Category Archives: Preparing to cruise

Creeping Towards Victory

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While Melissa was evacuating from her old office and attending the sailing conference, I spent another weekend in Astoria inching ever closer to that happy day when Andromeda is back in the water. We make progress, but slowly.

Since the weather was pretty mild on Saturday, I got to work right away sealing the cockpit sole and screwing it back down. The sole has been sitting loose since John, the previous owner removed the old engine sometime in September. That means that water has had an easy time flowing into the engine room and we had to keep the steering pedestal and other steering hardware down below. Now that the new engine is in, I really wanted to start buttoning up the cockpit. We have enough trouble keeping the boat dry without having the engine room practically open to a rainy Astoria Winter.

My Bear Trap.  This allowed me to apply the butyl tape and then lower the floor down with a minimum of lateral movement.

Melissa bought some grey Butyl Tape from This Guy after reading about its superior quality from Tate and Dani of Sundowner Sails Again. This was my first experience using this tape and I am so far very impressed with its ease of use and tenacity. I did have a bit of a learning curve when it came to applying it though.

Lesson one with butyl tape. Do Not Remove the paper backing until the tape is applied to at least one surface. This stuff is tacky!

I applied slightly overlapping runs of the tape to the cleaned and freshly wiped lip of the the sole.

Two runs of tape, slightly overlapping

For reference, check out our earlier post on getting the cockpit sole cleaned.

Once I had run the tape around the perimeter and gently lowered the sole back down, it was time to screw down the sole and seal the 32 holes that had been originally used. That’s a lot of 1/4 inch screw holes. Assuming 100 Kips of tension as the low end of the range for a quarter inch 304 or 316 stainless screw, clearly we are more concerned with the amount of attachment area between the screw and the fiberglass sole. I opted to screw down on both sides of each corner and once on each side, which comes to twelve attachment points for the sole. The remaining twenty unused holes were filled with epoxy.

Corners and sides are screwed and filled with Life Caulk. The unused holes are filled with epoxy.

I hope I don’t regret using the Life Caulk for the screws. After using the butyl tape, I think it may make a superior seal. It is certainly easier to work with.

We will refinish the sole at a later time. This may be an opportunity to use the Kiwi Grip paint. We will need something that provides a good grip but that won’t trap a lot of dirt. Suggestions anyone?

With the sole finally secured, I was really excited to put the steering pedestal and wheel back in the cockpit. I have knocked the pedestal over three times and am amazed that I haven’t broken the thing as we work around it down below. I had to repaint some of the brackets holding the steering pump and hooking up the rudder hydraulics is still a little ways off, but man it feels good to have an actual wheel back in the cockpit.

Sole and Steering pedestal re-installed

Sole and Steering pedestal re-installed

Since this post is running a bit long, I’ll save the engine alignment for Friday. But I do want to leave you with a final photo of one of Melissa’s projects. We brought home hundreds of pounds of hardware which Melissa meticulously went through and organized. We still have some weird stuff that I need to look at, but the screws, bulbs, O-rings, and a thousand other bits and pieces are now on Andromeda and labeled! Anyone who has ever just thrown up their hands and gone to the Chandlery for yet another bit of stainless steel will appreciate how great it is to have the ability to lay your hand on just the right sized screw for a particular application.

The metal bar with a dog leg is for the engine control cable. Finding the correct screw for the job was easy.

We have several containers like this which are divided by type, (Machine, Wood, Brass etc) The organization is still a work in progress but so far, I have saved hours looking for parts or going to the store to buy something we already have but can’t find. Thanks Baby!

 

The Beta has Landed

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The dirty little secret among sailors is that while all we talk about is sailing, what we all long for is an engine that can reliably get us into and out of marinas, anchorages and dicey situations. An engine helps us work our way around the crunchy bits of the watery world we want to explore.

Today we have that engine.

This is where having someone experienced in the art of lifting heavy objects comes in handy. Shawn had many tricks to make fitting the 49 inch tall engine and boom fit into the 39 inch tall opening under the dodger. He also sacrificed a shirt to keep the shiny red paint looking good.

The morning broke in Astoria clear, cold and with a wind blowing fierce out of the east. Shawn the diesel mechanic showed up with our engine for the second time in seven days but we were both determined to drop this puppy into Andromeda before the day was out.

The Port of Astoria has turned out to be a terrific place for the repower project. On a Sunday, the forklift had the key in the ignition and the boom was well built and ready for use.

The effort was not without its challenges. Shawn did the math and quickly concluded that the engine and boom height combined would not go between the top of the dodger and the cockpit coaming. His solution? Take off the oil pan and sump pickup. That gave us about eight additional inches of clearance, which was about a quarter of an inch more than we needed.

The Tricky Part

Our engine sans oil pan.

Once the engine was  under the dodger, we removed the cockpit sole and placed some blocking to allow us to set down the engine and set up our chain hoist.

An engine room with a view. The two by twelves above me were used to set the engine down while we got the chain hoist in place.

I love field engineering solutions to problems like this and it was great to work with a guy like Shawn who won’t be deterred by something trivial like no brakes on the forklift.

Once the engine was in the hole, Shawn re-installed the oil pan. That is a brand new, one ton chain hoist that Shawn is depending on.

The new rails required some modification. Shawn had to drill new holes to match the existing threaded inserts installed into the boat’s engine beds. Once that task was completed we were able to bolt down the new rails and lower the engine onto the rails.

Shawn tweaks the feet on the back of the engine. Until we get the new cutless bearing and prop shaft, this is all roughed in.

I think the engine is a little further back than either of us thought it would be, but the transmission dipstick and filler are pretty easy to access. The electrical control cable is just long enough to reach and connect to the engine without an extension and both the raw water and fuel lines are just a short jump from the starboard wall where the raw water strainer and fuel filters are located. There is also plenty of room in front of the engine to work tension belts or replace the raw water impeller. All in all we have great access to every part of the engine.

Shawn putting the finishing touches on the engine rail bolts. The old threads were pretty grungy and needed a little love from the impact driver.

We had Shawn’s tools packed and in his truck just as the sun was setting. He was happy to not be lugging a 600 pound engine up and down the Columbia river for another week. It had been a long day but finally, we have a new engine in Andromeda. We will disregard for a moment that it has no fuel, water, oil or battery. Those will come later.

It may seem trite to some that a big hunk of steel could be so important to the success of our cunning plan, but it is true. We are products of a culture that is in love with the power to just get up and go. Whether it is a 67 Mustang or 60 horse Beta, being able move under our own terms, on our own schedule, is important to us. Knowing that our new beta engine will be there for us around the crunchy bits will give us the false sense of security we need to really get in trouble.

Good bye to our Avian Allies

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This photo was taken in the middle of the day. There still wasn't enough light to get a good, sharp image.

This photo was taken early in our care taking careers.  You can count six chickens here.

A short post to say good bye to the remaining two chickens left in our care by our young nephew, Reid while he and his family spent a year in the wilds of Oregon. Faithful readers will recall that we were chicken sitting and can revisit our post here:Playing Farmville.

Cue ominous banjo music here

Our record for keeping our six charges safe is disappointing. We lost one chicken to the neighbor’s dog, one chicken just disappeared without a trace, and just recently we lost two to a marauding gang of raccoons. We really enjoyed having the chickens in many ways; they were beautiful, gave us yummy eggs and made the yard more amusing. Melissa will miss their help keeping the weed and bug populations down. And we will miss the way they clucked contentedly whenever we fed them scraps. On the other hand, we won’t miss the mess, the worry about their safety and the difficulty finding a qualified chicken sitter for our trips to Astoria.

Our last Australorp lays an egg before leaving

Have Chickens, Will Travel. Two chickens and all their appurtenances are neatly loaded into Darin and Amy’s truck.

After our sailing days are over we will have a place that can accommodate another small flock of chickens. Maybe some bantam breeds would be nice. Melissa and I love the beautiful colors and grace they bring to the property. We enjoy their little noises and antics as they weed the garden and worry the dog. Just a few chickens. No more than a dozen.