Windlass on the bench

Getting the windlass (a Simpson Lawrence Hyspeed) off looked like being the easy part. My problem was that the gypsy wheel had become ceased against the clutch cone and wouldn't slack off - hence not possible to surge chain through the windlass, only hand over hand which looked dodgy to say the least. (Those of you with electric windlass stop reading now - you will need all your resources to save up for an extra battery...) 
On the bench, the big problem was how to brake the shaft in order to get enought purchase on the clutch nut to unscrew. Fortunately my new best friend at SLSpares (http://www.slspares.co.uk/)  was not phased by this. On his suggestion I led a short length of chain over the gypsy wheel and secured between / under the platforms of a workmate style bench to which I had clamped the body of the windlass. Using my improvised handle and a bit of BFandI, a few moments later the gypsy was free and I had a fully functioning windlass again !
It seemed a shame to stop there, so a bit more maintenace will be undertaken, but it does seem that one of the big culprits was the lack of an O ring seal on the shaft under the gyspsy wheel. It was also quite gratifying to find that the grease nipple, although quite badly corroded, was quite easy to remove - up for replacement though in any case.

Heavy weight maintenance..

There are two items of heavy weight maintenance which I needed to do before the end of October.
The first was to remove the opening portlights, which were starting to corode, and to carry out some preventative maintenance to stop that. I had expected that getting them out would be quite difficult - but was pleasantly suprised So far the score's one - nil then.
This weekend's task - part two - was to lift the windlass for some on bench style in depth maintenance.

Success ! the windlass came free suprisingly easily

I'm not saying that this was an easy thing to do - but was just a bit awkward and required a bit of heave ho to lift it clear. Most importantly - no damage to boat or boater - other than a grazed knuckle.
Still, that's a Westerly for you, you know!

Last weekend of the season

Much better than last weekend, but consistent easterlies mean the entrance to the harbour will be too tricky to contemplate without a better reason.

Still, a lovely day and got a few things sorted out on the boat. Lift out in the morning!

Grizzly day in Pw

By contrast north of caernarfon it's a lovely sunny day, but here...

...which reminds me of a scoobydoo seaside episode! No sailing due to restricted visibility, but some useful work carried out on the boat.

This weekend

What miserable weather - definately staying home and working on shore side things !

Aerial visitor

Apologies for this dodgy photo of one of the swallows, wheeling around the boat at Porthmadog

Swallows over Porthmadog!

Suprisingly difficult to photograph on the wing !

Low water springs in Porthmadog harbour

The view from the trots moorings at low water springs.

We've miscalculated the tide in Porthmadog!

We'll have to wait till the tide comes in a bit until we can get to the yacht club bar...

Porthmadog revisited...

Tim takes the helm.

Running along the buoyed channel...

From our visiting mooring in the harbour

Roll on the Madoc Yacht Club.

Navigation old and new:

A well balanced binnacle - chart plotter to port and steering compass to starboard. 

Thanks to Tim and Emily for their help ( and Tim for fixing the VHF antenna) 

Porthmadog beckons.

( thanks again to Tyree Fabrications of Sheffield for some super stainless fabrication )

Good company and some succesful work

A great weekend in our home port - even if we didn't leave the mooring. It was mainly spent upgrading and repairing some of the minor damage suffered last weekend !

We had an excellent Saturday night with Joe and our neighbouring berth holder, who un-fortunately arrived too late for dinner, but not too late for a glass of very passable claret and some good conversation.

It was good to see the Autohlem successfully power up (just a minor tweak there)  The wind instrument problems seem to relate to not carrying out the linearisation of the anenometer during the calibration process (whatever that is ?)  Next time out, we need to do the bumps and turns required for to properly calibrate.  

New mooring lines fore and aft have at last been respliced and fixed on, and the main sheet traveller has been repaired and modified to give us some more control - as shown in the photo.

The new traveller / control lines

I think this should see us out for the rest of the season (...although if Santa was passing the Barton store on his way to our house!)

Most importantly of all, the loo brush is now also  fully secured in the heads - all crew please note.

An action packed return to Pwllheli

Something for everyone in return leg.
Starting out sunny and flat it soon became  overcast with winds freshening, backing and some squally rain.
A maginficent dolphin encounter as we passed Sarn Baedrig - with a pod of four breaking the surface line abreast swimming alongside and diving under the bow wave. Sorry - no pictures this time.
Many thanks to Bill for excellent work at the helm.
The weather closed in from this point onwards, with more rain and higher more variable winds, culminating in rather a hot landing at Pw. Many thanks to Ian of Rebellion for his help on hand!
And forgot to mention the puffins we saw - flying and diving into the swell !

Hello Aberystwyth!

Our first visit to Aberyswyth - great sail down - up to 7 knots over the ground and some lumpy seas.

North of Sarn Padraig - some lumpy seas

Bill relaxes for a while whilst Clive takes a trick at the wheel

On our visitor's berth in Aberystwyth

Gps chart plotter

Yea for the new garmin chart plotter adorning the helm - even if it is on a temporary bracket !

The trireme sail

Spending help from Jonathan and Rob at JKA for their help with the massive genoa, known as the trireme sail, once again adorning our forestay. 

<<note to self>> Must get their web site on our links when access to a full version of blogger allows

Warm front passes,

After literally weeks of high pressure, a low has broken into the cycle and the warm front prophesied by the surface pressure charts blew through in the early hours. 

Of course it all sounds much worse at night, and the wind didn't make F5, but there was much rocking, some rain through the port lights and the extra rigging that a ketch carries caused some extra moaning, so it sounded like a real storm at sea.

Now out to check round for any real damage...

Another visitor

This cheeky chap came to visit us. Watch out for the funny walk right at the end.

Another sketch of pwllheli harbour

Firmhelm office & yard to the left, the old harbour master's office + tender store to right

Fresh bread this morning!

Made some fresh bread this morning using this recipe which I have adapted from John Vigor's books (ackowledgements):

Mix 3 cups of self raising flour with 1/2 teaspoon salt and 2 teaspoons of sugar

Add a small bottle of beer - supermarket 'belgian' type lager sold in stubbies will do

Pour the mixture in to a greased bread tin

Cook in the oven until its done

On a comparative scale , delicious!

Our neighbour upstream

A lovely boat on the next pair of piles upstream from us. It's not clear whether they have brought this boat from the Isle of Wight or the owner is just commenting on two of their female acquaintances...

Pwllheli harbour

The cluster of buildings and slipways along the south side give the harbour it's character as a working harbour. The rnli is on the right. 

Electrical work

I've just been doing some electrical work for Annabella, on the bench at home, which involved soldering on connections for some not particulalry small components. Is it me, or in the past 25 years have the connexions got smaller- and rather more fuzzy?

New neighbours on the pilings

Rebellion

Welcome to our new neighbours, a spanking new UFO34 called 'Rebellion'. (Thanks to Barney for his photo)
I think we're going to get along...

The refurb goes on....

 Work to update the interior goes on. 

Prototype locker front

The orignal locker fronts are now too frail to hold the screws of the hinges. We have tried out a new replacement, using the original profiled foam but new fabric, expertly applied by Lynn. Result - success and four   three more to do.

  

We have also added some coir matting to both the forepeak and aft cabin sole. Good looking and feels great under foot!

Coir matting to the fore peak + aft cabin sole

Dolphin encounter

We've encountered dolphins quite regularly off the Lleyn peninsula, or rather they've come and found us. This must have be one of the most exciting episodes, partly because it took place in such clear conditions but also how close they came and their sheer exuberance.

Sorry about the rickety quality of the video, I wasn't really expecting to take it !

Porthmadog to Pwllheli

We thought the excitement of the day would be a bit of nervy manoeuvre in the harbour, to turn around and face out to sea. The conditions were beautiful, even if we were still deprived on wind...

Clive - enjoying the bright conditions

You can see from the photo that even the wind generator has stopped rotating !

Trip to Porthmadog

Beautiful sailing in the afternoon from Pwllheli.
Unfortunately there were very light airs, so not much sailing as such, but we did get out the mizzen out to see how that worked.

Although its only about 7nm between fairway buoys, there is quite a long buoyed channel leading into the harbour at Porthmadog. For fin keel boats like ours it can be very dangerous to stray out of the channel!

The scenery is stunning - especially on a sunny day like that - and there is always a warm welcome and a cold beer at the yacht club.

The fairway buoy for Porthmadog

             

About midway along the buoyed channel

Crew Notice : Porth Madog

Weather for the weekend is looking good. 
Who's on for a trip to Porth Madog?

Steering Compass:

We took the 'Sestrel' steering compass off in January (2013) as it was looking pretty tired. I was a bit worried that we might not be able to get it back to a reasonable standard - especially as it was sporting a large bubble in the spirit.

the condition of the steering compass in January

We sent it to down Robinsons, compass adjusters, on the Hamble. They are extremely knowldegable in repairing sailing instruments and had done some great work for us before.

after refurbishing, about to be re-fitted

Robinsons refilled the compass bowl, eliminating the bubble. They reckoned it to be in reasonable working order and should be good for a few years yet. Back home, We carefeully dismantled the gimble, re-finished all the painted parts and polished up the brass bezel.

the Sestrel, back on the binnacle

Here it is back in place. In seatrials in June, the course it gave read almost exactly the same as the GPS COG and - ironically - much more accurate than the fluxgate, which we then had to re-calibrate. It's was carefully positioned too - right in the helmsman's eye line. Its great to have it back and working!

Sea trials

<SOM> Sea trial concluded complete succes stop 
Brilliant conditions with lights airs to F4 - some rain in late afternoon stop 
Added experience now in reloading rototstay drum stop 
Photos to follow <EOM>

Crew Notice:

Saturday's looking good for sea trials. We should have about 2m in the channel from about 1040 BST up to 1800 (tides are 4 days after springs) Note (ie: please remind me) that we have some crucial shopping to do at the chandlery before we go. HW 1320 BST. D

The last six months since we took over Annabella have been hard work, but now she's just about ready to go. Watch out for new posts about The Ketch Annabella.

Back on the water at last - in a temporary marina berth in Pwllheli (http://hafanpwllheli.co.uk). Hot and sunny weekend with plenty of sun burn about !

Now with radar reflector fixed. Surely everyone will be able to see us now!
Grateful to the help received form Echomax (http://www.echomax.co.uk) even though it was a 2nd hand reflector.

David up the mast, fixing the new (to us) Echomax radar reflector. Grateful thanks to Barney for his work at deck level, rushing off to buy bolts that fitted, borrowing tools that worked, taking photos like this and avoiding falling objetcs.

A weekend of hard work to fix the new (to us) wind generator and mast. Bespoke stainless farbication provided by Tyree Fabrications of Sheffield - fitted 1st time ! Now we're independent for electric.

This is the result of the hard work - new light grey anti slip decks. She's starting to look really smart now !

Mr Joseph carrying out important preparation work for the renewal of the non-slip deck paint - on weekend at the beginnign of April 13. (Note the gloves and respirator Mum) His hard work made applying the new non slip much easier and was a very valuable contribution.
Later that day, f+cs from the nearest chip shop in town and a useful meeting with the cruising section of the sailing club.

Here's the none slip deck paint before replacement. A delicate shade of duck egg where it was still attached...

After we decided that there was no hope of refurbing the existing clock and barometer, we searched world wide for some good looking instruments that were reliable and reasonably priced. These came from www.redcellardoors.com in Canada and were good value even after paying import duty. I was a bit worried the baro might not survive air mail, but its okay and the clock has not lost a second in months
Why can't we make things like these here....

The cockpit grille after having been skillfully repaired by Tony of Tony Hill Technology Limited. he has scarfed in new wood to replace the front end of the rails on both sides which had worn away.

 Now we've got shore power, things are beginning to look up ! Many thanks to our friends at Rowlands (http://rowlandsmarine.co.uk/) for their help with the parts for the shore power cable and lots of other stuff. Long winter nights were beginning to look a bit brighter.