Shake down

After such a long period of not being in the water, the thought of a mere shakedown rather than a decent cruise to somewhere for a while seems a bit of a 'Toe in the Water', but on Bank holiday Monday at the end of May that's exactly what we did and as it turned out for good reason.

With the glorious weather that has bestowed us recently, it is tempting to just want to start sailing and not come back for a while.  However, Bank Holiday Monday like most bank holidays this year with the restrictions in place was glorious, and with some of the restrictions on movement being lifted for you humans, the chance to get out was grabbed by my skipper and crew.  However soon after starting my engine it became apparent that something was wrong as water failed to continue to flow out of the exhaust.

Unperturbed, the skipper took me out of the small ships channel where my sails were raised for the first time this year.  No birds nesting in the main, but no wind either and we drifted for a while and as the tide changed and the wind died. I spun around as what little wind there was altered 90 degrees.  With my engine slightly cooler, and the sails dropped, as we leveled with the Madina I was turned for the river and under tick over made my way in.

A saved impeller left and the one just removed right

My Yanmar engine has two cooling systems, one is a sealed one like you find in most cars and the impeller within the water pump is metal.  This system runs through the clarifier, like your hot water tank at home and the hot water from the engine follows a series of loops within the tank and so transfers the heat from the engine to the tank.  Clearly, once the water in the Clarifier reaches the same temperature as that of the loops its cooling efficiency is somewhat negligible.

Skipper replaces the impeller every time he services my engine and after inspecting the old one keeps it as a spare.  I have a few.  And so it was a simple switch over and then run the engine again to check all was well. He opted to return the following day to run the engine longer and whilst that was going on repair another leak that of a drip from the galley sink.  It appears that during this exceptionally warm weather we've been experiencing for the past few months, plus an extended stay on the hard and so no use, lots of rubber O rings or washers appear to leak, the other two sinks in the heads do the same.

Skipper liking to keep my engine and engine bay clean mopped up some water as a result of the impeller change, or so he thought, except more water appeared and so he checked the hoses to and from the impeller in case a split had occurred.  Having shut the engine down he traced the leak to that of the Waterstop, a system that prevents seawater from flowing the wrong way if a wave happened to go into the exhaust outlet and so set to, to remove it.

 Left is the waterstop in situ at the back of the engine where the sail drive (propeller unit) lives.  The leak was underneath.

Right is the waterstop taken to pieces to be cleaned, removing any pieces of the broken impeller that could be found.  Once re-assembled Skipper filled it with water to see if there was a crack or whether the rubber O rings, following cleaning, would now be watertight.  They were it was refitted and the engine ran once more.

The sink could be attended to.






As always seems to happen when I come out of the water the Marlec Rutland wind generator seems to have a problem.  This year the display unit started to scroll on its own as if one of the buttons was stuck, a quick e-mail to the manufacturer and it is going to be sent up to Corby for checks.

The day after the bank holiday my Code 0 returned complete with Furlex 4500+ top-down furling system.  This should make things a lot easier for Skipper and make tacking fast and straight forward.  With the J3, shown in the previous article 'Launch Day', the twin sails should provide a turn of speed in light airs.

So I reckon my time at the Yacht Haven is up and I will shortly be moved back to my mooring.

Launch Day

Following a lot of work to my hull and topsides, plus all the other work that has gone on since I was lifted out of the water last year, I'm finally back in the water and it feels good.

Ok, so you guys still can't mix very well and I have to bring my Skipper and Crew back to homeport at the end of the day but it's a start. I'm currently in the Yacht Haven in Cowes and not sure how long for, I think Skipper has or is striking a deal to have me here for a while, but we can go and try out my new J3 and hopefully be able to pick up the top-down furling Code 0 From Lymington too and fly dual sails and see how well I can perform.

Released from the land finally

Once in the water Skipper took 40 minutes to stop water weeping past the O ring of the log.  Unable to stop the weep, he opted to switch the plug for the log itself having inspected the O ring, it took another 40 minutes to slow the weep to a stop by tightening and loosening and twisting the log till the rubber softened and seated properly.  Not quite what you want but after so long in what has been quite warm conditions a lesson given, if learned we'll see next time.  The log should be checked and then left standing in water to soften it.

It's not dissimilar to having a glorious summer and then during the first Autumn rainfall, the windscreen wipers of your car do nothing but make loud noises and smear your view until they soften.

Today (Tue 19/05) another glorious sunny day with between 8-13 knots of wind, Skipper having cleaned and polished the rear portion of the cockpit table where the repeat plotter sits, to enable it to be bonded in, decided to fly the J3 for the first time.  The two additional outside spinlocks at the cockpit, together with the sidecars that the former owner had fitted but never used, finally came to good use.  The Spinlocks required a little bit of cajoling to enable the 12mm guy to be passed through them as they've not been used.

My new J3 finally up and given an airing

As Skipper likes to ensure that everything he adds to me has two uses, the guys for the J3 will also be used as gybe preventers, enabling him to remove the line he had fitted to the boom.

Looking up from the deck at the J3

Looking up from the foredeck you can see another job to be done.  As the radar is analog but my navigational system is digital the radar dome and its cabling is just dead weight right where you don't want it if you don't need it.  So this, I'm sure will soon be brought down to Earth or eBay!

I'm sure that my jib will soon be fitted and furled up and then I'll be ready to head out into the Solent once more for a shakedown before plans can be made as to where he might take me, Virus willing!