WORK, WORK, WORK!!!!!!!!!!!

SHIP'S LOG:



Here was yesterday's "Things To Do " list:

1.) Trim the flu;[]

2.) Install the bottom reflector plate;[]

3.) Install weather stripping around the deck hatch for the Propane locker;[]

4.) Install the solenoid in the propane locker;[]

5.) Rig the flag halyards on the mizzen mast;[]

6.) Re-rig the mainsail clew;[]

7.) Re-install the boarding ladder on the transom;[]



Here is what actually got done: #1, #7, and some part of #6.



Installing trim around the flu is just to make it look better, more finished. The project itself was also something akin to trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. What I had decided to use to trim this hole for the flu exiting the cabin was a leftover piece of trim from the installation of the ports in the aft head. However, the piece of trim was a 6" X 15" rectangle and the hole was a 5" diameter hole through which exited a 4" octagonal flu. It took a lot of measuring, cutting, fitting, trimming, screwing and cussing before everything was in place. It even came out pretty decent if I do say so myself. . . . and I better for no one else will.



Ken came by to help with the re-installation of the boarding ladder. This ladder on the transom was removed last fall so I could install the wind vane steering system. I do not recall why I did not re-install the ladder at that time but the delay meant that while the ladder was removed while ABISHAG was out of the water, it would be reinstalled when she was in the water, making everything exponentially harder. True, it only require the drilling of 4, count'em 4, holes but there ain't no such thing as a simple, get-it-right-the-first-time, no snafus boat project.



The first two hole along the cap rail on the transom were easy to do. The bracket on the ladder was place on the rail, spots were marked, holes were drilled . . VOILA!!! The last two were just a bit more tricky. The screws were a part of the lower bracket itself and you couldn't simply lay the bracket against the transom, mark it and drill. Nope, you had to lay the bracket "gently) against the hull, mark where the screws touched, and then guestimate how much further to extend the mark so that the bracket would lay flush to the transom. No a particularly difficult task for someone with a good eye and Ken has a good eye. True, he had to hang over the transom in a safety harness two feet above the water, but he has a good eye. I went below to the aft cabin to remove the large upholstered cushion that is set against the transom inside the boat so Ken wouldn't drill into it. And there we ran into our second difficulty. It was not really a difficulty so much as a bit of a challenge.



Originally the the bottom screws of the ladder bracket were drilled through an aluminum bar that was fiberglassed into the transom. This acted like a backing plate spreading the pressure of the ladder loads. Now with the ladder off-set, only on of the screws would penetrate this bar and we either had to hit it square or miss it completely. It took a bit of measuring but we ran the hole for the screw straight through the bar. Both holes were drill and the ladder was lower over the transom to be fitted and screwed in place.



Challenge number three: the bottom screws would not fit through the holes. Swinging the ladder into place meant that the screws came in at an acute angle and they just wouldn't fit through the hole. The ladder had to be swung out of he way and the holes drilled out with the next largest bit. Back went the ladder and it still didn't quite fit. Move the ladder again and work at the hole with the drill bit to enlarge them just a bit more. (You don't want them too big as it will make the ladder wobble.) We had to do this 3 or 4 time before the crews went in as they should.



Challenge four: While enough of one screw came through to fit it with a washer and nut to hold it in place against the transom, the one that passed through the aluminum bar came through flush, with no way to fit washer and nut to it. Remove the ladder again, and grind down the fiberglass covering the aluminum bar. Refit the ladder. Better but no good enough. Remove the ladder and grind down the aluminum bar. It took two or three more shots before there was sufficient threads exposed on the screw to fit it with a washer and nut. Finally the just was finished . . .well, almost. The ladder is has an extension that swings to the level of the ladder to use in getting on and off the boat and which swings up out of the way the rest of the time. The extension is held in place by a little piece of line but now it makes contact with a lifeline stanchion and it bangs! SO I will have to find and fit a little block of wood to fix it in place. A I said, most jobs never quite get 100% finished no matter what you do.



The mainsail furls into a housing behind the mainmast. For some reason it would not furl, retract completely, leaving too much of the clew of the sail exposed. In the heavy wind of a week ago, it unshackled the shackle and I had to tie it too the mast to keep it from destroying itself. It was in trying to reattach it that Ken and I found that the reason the furling system wasn't retracting the sail completely was that the rod, around which the mail wound itself, was detached at the bottom. We had to unfurl the mainsail and take it off completely. It appears that a small doohickey which connects the rod to the thing-a-ma-bob is absent without leave. We are going to have to come up with a brilliant fix and get the system working again.



And that was as far done with the list as I got. It doesn't seem like a great deal but it was about 6 hours work all told. But the weather was beautiful and sailing is getting closer all the time.

MASTER'S PERSONAL LOG:

Now that it is almost tax day and the weather is getting warmer, the boats are getting unwrapped and some are even getting afloat. It is old a matter of time until I am asked to "vacate " the dock and head off. Un-winterizing the boat is a rather simple thing . It just takes doing. I am getting twitchy about the prospect of getting underway at last. I just want to make sure that the surprise, freaky, unexpected-but-anticipated Spring snow storms it off the books before I do so.