Projects / Maintenance

Wed 12 May, HHN day 29: Rudder avoidance: Plumbing repairs finished, Aquadrive back in its place of duty, and the new PSS shaft seal aligned.

I decided to sleep in my “passage berth” on the saloon settee last night, to see if it helped my asthma compared to the aft cabin. But the settee is so narrow the duvet kept falling off, and I ended up with a worse night’s sleep than ever. What I needed was to be mid-passage exhausted, with the lee-cloth up, the boat heeled over, the sound of water rushing passing the hull, and only the dull red night light from the nav-station – then I would surely have slept like a log!

Although I swore not to touch the plumbing again until Thursday, I always have more of an urge to finish a job rather than to start the next. So to avoid starting on the rudder, I am lured back into the engine room where I put the hot water tank back in, for hopefully the last time.
The good news is that after 4th time of in/out I can almost do it with my eyes shut. But I do defer ty-wrapping the pipes again and also the rewiring of the emersion heater, until the water system is back working and there are no leaks. I will fill with water tomorrow, with all my fingers and toes crossed.

The hot and cold water manifolds are not so straight forward to reinstall. First, because of the Houdini position I need to be in, and second, because the 9 pipes are very closely spaced. It eventually takes a big rubber mallet to get the manifolds to lock back into their securing clamps.
But I’m pretty happy with the work once it’s done. I’m glad I went the extra mile to do this too – it would have niggled me to still see corroded and dripping pipe connections while all the others in the engine room are now gleaming like new.

Any work behind the generator has the danger of dropping tools into the very inaccessible void below the generator, where they join the monster that lurks down there (“monster” is the generator silencer…. someone in HR had a warped sense of humor to design it into that hopeless-to-get-at void).
During the job I’m super careful and I don’t drop a single thing down there. At the end of the job, I very carefully take all my tools away being sure to grip each one. But the last pair of pliers slips and escapes and…. yes, went directly down to join the monster ☹.

So for the next 45 minutes, armed with mirror, mini touch, endoscope, various magnets and my retrieval pincer tool, I finally locate the rogue pliers hiding in a remote corner. Guiding my retrieval tool while viewing on the endoscope I just manage to grab them. And once back in my hand, the pliers are banished to solitary confinement in the shittiest tool box I have.
But, while down there, I also managed to retrieve 2 washers, a screw and a small bolt. Likely all that is left of some device the monster has devoured – like skeletons in a cave!

So NOW, do I get on with starting the rudder? Of course not. I find another excuse. Re-fitting the Aquadrive that has just returned from refurbishment. For this one I follow the installation destructions (instructions) to the very letter. But that means I can only go so far, because I need a special grease called Molykote 321R (MoS2).
I look in West Marine but it’s far too exotic for them. I ask 2 or 3 mechanics shops in the yard but none of them know what it is. Amazon comes to the rescue, but at a price. $50 for a small spray can! It will be here by the weekend.
But I do get the Aquadrive back in its place with the shaft pushed through it. The shaft clamp and collet will need the Molykote to complete it. Plus, I’ve ordered some new high-tensive bolts because the ones I removed got their hex-heads damaged by my impact wrench in the effort of getting them out. I cannot put them back in like that because for certain they will not come out next time without rounding out the heads.

With the shaft now aligned properly (but not yet clamped) I also manage to finalise the PSS shaft seal, aligning it and tightening it in place. So nice to see a job coming together. This job started as “replace PSS bellows” but crept to: rebuilt of the Gori Prop, new Cutlass bearing, complete new PSS seal, refurbished Aquadrive, painted bilge and (yet to come) the rebuilt CV joint.
Am I one of those contractors who quotes small, knowing there is huge potential for work scope creep? Surely I wouldn’t do that to myself?! Whatever, I’m a happy customer of myself, because Cloudy Bay is now good-as-new from the tip of the propeller right up to the Volvo. And to boot, this contractor is quite a cheery fellow and seems to work for no wage!

Lastly, I head out on my bike on this beautiful May evening to pick up deliveries. I receive my new “seal twister” tool. This tool is to get the pesky internal rod seal into the outhaul piston end. I have a quick practice re-installing the old seal, and it works. But I will defer putting in the new seal until tomorrow. Right now I have to eat.

In the evening I’m super tired. In fact my eyes are almost closing as I write this blog. Oana will likely have to do quite some grammar clean up before she posts first thing in the morning, Bucharest time. Yes, this is how it works: I write it near to midnight eastern USA time. Oana receives it 2 hours later when she wakes up in Bucharest. Corrects my dyslexic English, then posts. We are like mini a daily newspaper team, enabling the hot-off-the-press news from Cloudy Bay to be available for your morning coffee reading, globally 😊