Cleaning out the water tanks and painting

First thing this morning I turned the engine on, so I could use the electric water pump to empty out the water tanks. As the water came through all frothy with bleach I realised that was the perfect time to wash down the rest of the cabin. By 9am I had a clean cabin, and had emptied, refilled, emptied and refilled the tanks. The engine had also had an hour of gentle use under load as a generator, so I felt happy about that.

 

A walk up to the local shop for milk for breakfast, then a drive to Maldon to buy provisions for the week took up the rest of the morning.

 

The only obvious change to Robinetta today is the paint work. Julian tidied up the stenciled name which had got over painted slightly last summer, and I got in Worm, and painted over the linseed putty mix that had been put in just before she went in the water last summer. She now looks smarter, but the assistant harbour master has confirmed that the mast can not go in until Tuesday, which leaves us only 4 days to head north before Julian has to be back at work...

 

 

 

Putting her back together

Julian spent most of the day getting the electrics sorted out, (he might post details himself?) which included getting the new running lights to work. Meanwhile I washed down the insides, reinstalled various bits and pieces, and re-caulked the bits, which had been leaking for a while.

The water tanks have been empty ever since the winter of 2019, so I began the process of getting them back in commission by filling them with a solution of Puriclean. Tomorrow I will pump that out, refill the tanks, and pump them out again. The it is time to replace the charcoal filter, and finally fill with drinking water. All that pumping out will drain the batteries if I don't have the engine on to power the pump, so the new engine's first use will not be for propulsion but electricity generation... This will at least help with the running in of the engine "Five hours of gentle use before you start to push it," went the instructions from Mike French!

Back afloat

At long last Robinetta is back in the water! We heard that French Marine would finish installing the new engine on Friday morning, so I phoned Tollesbury Marina with my fingers crossed, and asked if they could launch her on the Friday afternoon high tide. Miracle of miracles they could. They would even be able to put the mast in her on Monday morning. Julian and I drove down from our new home in Scotland with Worm on the car roof on Thursday, and spent Friday morning washing off mud residues then painting on anti foul. I had not expected so much mud to be left on Robinetta since she was power washed when she was lifted out, so I expect they were careful not to use too powerful a jet, which has been known to wash out stopping and caulking from between the planks

Having to wash her did slow the painting down. There was no time to touch up the topsides that still sported their crack filling layers from last summer’s extended drying out on land, and I was doing the final touches below the water line when the tractor arrived, launch trailer in tow, to take Robinetta off the cradle. That did mean that I had a brush all ready when the pads of the cradle were removed, but there was not a lot of time for the anti foul to harden before she was launched. The other unfortunate news was that when the harbour master told us they could get the mast in on Monday he had forgotten that it was a Bank Holiday, and they would probably not do it until Tuesday.

 Rather than trying out the new engine the yard used their work boat to move Robinetta to her new temporary berth. Once she was tied up Julian and I jumped on board. She had only been out of the water for a month, but five weeks of July and August sun had not been kind to her, and quite a few seams were seeping. For the first couple of hours I was pumping her out 24 strokes of the pump every ten minutes. Normally the float switch and electric pump would have taken care of this, but all the old electric system had been disconnected when the new engine went in. 

French Marine had installed new wiring from the batteries, heavier gauge that the old, and it took Julian nearly four hours to get the electric pump hooked up to the power and working. At one point he was sure the pump was broken, and took it out of its housing. He discovered it was totally blocked by wire wool, and after he cleaned it he hooked it up directly to the batteries. This proved it still worked, which was a huge relief. I had not been looking forward to waking up every hour to pump!

Once the pump and float switch were working (but not the rest of the electrics) we went out for dinner, before heading back to Robinetta for our first night afloat since May.

engine compartment cleaned

 

The engine compartment has been painted ready for the new engine. The freshly varnished mast has been dressed ready to be put back once Robinetta is floating again. Now we just need to wait for the engineer to get back from holiday....

Out of the water again

 Robinetta came out of the water today, and has had a winter's worth of weed washed off her hull. She is now in the lower yard in a cradle, waiting for her new engine and the other work to be done by the yard. Hopefully this will not take too long, as having a wooden boat out of the water at the height of the summer heat is not a great idea.

No pictures, as I was not there. Having everything done at a distance of over 300 miles is nerve wracking!

Robinetta is not being ignored!

 It feels like a long time since I did a blog post, but that is because of too many other things going on, not that Robinetta has become unimportant. She is still not sailing, but there are various reasons for that. 

The varnish on the mast had crazed horribly since she was relaunched last October, so we have had it taken out. Once we undressed the mast we realised that we needed new back-stays, as the galvanised iron was now rusty (the other stays and shrouds are stainless steel). We took the old ones to TS Rigging in Maldon, who made us some lovely new stainless ones. We have also bought a new peak halyard, as the old rope was not very good quality and kept twisting when it shouldn't. We need to buy a few new blocks and get the rest varnished; we did not touch them when the mast was out in Bristol so it is not surprising they need some TLC. There is a lot of serving to be done as well. Due to lack of time the yard have stripped and will varnish the mast. but I have managed to get the bowsprit looking smarter

The glass in one of Robinetta's nav lights was broken over the winter of 2019-20, and so far we have failed to get it replaced. Although Julian wants to keep the old lights, for the moment we have modern ones in new fittings which I put in place today.

One of our friends has taken out the old engine (it will be used for spares). We need to get the engine "compartment" cleaned up and painted before the new engine goes in, but with a leaking stern gland (again) this is impossible without taking Robinetta out of the water. I arranged this with the yard today. They were going to be taking her out to clean the hull and antifoul her anyway, but now she will be out for longer to let the engine area dry out enough to paint. At least this will means that if a new drive shaft is needed there will be no delay while she is hauled out. With any luck the engineer will be fitting the new engine in the third week of July. Fingers crossed!

Engine replacement needed

 Julian and I went to Robinetta this weekend with the vague hope that we could get the engine going ourselves. Unfortunately we failed, and the engine would not even turn over on the hand crank. We have come to the conclusion that it would be best to just get a new engine... This has put a damper on our sailing plans for the year as I suspect it will take a while to organise. 

The varnish on the mast has also crazed and is peeling in a way that will probably flake off the first time we try to haul up the main sail, so we need it stripped off and redone. All this combined with the fact that we are in the middle of moving house to Scotland, means I am going to be very busy since we hope to sail Robinetta up the East Coast this summer.

The good news is that Julian got a reading from the new depth gauge transducer in the bow that we had fitted last summer, and that the hull has now taken up completely. The weather was also beautiful, and we got to fly our East Coast year  flag.