rid of all the anti-freeze and somehow burnt out the hot water heater in the process - Arrrgh! All the head (aka toilet) hoses had to be taken out, beaten on the dock to dislodge all the crystalline build up and reinstalled - that was not a pleasant job I can tell you - and poor Tom, who is much more squeamish than me, had a very hard time with this. I had to dismantle the head itself, clean and lube all the parts and repack all the seals. The solar panels had to be re-installed and the battery monitor reconnected and rebooted. We also discovered a nasty leak from one of the stanchion bases and had to do some major repair work inside to replace some rotted wood - see picture. Then we rebedded all the port side chain plates and will tackle the starboard side ones tomorrow. Still to do is reinstall all the halyards which we took down in the fall, fit the sails, clean, polish and bottom paint the dinghy. If we have any time left at all we hope to get to some of the brightwork (varnishing) but that is a daunting task and requires fine weather which is something sadly lacking here in the Northeast this Summer. The engine install is on hold for now as we are waiting for some special order engine mounts. In two weeks time, I am headed back to Maine for six weeks of work. Tom will stay here, working the launch and continuing the jobs here. Once I get back, in the middle of August we will finish the final preps and hope to leave East Greenwich shortly after Labor Day.
|
|
06/17/2009 | Jennifer (svruth att live dot ca)
i guess the "head" fixing was akin to surgery you might do. ha. maybe thats why you weren't so squaemish .
|
|
06/21/2009 | Dad (frankstannard att googlemail dott com)
Thats my girl !!!
Love Dad XXX |
06/12/2009
One of the reasons I have enjoyed doing this blog so much for the last two years has been reading the comments posted with each new entry. I can usually depend on my Dad and also Tim to leave a comment or two with each new post. Indeed, the last few posts have been no exception and Dad has left his opinion for us to see and appreciate. I have kept meaning to point out that Sailblogs has added the "Current Position" feature to the Premium Level of Membership (you used to have to pay extra to get this feature and I was thinking of upgrading before we set off agin). So now, as long as I remember to update our position it will automatically show on the map via the link on the sidebar. If you download the Google Earth link it is even more impressive. For now our position is Norton's Marina - but once we start cruising I will update it as we go along.
The photo is another from our wonderful get together at Martha's Vineyard. This is me with my lovely Mum and Dad!
|
|
06/12/2009 | tim (twstannard att gmail dott com)
Of course, some of us have been doing that 'manually' since day 1 :o)
Neat addition though. saves phaffing about a lot |
