Friday 16 & Saturday 17 Oct, HHN, boat winterizing days 16 & 17: Combining 2 blog days to hide how lazy I was on Friday!
Friday was wet wet wet. It rained all day as the cold front came through. Pretty miserable, which also perfectly aligns with my technical performance. With little desire to venture outside, I manage to use up most of the morning doing not much.
I had arranged to go see Steve at the rigging shop, but just as I’m thinking I won’t bother, I receive an email saying they have all our rigging laid out on the bench and could I please come over to discuss. So I’m forced into action. Steve sends one of his guys to pick up all the hardware, like bottle screws, spreader end connections, HF insulators etc. And I’m quite happy to be able to present them all shiny and looking like new – I trust they will realise the high standard I’m going to hold them to!
Last evening, I had sent a spreadsheet with all the rigging details and outlined exactly what I want them to do. It was nice to see those spread sheets all printed out and ready waiting for me to go through. We discussed which standing rigging sections should be cut slightly longer or shorter (to even up the bottle screw positions); the need to rake the mast slightly further forward and about upgrading the cutter stay to 12mm from 10mm. The current 10mm wire looks awfully thin considering we use the cutter sail in extreme conditions (with Genoa rolled away). But Steve rightfully tells me that the Furlex extrusion (type 300) will only take up to 10mm wire. 12mm won’t fit. I later check … and he’s right. So 10mm it will have to stay. But Steve does mention that I could upgrade the 10mm wire “compact stand” which would bring the breaking strength form 18,527lbs to 21,539lbs (by reference: 12mm standard wire is 26,680 lbs). So that sounds like the way to go, or at least a good midway solution.
The meeting is about 1 hour and I cycle off back into the rain, happy that these guys are both professional and very customer orientated. Just need to see their pricing now. Back at Cloudy Bay, I continue to potter on this and that, but frankly no firm achievements to report for the rest of the day.
Saturday is a new day. The sun has returned and I’m up with vigor this morning. It’s quite clear that my mood is following the weather these days! Like last weekend, I first head to Weaver Boats with my little trolly towed behind the bike, rattling with all manner of items ready for polishing. Not as much as last week, but still enough to keep me there polishing for 2 hours.
The other task is to partially destroy the 2 upper swivels from the genoa and cutter Furlex. I mentioned before that internal retaining nuts are spinning in a plastic sleeve, stopping me from dismantling the assembly. Well, today I have my hacksaw and I’m going to fix it! Using Weaver Boats large vice to hold each swivel, I carefully saw out the inner plastic sleeve so I can get to those damned nuts. Yes, this destroys the sleeves (which are now on the shopping list) but it allows me to fully disassemble the swivels and give them a good cleanout of grimy grease.
Back at Cloudy Bay, it is now time to get really dirty. I have a tray of diesel ready to take and clean greasy parts. First, I start to take apart the cutter gearbox that connects the hydraulic motor to the Furlex extrusion. I’ve already found that the lower bearing is totally seized with rust. With that bearing removed, the next challenge is with retaining rings (or truarc rings). But I don’t have the correct truarc pliers to release them. So, it’s back on the bike again, this time to the hardware store, where I grab the last pair of pliers on their shelf – lucky! With my new pliers, I manage to get 2 retaining rings off and making good progress into the gearbox, when I come across a really tough one. I just can’t seem to get it out, no matter how I try. Frustrated, I give up … for now. I’ll come back to that one when my logical brain returns. Because, right now it has slipped into primitive brain mode – which in engineering terms means large hammer and/or throwing the problem items across the workshop!
Next, I turn to the furlex upper swivels. Following my butchering this morning, they now come apart easily and I soon have them (including loads of loose ball bearings) all soaking in diesel. It’s a real pleasure to see all the grease and grime falling off with a simple brushing (old tooth brush) and they come out gleamingly clean, looking like new. This pleasing act certainly makes up for my retaining ring dramas.
In the evening, I set about looking up part numbers from Selden’s very good on-line documentation. Rebuilding all these items is tedious work, and the new parts list won’t be cheap. But I comfort myself that I will save $thousands$ by doing this myself (each hydraulic section was estimated at $1,200 to service … and there are 3 of them).
So, I go to bed happy with my performance today, but also starting to wonder if I can fit in everything I have yet to do, in the remaining 2 weeks I am here. I’ll have to step up my game going forward.