The time finally came to get Robinetta back into her natural element. She was booked to go in on Friday, then I got a phonecall..... Friday was off due to bad weather, but there was a better chance on Saturday.
Saturday came, she was lifted off the cradle and into the slings after the rain turned into drizzle. Julian cleaned off the patches where the cradle had been, then dried them with an old tea-towel so I could slap some antifoul on and Robinetta was ready for salt water again.
She went into the water an hour before high tide, and rested in the slings while we checked the bilges. The bad news was that for the first time since we have owned her she started taking up. Water was trickling in at bow and stern, but only on the side that had been facing the sun while she was out of the water. It was nothing that the automatic bilge pump could not cope with, so it was tide to turn the engine on.
The starter motor worked fine, but the engine showed no signs of turning over no mater what we did. Barry, our diesel engineer was passing and came to have a look. He recommended a shot of ether, then once the engine was moving giving it a good hard run to thoroughly warm it up and let the cylinders reset themselves. Unfortunately no one around had any ether..... We tried one last time, and this time not even the started motor showed any signs of life.
In the end the marina work boat came round and towed us to our temporary berth there. I wanted Robinetta surrounded by water rather than being in a mud berth until she stopped taking up, and there are still plenty of things to do before she is ready to sail again.
When I left her on Saturday the bilge pump was going 2 minutes in every 15, but today (Monday) it was 2 minutes every hour. The trickle had become a seep, but water is still coming in. Hopefully she will get drier soon.
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