WORKING IN BAHIA
Bahia de Caraquez, Ecuador, Wednesday, 20 September 2006
Since we returned from doing a conducting/singing workshop in Cotacachi on 22 August, things have been enjoyably quiet. We had been putting off doing the necessary repairs to Vilisar so she will be ready to go to sea in the Spring of ’07 but now had the time to focus.
The first thing we did was to put her up on a makeshift tidal grid last month and paint the bottom with red anti-fouling paint and her topsides with glossy white enamel. We even renewed the ‘teal’ accent stripe along the caprail. Now, bobbing at anchor, she looks beautiful again as you row out to her.
But, in the course of going so long to windward on the way here from Mexico via The Galapagos, we suffered some wear-and-tear: we lost the tab from the windvane steering; the bobstay chain broke at the waterline and was hanging straight down from the tip of the bobstay; and the lower shroud tang on the starboard side was ripped right off of the metal base-plate holding it to the mast. The shroud itself dropped to the coach-house roof one night to be discovered at sunrise. We were still pretty much on course, fortunately, but we got sails doused in a big hurry. The shroud was the only broken item that we actually noticed at first. Who knows, we could have been travelling for days with no trim tab on the windvane steering and no bobstay.
While I had planned anyway to replace the (chain) bobstay and the two (chain) boomkin shrouds when we arrived at Bahia de Caraquez, I had not really planned to replace spreaders! But while we had the boat on the tidal grid last month, she leaned against a fence with a shroud which apparently also stressed the starboard spreader. Made of wood, it split along its length. So now we had a broken spreader AND the base-plate holding the shroud tang was also compromised. With no confidence in the whole setu-up now, we decided to replace everything around the spreaders. i.e., both the two metal base-plates and the spreaders so we would not be worrying about them crossing the Pacific.
The plan was to have the metal parts made by Maestro Quanqui across the river in San Vincente and the wooden parts made by Maestro Luiz across from Puerto Amistad. The big job was going to be how to get the spreaders and plates off. We put off getting started thinking we were going to be travelling to Machala for a music workshop. When this fell through we had no further excuses.
Our neighbour-at-anchor, Andrew from S/V Nueva Vida, Nanaimo, B.C., came over on two mornings this week to haul me up the mast. With a lot of banging and hanging, the two wooden spreaders were finally lowered to the deck and, eventually, after hammering the two 6-inch bolts back through the mast, we were able to get the metal base plates off as well. The corner had been torn off one of them where the tang had been and a little cosmetic wood damage done to the mast.
All four lower shrouds – they had been attached to those mast-mounted base-plates – were also lowered to the deck and laid out flat on the deck. So now, there I was, way up there in a bosuns-chair that was hanging from a mast with no athwarthships support. Fortunately, our mast is very strong, about 14 percent of its overall length is buried belowdecks and held in place at deck level by a 5-inch thick mast collar. I swayed a bit when the fishing ‘pangas’ went through. But there did not seem to be any movement in the mast itself. Down I came, stiff and sore and hardly able to feel my legs any more.
The next job was to get the replacements made. Yesterday, therefore, I gathered up the various pieces including all the old bronze turnbuckles, which had over the years become frozen and would not turn. I took the ferry across to San Vincente and found the metal-working shop. They quoted me a decent price to fabricate the windvane tab fitting, free up all the turnbuckles and make two new spreader base-plates. The latter are going to be in ‘acer negra’, i.e. ‘black steel’ that I intend to have galvanised in Manta before remounting them on the mast. The ‘carpentero’, Maestro Luiz, agreed to make two new spreaders of ‘lorel’ (a tropical wood) and two spares as well.
So, things are now well under way and I am relieved to know that soon those weak spots will have been taken care of before putting to sea again. I still have to paint up all the wooden pieces and get the wooden tab made for the windvane steering. I have to slush (i.e. paint) the rig also. But at least I can do this on the ground rather than swinging from in a bosuns chair with a can of paint between my knees and the wind whipping the drips all across the decks below me. Once everything has been re-installed, I shall get the upper shrouds down as well and treat them.
As major jobs, that will leave only getting the dinghy re-painted and getting our new 7-foot wooden oars finished before we leave for Venezuela. Unfortunately, Puerto Amistad is now charging $5 per day to use their little vacant yard for boat work. This seems a little excessive so I shall find another spot. Indeed, at that price I can almost hire somebody to paint things.
Bahia de Caraquez, Ecuador, Wednesday, 20 September 2006
Since we returned from doing a conducting/singing workshop in Cotacachi on 22 August, things have been enjoyably quiet. We had been putting off doing the necessary repairs to Vilisar so she will be ready to go to sea in the Spring of ’07 but now had the time to focus.
The first thing we did was to put her up on a makeshift tidal grid last month and paint the bottom with red anti-fouling paint and her topsides with glossy white enamel. We even renewed the ‘teal’ accent stripe along the caprail. Now, bobbing at anchor, she looks beautiful again as you row out to her.
But, in the course of going so long to windward on the way here from Mexico via The Galapagos, we suffered some wear-and-tear: we lost the tab from the windvane steering; the bobstay chain broke at the waterline and was hanging straight down from the tip of the bobstay; and the lower shroud tang on the starboard side was ripped right off of the metal base-plate holding it to the mast. The shroud itself dropped to the coach-house roof one night to be discovered at sunrise. We were still pretty much on course, fortunately, but we got sails doused in a big hurry. The shroud was the only broken item that we actually noticed at first. Who knows, we could have been travelling for days with no trim tab on the windvane steering and no bobstay.
While I had planned anyway to replace the (chain) bobstay and the two (chain) boomkin shrouds when we arrived at Bahia de Caraquez, I had not really planned to replace spreaders! But while we had the boat on the tidal grid last month, she leaned against a fence with a shroud which apparently also stressed the starboard spreader. Made of wood, it split along its length. So now we had a broken spreader AND the base-plate holding the shroud tang was also compromised. With no confidence in the whole setu-up now, we decided to replace everything around the spreaders. i.e., both the two metal base-plates and the spreaders so we would not be worrying about them crossing the Pacific.
The plan was to have the metal parts made by Maestro Quanqui across the river in San Vincente and the wooden parts made by Maestro Luiz across from Puerto Amistad. The big job was going to be how to get the spreaders and plates off. We put off getting started thinking we were going to be travelling to Machala for a music workshop. When this fell through we had no further excuses.
Our neighbour-at-anchor, Andrew from S/V Nueva Vida, Nanaimo, B.C., came over on two mornings this week to haul me up the mast. With a lot of banging and hanging, the two wooden spreaders were finally lowered to the deck and, eventually, after hammering the two 6-inch bolts back through the mast, we were able to get the metal base plates off as well. The corner had been torn off one of them where the tang had been and a little cosmetic wood damage done to the mast.
All four lower shrouds – they had been attached to those mast-mounted base-plates – were also lowered to the deck and laid out flat on the deck. So now, there I was, way up there in a bosuns-chair that was hanging from a mast with no athwarthships support. Fortunately, our mast is very strong, about 14 percent of its overall length is buried belowdecks and held in place at deck level by a 5-inch thick mast collar. I swayed a bit when the fishing ‘pangas’ went through. But there did not seem to be any movement in the mast itself. Down I came, stiff and sore and hardly able to feel my legs any more.
The next job was to get the replacements made. Yesterday, therefore, I gathered up the various pieces including all the old bronze turnbuckles, which had over the years become frozen and would not turn. I took the ferry across to San Vincente and found the metal-working shop. They quoted me a decent price to fabricate the windvane tab fitting, free up all the turnbuckles and make two new spreader base-plates. The latter are going to be in ‘acer negra’, i.e. ‘black steel’ that I intend to have galvanised in Manta before remounting them on the mast. The ‘carpentero’, Maestro Luiz, agreed to make two new spreaders of ‘lorel’ (a tropical wood) and two spares as well.
So, things are now well under way and I am relieved to know that soon those weak spots will have been taken care of before putting to sea again. I still have to paint up all the wooden pieces and get the wooden tab made for the windvane steering. I have to slush (i.e. paint) the rig also. But at least I can do this on the ground rather than swinging from in a bosuns chair with a can of paint between my knees and the wind whipping the drips all across the decks below me. Once everything has been re-installed, I shall get the upper shrouds down as well and treat them.
As major jobs, that will leave only getting the dinghy re-painted and getting our new 7-foot wooden oars finished before we leave for Venezuela. Unfortunately, Puerto Amistad is now charging $5 per day to use their little vacant yard for boat work. This seems a little excessive so I shall find another spot. Indeed, at that price I can almost hire somebody to paint things.
posted by rjb @ Thursday, September 21, 2006
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