Progress continues, despite the anxiety of Covid 19. We were hoping to have relaunched today;
however, although the predicted tide should have been sufficient to float us
off, the high pressure we’re experiencing meant that there wasn’t enough water
in the creek! Still, it has been a
beautiful day and we have made a lot of progress since my last post.
Our aim was to have the boat as watertight as we could prior
to relaunch. We started by concentrating
on refitting stanchions, toe rails and rubbing strips over the past few
days. Every bolt has fought hard. When we removed the stanchions I didn’t
measure where the existing bolts were as I thought I would be able to pick up
the original holes. However, this was
before we replaced the whole deck which, in the process, took away all the old
holes. The only remaining datum was the
two screw holes in the stem post where the toe rail was attached. We have had to work our way back from this
point which has been quite a battle.
We have also made new quadrants for the coachroof and fitted
and sealed them. More plugging for
Bridget to do! We have refitted the
windlass onto the foredeck. This
involved fixing an oil leak and making a new plinth out of iroko. Once installed we were able to lift the
anchor chain and anchor back up into the forepeak which I was anxious to do
before we moved the boat. I didn’t fancy
having to walk across the boatyard with forty metres of chain and a danforth
anchor!
There’s still lots more to do, but we now have to wait until
Maundy Thursday before the next spring tides come back and hopefully, at last,
lift us up off the slip. Till next time…….
It’s been over a month since I last updated this blog and
we’ve really struggled with many aspects of our new life. We had hoped to be on the water many weeks
ago but as I type this we are still on the boatyard slipway and watching the
latest spring tide come and go. This is
a real frustration for us. We are
dependent on a spring tide to float us off the cradle and allow us to move down
the creek to our mooring, but we are a long way off being ready to leave the
protection of the covered slip. Bleat
over, what have we been up to since my last post?
The main leap forwards is that we have completed the
replacement of the deck. Sheathing with
fibreglass cloth and epoxy resin was a really unpleasant job. Not only is it very messy, it was also
difficult to get a really good result.
Overall, it’s not perfect but it will give strength and protection to
the underlying wood. It also has had two
coats of 2-pack epoxy primer ready for several coats of deck paint. We decided that we would be able to improve
the deck finish over time if any issues arise – one of the advantages of living
aboard I suppose.
The topsides have also received much attention. Bridget has sanded and painted, and sanded
and painted, and sanded and painted! We
opted for Epifanes #24 for our colour choice.
It is a lovely, creamy off-white colour that suits the teak
superstructure well. We intend to put a
couple of further coats on before we hit the water, but I’m anxious to get the
toe rails, rubbing strips and guard rails fitted whilst we have the staging
around the hull.
We have found it immensely satisfying to start putting
things back on. We have refitted the
forward hatch which was the final stage of making the boat watertight once
again. We do get some rain falling onto
the bow, despite the tarpaulins, which trickles down through the hatch opening,
so finally being able to shut this over was a significant milestone. We have also refitted the deck filler caps
for the fuel and water tanks.
The big achievement was finally fitting the wood stove. This is a major investment into our future
comfort, so we wanted to get it right.
We chose the Hobbit stove from Salamander Stoves in Devon. That was the easy bit……working out how to fit
a flue and what material to use for heat protection proved more of a
challenge! We finally decided on using
heat resistant tiles on a cement-board backer, with a 2cm air gap between the
backboards and bulkheads. We think the
overall look is fabulous and will become a real focal point for our new ‘living
room’. We opted for the ‘canal boat’
flue fitting kit as the nearest match to our situation which uses a twin-wall
pipe to reduce the heat transfer to surrounding material. However, this meant cutting a 9-inch hole in
the roof of our saloon. I tell you,
nothing focusses the mind more than cutting large holes into your boat –
measure 10 times, cut once! Anyway, the
deed is done.
So, we have a lot to do yet, and we hope to finally take to
the water in a fortnight’s time when, hopefully, there’ll be enough water to
float us off the cradle and finally onto our mooring.
