Daily maintenance log

I'm trying to do a little project every day I go down to the boat. I walk the dog there, leave him to play on deck and I fix something little. Yesterday I installed the new winch handle holder and put a coat of cetol on the traveler support. Today I cleaned and greased the cabin-top winches. 

Stateroom lights v4.1 and new winches

Stateroom lights v 4.1

Success at last!

The new winches

Mast rewiring done!

Progress!

There has been a tremendous amount of progress in Koan land over the last week. Dan helped me route the cables through the mast, and I spent what seems like endless hours at the masthead installing the VHF antenna, windex and an anchor light. At this point what remains to be done is to route everything through the deck and to its final terminal spot. That's going to involve drilling a fairly large hole, filling an old one, deciding on some hose to protect the cables, possibly moving the mainsheet turning block so it's not in the way, and finally crimping everything to its final place. Phew! Even so, I'm delighted to be done with going aloft!

The neck of the goose

The car on Koan's gooseneck is another mechanical fitting embodying who knows what kind of history. The assembly is supposed to be made of a car, a pin, and a piece that swivels around the pin. The swiveling piece is made of a different metal than the stainless of the car and pin, milder steel maybe? I just can't see it being aluminum, but maybe it is... In any case, by virtue of corrosion between the pin and swiveling piece, these three pieces are now one. In addition, it's clear that the swiveling piece has a groove worn into it, from being mounted proper-way-up. So when I removed it from the boat, it was mounted upside-down, presumably to even the wear by exposing the other bearing surface.

The reason why it would be nice for the two seized pieces to be moving independently again is that, when they fused, they didn't do so at a 90 degree angle, but a little bit, maybe 10 degrees, off 90 degrees. You can see that in the picture. That means the shackles that go through the two holes in the pin (one to hold the tack of the main, and one to hold a block under the boom that redirects a reefing line) are off 90 degrees, so they're subjected to torque. The one holding the tack is showing it, because it's bowed out to one side. I don't think they're anywhere near breaking, but I don't like it, either.

No amount of penetrating oil and prying has managed to break these two pieces apart of course. Heat might do it, but it might also make things worse, or break something, in which case the boat will be unusable.

Proctor Masts still exists, and, mercifully, I believe they have a shop in California. So I'll contact them for a replacement, but they've been known to quote people prices that essentially mean they're re-tooling just to make the one piece you ordered. So that may not work.

From the WTF department

I went to the boat this morning planning to take off the mainsail and figure out how to build an outhaul, since our boat came without one. I left with the sail off, as planned, but also the boom off and fully disassembled. In the process I ran into some lovely examples that belong in the WTF department.

Take for example the installation of this turning block. Three philips machine screws, one hex-head. Brilliant! (Turns out the hex-head is there because the threads on the old hole must have been messed up, so the hole was over-drilled and re-threaded. West Marine does not carry philips in 5/16-18. Nevertheless, I will look for them elsewhere. Also the hex head was probably 1/2-1/3 of an inch longer than the philips screws. Sigh.)

And check out this fabulous installation of a horn cleat using two -- wood or sheet metal? -- screws that are at least 1/2 inch too long for the job, and too coarsely threaded.

I'm sure this installation, which is the gooseneck side of my boom, was also made in response to some dire mixup. The old holes must have been stripped of threads, so instead of overdrilling and rethreading -- which I can see is tricky, because the holes are so close to the edge -- the genius here drilled new holes. 2mm too close to the edge. Brilliant! And then used five machine screws and one sheet metal screw. This is so fucked up I don't know how I'm going to fix it. I'm thinking of returning to the original holes and tapping them properly. At least that way the cap doesn't leave a 2mm gap when you put it on the extrusion! Note the complete absence of anti-corrosion measures in this area. The aluminum is practically crumbling, in the area of the boom subject to the most torque. Oy vey!

Back in SB with a clean bottom

This past week was incredibly stressful, and I think I'm paying handsomely for it with a peptic ulcer. I wanted to bring Koan back up to SB before Memorial day, but we've had the most incredibly windy weather. I was watching the wind patterns like a hawk on Wednesday and Thursday, planning to sail or motor up on Friday. I decided that I needed some flexibility in my departure time, so I planned it as another solo trip (I'm up to 125 nm solo now!) Wed. and Thursday's predictions were for really high winds, but the pattern was very spatially variable, and there were also times when SB was in a wind hole. On Wednesday, unbelievably, the race was a light air race. On Thursday there was a hole in the morning, with the models predicting > 20 kts but actual being < 5 kts. Hoping that Friday would follow Thursday's pattern I went to Ventura on Thursday night and slept on the boat, planning for an early departure. I was hoping that I could make it to SB before the howling winds picked up.

I took off at 6:30 and arrived at 11:30, motoring the whole way, in a very uneventful trip. Sure enough, the wind picked up around noon and howled a stead 25 kts for the rest of the day, so my calculation was correct. The swell was actually really bad the whole way, and especially unpleasant near the SB harbor entrance, where I had to go beam-to-swell to drop my sails, and almost got bucked off the boat.

So Koan now has nicely buffed topsides, a clean baby bottom and new zincs. Time to get on with other projects, and hire a diver for monthly maintenance.

Hauled out!

On Thursday I motored Koan down to Ventura to haul out at Ventura Harbor Boat Yard. They're doing the bottom while I'm focusing on buffing and waxing the topsides and various other small jobs. I spent Saturday and today, with Dan's help, working on that and I'm pretty happy with the results. Not all the oxidized paint is coming off after two passes, but it's a huge improvement.

There is a video of the haulout here.

New Home

Big news in Koan-land! We've found a slip in Santa Barbara, and moved there from Channel Islands Harbor. In a big way, Koan has come home!

I didn't know whether there was an inspection coming up during this move. CIH Patrol did inspect Shadow Line when I put her into one of their slips, so I considered it a distinct possibility. Thus I decided I'd better be prepared and scrambled to make a necessary, but very frustrating repair: the steaming light. Both the deck connection for getting power to it was missing and the existing light was hopelessly corroded and disgusting. After trying out a Hella and a straight up replacement of the classic Perko that I'd just removed, I settled on an Aqua Signal 25 series. This has a deck lamp, as well, but the separate wiring for that wasn't run, so it's not operational. On Friday I did the deck wiring, which took a little creativity, because there are separate ground and hot wires running and it's tougher to insulate the entry of two wires into the connector. I ended up using a bead of polysulfide instead of the existing rubber gasket. On Tuesday morning I went up the mast and tapped two #29 holes for 8-32 machine screws, and installed the fixture. I've just received an LED replacement for the bulb, and once I ascertain that that doesn't nullify the light's USCG rating, I'll install that too. 

After that job was finished on Tuesday I got the boat ready and headed up to SB. There wasn't much wind to begin with, so I attempted to sail, but at 2.5 kts I thought it was impractical. I motored on up until a nice 16 kt breeze kicked up, then close reached in that for an hour and a half or so. The visibility dropped to maybe 1/4 of a mile at some point and I got quite nervous, because I knew there were oil rigs coming up in a mile or two. But the breeze slowly dropped and the visibility improved, so I put the motor back on for another hour. Then within 6 miles of SB another nice breeze kicked in, maybe 14 kts or so. This time I was close hauled and making 4.5 kts, but it was still worth it to sail instead of beating into the wind with the motor on, so I did it. I did a horrendous douse right outside the harbor, then motored in amongst a class of CFJs. I was dying to pee! I went up and got my slip assignment, and we were home. The next morning we did the paperwork for the slip and the rest is history. 

During the previous solo trip up to SB I had recognized the problem with the mainsheet fiddle block and cam. During this trip I discovered a more minor, but still important to solve, problem: the running backstay adjustment mechanism is really jammed. I've actually never successfully operated that thing, but when it's blowing quite a bit, it's absolutely necessary, both to give the boat a little more weather helm, and to tension the forestay and jib luff. I'm fairly sure the boat would point higher and handle better if I could work the backstay, and the reefer assembly would also have fewer problems. So, here's an attempt to list that and other projects I plan to play with next. 

Slip-related: 

• install bumpers
• figure out outboard storage

Rigging:

• fix running backstay tensioning
• put spacers in reefer assembly
• install outhaul
• buy spinnaker sheets

Interior

• Redo electrics
• make v-berth window cushion
• make window shades
• buy stove

• And finally we need a haul pretty badly!

Dogs and boat therapy!

Sailors
Originally uploaded by slampoud

I am so lucky that my dog understands the concept of boat therapy!

Dan and I started acclimatizing Huckleberry (who is 5 months old at the moment) to the boat gradually, a few weekends ago. On the first time there we only walked the docks, tried on his lifejacket for a while, and took him on and off the boat by lifting him. The second time around we went for a sail, and held him a lot, so he could sleep while we were sailing (isn't that a great picture?!). Today there was a fierce Santa Ana wind blowing and I was alone, so we didn't go out, but we did spend the whole day on the boat. This time he got on and off the boat all on his own, met other boat dogs, and generally got comfortable, chewing his bone on the foredeck.

I got lots of little chores done, myself. I uninstalled the v-berth lights, and threw them away. The plastic was melted from, presumably, bulbs that got too hot. I also realized the inside power is on all the time -- no battery switch. I'm lucky something sparked and I realized I was working on a live circuit before I burned myself. I also ascertained that the main cabin fluorescent bulbs are all good. That means the reason the starboard ones won't turn on is that that circuit is messed up. I had brought a multimeter but -- Murphy's Law -- its five year old batteries had died, so I couldn't do any diagnosing. I charged the battery, then I used my new Mastmate to climb halfway up the mast and drop down the spinnaker pole topping lift. I came up with a way to sky that and the spinnaker halyard, and that situation is now ready to roll. All we need is spin sheets and we can RUN!

Back home, I'm almost done with building the 2x2' v-berth insert. Next up, make a cushion for it, and the v-berth will be complete!

More TODO's:
* replace mid-mast running light, connect wiring for it.
* install fuel hose thru-deck fitting
* install rubstrakes for new cam-cleats
* diagnose stbd electrical circuit

Shopping list

This morning I picked up fender covers, a couple Harken 150 cam cleats and a sail track slide stopper. I also ordered a replacement mainsheet fiddle block with a cam & becket. I ended up ordering one of the fancy new all-synthetic Lewmars instead of a stainless Schaefer or a mixed Harken. We'll see how well that works. Other things on the shopping list (to aid my memory):
* outboard cover (smallest one from West)
* windex 15
* spin sheets (2x50 ft, 7/16 in diam)

Mainsheet data

Harken's Compuspec suggests the 1566 Midrange Hexaratchet as a replacement mainsheet block. This mainsheet load calculator suggests that at 25 kts (the most I imagine carrying a full main at) there should be just over 1,100 lbs load at that block. The 1566 is rated for 1,800 lbs.