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.

No Duck, Hurrah!

 Finding the duck still brooding last week was depressing, but the eggs had to have hatched by today... I headed down the pontoon dreading what I would find. Luckily the only remnants of the duck's presence was a mass of down. No eggs, dead ducklings, or messy remnants of her presence.

I had brought the vacuum cleaner with me, which helped with the tidy up. Julian and I are going to be sleeping aboard at the weekend, so most of my time was spend turning the paint store version of the cabin into something more like a saloon.

Duck still there

 Went to Robinetta today, only to find the duck still there. Drat!

A sitting duck

 It looks as though the scare I gave the duck yesterday has inspired her to sit tight and begin to brood. I don't have the heart to dislodge her, and with a brood time of 28 days Robinetta will be getting a late start to the season.

I will go again and check next week, just in case she abandons the nest....

Mallard eggs

Since we live 35 miles from Tollesbury I have been unable to visit Robinetta during lockdown, even though the Marina stayed open. The marina have been keeping an eye on her, and an OGA friend has been walking past her on a regular basis, so I was not worried, but as soon as we were allowed to travel I headed to see her.

Rain had accumulated on the fore deck cover as usual, and we will need to take her to the scrubbing posts to take off the weed, but otherwise she looks good externally. 

I did not get a chance to look inside though, since as I went to the stern to start taking off the cockpit cover a duck flew out from under it. There, nestled between the pin rail and the main sheet horse, were 4 eggs. The duck did not fly far, and I headed to the marina office to find out if there was a policy on what to do in this situation.

The harbour master said it was up to me what to do, and I had a chat with a local who offered to contact a local wildlife enthusiast who might take the eggs off the boat to hatch them this evening. I will go back in the morning, and if the eggs have gone I will be happy. Apparently a normal clutch for Mallards is about 12 eggs, so this is a partially laid clutch and the duck can start again elsewhere.

A post lockdown condition check

I got all the covers on Robinetta the day before the latest lock down started, and I left a small low wattage oil filled radiator on her, set to its lowest settings. This is the first time I have tried such a thing, and I was not sure how useful it would be.

I went aboard for the first time yesterday, when the air temperature was only 2C and there had been a day and a half of fog. She certainly did not feel in any way warm, but there was minimal condensation in the cabin. In other good news she has finished obviously taking up.

Now we just need to do something about the engine...

Back in the water

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.