Erbas prep weekend - day 2

I really must find the time to move the blog over to the new version for the new boat but sufficient unto the day thereof ..

I forgot to mention one job we did yesterday which was fixing the mainsheet traveller. In a nutshell, it didn't travel very well. After much head scratching we concluded that the string was too short resulting in too much tension. An unusually cheap visit to the on site chandlery for a new bit of string and hey presto

On to today ...

The most urgent task was tackled first - a generous coat of anti-foul on the patches scraped back for the survey.

That done, we attempted to obtain breakfast but there was no sign of life at the cafe even though it was the advertised opening time. Never mind, we'd have a pint and a sarnie later

Next job involved plastering the prop with PropGuard, a wax based anti-foul that has to be melted in boiling water then brushed on quick before it sets. Messy job!

We moved on to the rather less messy but a good deal more puzzling task of investigating some oddities on the electrics. For some reason, the NMEA output from the Seatalk - NMEA interface had been disconnected from the chart plotter.

(For those who don't know the technology, the instrumentation, depth, speed, wind and compass, is connected to the sensors and to the interface with a proprietary bus called Seatalk. The plotter, however, uses the industry standard NMEA connections. The interface connects one to the other)

Without this connection, the chart plotter cannot display the data from the instrument sensors. We wired it back up and bingo, it ask worked properly.

We then investigated the sink waste plumbing which is a bit odd. Having to go to the v-berth to press a button to operate the pump which empties the gallery sink at the other end of the boat seems a bit awkward to say the least. In its favour, it works but it's begging for improvement!

It being lunch time we headed to the club, ordered a pint and enquired about the prospects of a sandwich or two. We were, as you can imagine, delighted to learn that we'd have to wait an hour and a half and then we could have a carvery sandwich. We settled for a packet of crisps each!

Back aboard, we chucked our kit plus some stuff too go into storage into the car ready for the off. Then we checked the sea cocks were definitely all closed before locking up and leaving.

Stuck my head round the door of the office to say tara, which in hindsight might have been a mistake. The harbor master seems awfully keen to get us in the water as soon as and, of course, start charging us visitor berthing rates. As we've paid until the 6th of October for yard storage I'm not happy about that. Shall have to ring the boss man tomorrow and clarify matters.

We hit the road good and early and headed up to Fox's in Ipswich to pay a flying visit to Ocean Lady and pick up the anchor that Jim off Fullcircle left with Lisa for us. That done, we did some window shopping and tyre kicking in Fox's chandlery before heading for home

All in all, a very successful weekend. Can't wait to actually go sailing though!

Erbas prep weekend - day 1

The bosun and I departed that fine but annoyingly landlocked county of Northamptonshire at the crack of dawn. Well ok, about half six in the morning actually

A very swift and stress free drive down put us at Tollesbury well before either the cafe out the marina opened their doors. We went over the exterior of the boat identifying the whereabouts of the scraped patches from the survey and the location of inlets and outlets etc

Soon enough it was time to wander up the road to the cafe for a full English then we could finally grab the keys from the marina office and get on board. I should have kept one key when we completed the paperwork (they need a key to check for leaks etc when she's launched). I've done that now!

It being a rather overcast, chilly and slightly damp feeling day, we elected to defer patching the anti-foul until the morrow and set to emptying each and every locker to sort out the contents

The cockpit tent came out of the port aft v-berth locker and into the port cockpit locker (although I'd like to get a bag for it as its currently stowed in the mainsail bag. That move allowed the storm trysail and storm jib the be stowed along with the No.2 jib in the v-berth locker.

The spinnaker takes up all the space in the equivalent starboard locker.

Talking off the No.2 jib, whilst we had out out we removed it from the bag to check the fittings and add I'd hoped it has brass piston hanks confirming that it hoists on the removable inner forestay. That makes it a sail that I reckon might get some use.

The difficult to access aft locker under the quarter berth we declared a black hole into which we “lost" all the stuff that we couldn't figure out a purpose for but which we suspect we might need some day! The forward locker under the berth I'm keeping empty for the time being (I have designs upon it off which more anon)

We retrieved half a dozen good sized fenders from under the cockpit floor three off which, plus a big fat fender acquired by the bosun at the Cutweb canal rally the other weekend, are now stowed in the starboard cockpit locker.

Also in that locker we have the 7.5kg Bruce anchor which has been demoted from Best Bower to Kedge. It's on the chain and warp also retrieved from under the cockpit. The grapnel that was the kedge is now ballast!

A sort out of paint tins on the shelves in the port cockpit locker and a general re-organisation of the contents thereof finished off the jobs for the day.

A bit of a wander passed the time until the club bar opened then we indulged in beer and a very good meal. I was nodding off by nine so we made it an early night. Back aboard I was awake again so we l lit the oil lamps and put the kettle on for coffee with rum in it

We also have the cabin heater a blast. It works very well and soon got turned off again as it was a bit too warm! We will have to be a teeny bit wary of the dreaded CO though with two or three oil lamps, a paraffin heater and a spirit stove all burning away merrily. Oxygen depletion might be an issue too! Plenty of ventilation though

To bed at last. The v-berth is most comfortable for one, we'll see how it goes for two.

Catching up ...

I never did get around to posting anything about last Sunday. In truth, that's because there wasn't a lot to post. Neither Jane nor I felt much like do anything much, the weather was a bit pants and in the end we had a late breakfast round at the Ferry Boat Tender, idly sorted out our gear and put Brigantia on her buoy in good time to make use of the trot boat and save faffing about with the tender before hitting the road home.

This past week has mostly been about paperwork and sleep - a lot of the former and not enough of the latter.

I'm working my way through the reams of documents, files and folders deciding what's important, what's interesting and what's neither. I've also been sent a panoply of CAD drawings, spreadsheets and word processor docs by the previous owner which are definitely important and interesting!

The goal is to sort it all out and put together a slightly less bulky set of ships papers and operating instructions and archive the rest. 

And then there's the shopping. Jim off Full Circle has offered us a couple of dry powder fire extinguishers which saves me buying any. He's also got a nice big Delta anchor copy which he's letting us have on approval sort of thing. That's another few quid saved.

We've placed the inevitable, and doubtless only initial, swindlers ... sorry, chandlers ... order. 

First item on the list being a 500W electric heater which will be left on over the winter on "frost". It's not been a worry with Brigantia since her plumbing was about as simple as you can get unless you don't have any plumbing at all but Erbas is a very different matter. 

Last thing we need is anything freezing up - I'm mindful that we made that mistake many moons ago when Glen first bought Badger and had to get the gas water heater repaired. No gas water heater on Erbas of course but there's complex fresh and hot water systems plus the engine cooling circuit all of which are vulnerable to frost damage if not protected.

The next item on the shopping list caused some significant debate it must be admitted. Partly because it wasn't cheap and mostly because it wasn't strictly necessary. We've got a significant collection of assorted plates, bowls, cups and cutlery on board Brigantia and there's a further collection of such items been left aboard Erbas. 

The problem? None of it matches and it's all higgledy piggledy and my view was that nothing would stamp our personality on the domestic arrangements more emphatically (apart from totally changing the colour scheme for example) than choosing and purchasing a full set of matching tableware

We priced up what we wanted, albeit not with a nautical theme pattern, at the local caravan shop and it wasn't going to work out a hell of a lot cheaper so we went with the one what we wanted in the first place ...

A set of six each of dinner plate, side plate, bowl, mug, tumbler, wine glass, cutlery plus a serving bowl and three serving dishes should do the job!

The serving dishes are possibly a bit pointless but as the set is cheaper than the individual items ordered separately ...

They're melamine, unbreakable (virtually anyway), and dishwasher and microwave proof. Not that we've got a dishwasher or microwave of course!

Hang the expense I say, hang it!

That wasn't quite everything ordered, the remainder of the order being made up of some odds and ends for the engineering department - fuel treatment to combat diesel bug, water system purification stuff and some antifouling grease for the prop (which annoyingly I've got three quarters of a pot of on Brigantia which I meant to put in the car - still, it'll get used up soon enough)

Next mission is next weekend - getting Erbas ready for launch. Can't wait!

Autumn Weekend #1 2013 Day 2

Today was all about Erbas

After breakfast on board, we set off by car to Tollesbury grabbing coffee to go before sitting down in the brokers office to sort out the paperwork.

Apart from the formal bill of sale, we also received a folder full of paperwork going back through several previous owners with bills of sale, the paperwork relating to her transfer from the Part I to the Part III register of shipping, that rare and almost mythical beast a certified C88 VAT form and so on

With the formalities complete, Erbas was officially ours and we took possession of the keys (albeit temporarily as the yard needs them in case we're not around when she's launched)

On board, we did a bit of locker diving and discussed things we need and don't need until we were hailed by the former owner Nic who came aboard with some info and more useful tips about the systems. We arranged to call by his house a little later to pick up some gear from his shed too.

After lunch in the club, we headed up into the village to Nic and Linda's where we collected the gear for lowering and stowing the mast, various tins of paint and a box of what can best be described as useful odds and sods

Over coffee, we perused the various spreadsheets and drawing files on Nic's laptop and decided what would be useful to us before taking our leave and heading back to the boat - the new boat that is!

Back aboard, I gathered together all the files and paperwork to take home to be copied and sorted. We'll need to carry originals of most things on the off chance we're asked to produce them when we venture into continental waters but I want hard and electronic copies of the whole lot safe ashore

As the chandlery and office shuts at four on a Saturday, that curtailed our time aboard on this occasion. We could happily have dozed off in the saloon and stayed the night!

Back we drove to Fambridge via Tesco Maldon for a not very good dinner of tinned stew (shan't buy that brand again) before heading to the pub for beers.

Autumn Weekend #1 2013 Day 1

Originally, this weekend was planned as a sailing weekend with Mark and Heather but the best laid plans and all that!

Firstly, we went and bought another boat! Then Mark and Heather took a rain check so in the end just Jane and I headed down the A14.

The Friday traffic was busier than usual but moving well apart from a bit of a hold up around Chelmsford so we made reasonable time. Kev was chatting to Toby on the pontoon when we arrived and ran me down to the mooring in his dory which saved the effort of digging our tender out

We've travelled light for once so one trolley load was all it took to get our gear aboard. Then it was up to the pub for a meal and some inevitable beer

Got chatting about narrowboats and canals, ships and boats and things. Ended up rather later back on board than we probably intended!

Tomorrow, well today now actually, we drive up to Tollesbury to sign the paperwork and pick up the keys to the new boat.

It's all done bar the paperwork

Finally got the insurance sorted out earlier today after a bit of a fuss over the survey - administrative rather than technical. All sorted after several phone calls happily

That was the penultimate step sorted and made it possible to phone the brokers and transfer the funds to pay for Erbas into their client account

Jane and I are heading down to old Brigantia anyway this weekend so the timing is perfect to pop up to Tollesbury on Saturday and complete the paperwork and get the keys

The spending had started already though! The Bosun has ordered up an FE-36 halon replacement automatic extinguisher for the engine bay from one of his suppliers. It's brand new but has scratches on the casing so it's half price

There will be more to spend for sure!

The antepenultimate step has been taken

Aha! I have a copy of the survey report

All is good ... well ish

The first item of some concern is that Toby found very high moisture levels over the whole of the bottom. This is a bit of a puzzler. There are no signs of any structural problems or delamination though which is good.

I've been giving this some thought and doing some research and I've concluded that it's almost certainly a false indication (to some extent at least) due to the unusually thick layer of epoxy on the hull. "Erbas" was professionally peeled (had the gelcoat removed in other words) and dried out for 18 months before having a whopping eleven, yes eleven, coats of epoxy applied below the waterline in 2000 / 2002

It seems unlikely that she'd have been totally dry even after 18 months so doubtless that process sealed some moisture permanently into the hull where it'll do no harm at all if it hasn't done so already but given that even a coat of antifoul can mess up a moisture meters readings, what is eleven layers of epoxy going to do to it?!

So after due consideration, unless the insurers take fright at it, we're going to take note and do nothing!

We've got a couple of items to sort out - slightly surprised to be advised that there appears to be no split pin or securing grub screw on the propeller nut. Surprised because it's a new propeller fitted this year and the current owner over-engineers everything to the highest standards with nothing left to chance (I guess on submarines you don't get to call out the RNLI for a tow home when it goes pear shaped!). So we'll have to have a look at that and do something about it - shouldn't be too much of a problem to drill a hole and fit a split pin.

We knew the fire extinguishers on board were a bit dated so that came as no surprise. I'm also no fan of dry powder and the automatic in the engine bay will get swapped for a halon substitute automatic. The engine and ancillary gear will still be serviceable after that goes off whereas the dry powder jobby might (if we're lucky) put the fire out but it will also ruin anything hot it comes into contact with

The two big AFFF foam extinguishers will be transferred off old Brigantia and they'd be my weapon of choice for most shipboard fires especially involving petrol for example (although that will be less of an issue now of course but we'll still be carrying some for the tender outboard). They're not ideal for alcohol fires though as the alcohol prevents the foam film from forming properly. However, an alcohol fire is very susceptible to simple action with a fire blanket or, if necessary, a bucket of water so I'm not overly concerned.

The one area where I do have a concern is an electrical fire inside equipment such as the Sterling battery management unit or the inverter (acquired from the Bosuns Stores last weekend and to be fitted in due course!). This is the one area where the otherwise utterly useless CO2 extinguisher comes into its own. Or better yet a small Halon but we're not allowed those because so many of them were set off it buggered up the ozone layer. Trouble is, you can't get the little aerosol gas extinguishers any more and the smallest CO2 job is still a pretty big beast. Dry powder is an absolute no-no as far as I'm concerned in this application because it will mullah every piece of hot electrical equipment, faulty or otherwise, it comes into contact with. Worse, it's not that good at dealing with fires inside enclosures because, unlike a gas based extinguisher, the powder isn't great at penetrating through vents and apertures and then flooding the inside of the casing. We're thinking on that one.

The one bone of contention is over the glassing in of plastic skin fittings. It's been recommended as standard practice but I'm not in favour of it at all! In theory, it protects the fitting in the event of something hitting it. In practice, what is going to hit a skin fitting underneath the cabin sole? (It does nothing to protect the fitting from external damage but as the fitting is all but flush with the hull that's unlikely to happen anyway)

What is more, glassing in the fitting renders any inspection or maintenance of the nut and seal all but impossible without totally removing the fitting and replacing it with a new one. I prefer to be able to examine the nut and check it is secure and the fitting is undamaged and, if necessary, to be able to dismantle, re-bed and refit the fitting in the event of any leakage

And the final killer blow is that I strongly suspect that any attempt to glass in a skin fitting in an older hull is doomed to failure anyway. In the unlikely event of the fitting being struck with sufficient force by a heavy enough object to shear it off, I would put a not inconsiderable sum of money on the same circumstance simply removing the fitting AND the lump of mat and resin which for a certainty won't bond well to the existing hull interior surface

Other than that, nothing much to write home about. Need to check and replace if necessary the anode bolts although I suspect they'll be up to snuff given how well maintained she is.

So now I am waiting on the insurers acceptance of the survey and my additonal comments thereon and if all is well we move on to the penultimate step - paying for her!!!