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Saturday

Sometimes I liked to take  a few moments during the weekend to catch up on or redact various small jobs from my list, and with some time on hand during the afternoon I decided to finish up the varnish work (hopefully) on the companionway swashboards and reverse side of the cockpit table.

Meanwhile I sprayed a few coats of paint onto the coupling.  I like bright and frankly fun colors for couplings.

But this incidental stuff–necessary as it was–wasn’t the main focus.  The owner had requested that I replace the gaskets on the two deck hatches, as well as install a second set of hatch dogs on the midships hatch, which he said didn’t seal all that well.  So to this end, and with new materials on hand from the hatch manufacturer, I removed the two hatches from the boat to the bench to make the job easier.

Starting with the midships hatch, I first contemplated the extra hatch dogs and whether I could–or wanted to–attempt their installation.  In due course and after studying the new parts and existing dogs, I decided the job was feasible.  The dogs required a hole through the cast aluminum ears on the hatch–these were not predrilled at time of manufacture–and then installation was theoretically simple with a friction pin and small spring.

Drilling the holes wasn’t difficult other than the fact that the shape of the drill, and minimal clearance at the hatch, prohibited me from drilling the second part of the hole (through the second of two ears at each location) with the power drill:  the bit would have ended up at a wacky and unacceptable angle.  A right-angle drill I had didn’t help the issue any, but then I recalled a little hand-powered drill I’d always kept in an on-board tool kit in the past, and this proved to be a good tool to complete the holes through both sides.  If the material hadn’t been aluminum I’d never have tried it (nor, frankly, would I have tried any of this installation).

With the holes drilled, installation of the new dogs was easy.

Next, I removed the old gasket, which was quite similar to that which I’d recently installed in the bronze ports.   The replacement gasket sold by the hatch company featured a self-stick adhesive line (covered with orange protective material), and I had serious doubts as to the staying power of this adhesive, so at the onset I was prepared to use my gasket adhesive to install the new gaskets as well.  But as I removed the old gaskets, I saw the same sort of self-stick adhesive, and I had to say it was surprisingly tenacious, and this allowed me to hope that perhaps the new would work well, which would make installation a snap.

And so it was indeed.  With a scraper in the form of an old 1/4″ chisel (I tried heat, but it made the removal harder, not easier), I removed the old gasket, and cleaned up any remnants left behind before solvent-washing the gasket cove.  Then, I pressed the new gasket into place, removing the protective strip as I went to expose the adhesive strip, and taking special care in the corners.  It worked–and worked apparently quite well, though I supposed only time would tell.  I put the seam right behind one of the hatch dogs, and glued the cut ends together with some of the gasket adhesive.

Frankly surprised and happy with the installation, I repeated the process with the forward hatch.  This hatch already had four dogs on it, so I simply replaced the gasket.

This was a nice little project to expunge from the list, and with any luck I’d be regarded as a hero come the first thunderstorm or heavy seas encountered.

Total time billed on this job today:  2 hours

0600 Weather Report:  15°, clear.  Forecast for the day:  sunny, 30s.  Nice.

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Friday

I’d lined up a helper to remove the shaft coupling and stuffing box, as I knew he’d fit in the space more easily than I.  The shaft had to be removed in order to replace the stuffing box hose, and the owner had been unable to remove all the packing from the nut while it was in place (space was very limited and prevented access into the nut).  Before Jason’s arrival, I worked to prepare tools I thought we’d need for the job, and once he was here I played gopher for a while, but tried to do some other jobs while I was not immediately needed for his assistance.

With Jason crammed into the locker beneath the cockpit, we got to work.   The basic procedure was to unbolt the shaft coupling from the transmission, which went fairly well with no real issues other than trying about six different wrench sizes on the coupling bolts before he found the right one:  they were oversized heads and turned out, finally, to be 17mm.

Once the coupling was free, with considerable effort (a harbinger of things to come) we pulled the shaft back enough in order to fit a spacer between the shaft and the transmission coupling.  For this purpose I’d sourced a variety of 7/8″ diameter pipe nipples of various lengths.  With a 1″ shaft, these would stay within the shaft footprint and allow us to pull the coupling off the shaft with long bolts threaded into the transmission coupling.  A simple task in theory, but one greatly complicated by the challenging access and the minimal space available between the transmission and the stuffing box, which limited how far back the shaft could be pushed and spaced.

Over the next few hours, resetting the equipment several times (a few times because the threads on the bolts, as the coupling moved forward, contacted the transmission and had to be spaced further back, once to replace the spacer with a longer one), Jason eventually released the coupling–a long, tedious process, a snippet of which is shown below for all to enjoy.

During this time, the shaft often became very difficult to turn at all, and seemed to be binding in the Cutless bearing.   As the coupling moved forward, slowly, off the shaft, the exposed key in the shaft started to get close to the stuffing box nut, and with such tight clearances we eventually decided to cut off the old stuffing box hose to increase the room as much as possible.  Fortunately, Jason found that the old clamps came off  easily, and the old hose was easy to cut lengthwise and remove.  Replacing this hose, and repacking the stuffing box, were the whole point of this operation in the first place, of course.

With the coupling finally off, it should have been quick and easy to pull the shaft.  In fact, I’d hoped to do this, repack the stuffing box, and reinstall everything on this day.  Alas, this was not to be.  The earlier issues we’d encountered with the tightness of the shaft now prevented the shaft from moving basically at all.   We couldn’t turn it, and couldn’t pull it.  At the deadwood, I could see the problem:  the Cutless bearing was coming apart, and the rubber inside was clearly binding the shaft.

I’d neither wanted nor expected to worry about the Cutless bearing, but since the shaft was immobile there was no choice but to get it out.  The bearing was housed in a molded (so I thought at the time) protrusion in the aperture, and I was initially unclear how best to proceed.   Eventually, I cut away some of the material surrounding the bearing–it turned out to be only polyester filling material so the removal was easy with a grinder.  This process exposed the end of the actual stern tube, with the bearing inside and secured with a pair of set screws, which were interestingly–and unusually–seized together with wire.

Now that I could see the situation, I proceeded a little more slowly, and cut and chiseled away enough additional material to fully expose the set screws, and cut away a bit extra of the fiberglass stern tube to expose the end of the bearing.  This would allow me to get a wrench on the bearing and hopefully pull or twist it out.  (Teaching Moment:  always leave some of the bearing exposed at the end of the stern tube to allow for this without dramatic surgery!)    With Jason still on hand to help, I put a large set of slip-joint pliers on the newly-exposed section of the bearing, and twisted, while Jason pulled.  After some exertion the bearing (with shaft firmly stuck within) spun, and we had won.  From there, the shaft came out easily.

Annoyed and frustrated with this turn of events, I didn’t take pictures throughout the process, but these photos show the aperture shortly after shaft removal, showing the area where I ground and cut away material.  This process also shortened the fiberglass stern tube a bit, but all that would be straightforward to rebuild now that the shaft was out.

With the shaft out, Jason could clamber once more into the bilge to remove the remains of the stuffing box (we hadn’t been able to pull the shaft far enough back before to remove the stuffing box from the inside), and cleaned up the now-empty space, bringing his help to a close for now.  Obviously reinstallation of the new parts would wait till another day.

Afterwards, I got right into the rebuilding of the stern tube and aperture.  I started by sanding away the bottom paint and barrier coat all around the area to be rebuilt, and this eventually led me to notice small cracks at the seam where the old gray polyester filler ended, so with a chisel I knocked away the remains completely–better to start anew anyway, and it took only a pair of seconds (polyester= poor secondary bonding, i.e. adhesive ability= easy to knock away in a pair of seconds).  Then I cleaned up the whole area to prepare for the new work.

The stern tube was 1-1/4″ inside diameter, which dictated the size of the new bearing, and I immediately ordered a replacement bearing so that would be on hand soon.  Meanwhile, hoping to rebuild the now-truncated stern tube immediately,  I searched through materials on hand looking for a larger piece of tubing to slip over the existing length of tube (1-1/2″ OD), or something to insert within to act as a mold for new fiberglass.  I didn’t have anything on hand of the right size, so I ordered some slippery plastic rod that I’d use, upon arrival, to mold a tube extension as needed.

I moved on, and spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning up the existing parts and preparing everything for reinstallation.  I began with the shaft and old bearing, which were firmly conjoined.  With the piece held in a vice, I carefully cut through the shell of the bearing, which eventually–but still with surprising effort–allowed me to remove the offending thing.  The rubber was trashed, and clearly it was just as well that this all happened now, so the whole shafting system would be good as new once reinstalled.

The shaft was in good condition despite it all, with just the most minor of scoring (virtually inevitable) visible at the location of the old, burned-out and rock-hard, flax packing, three old rings of which were still in the packing nut and were the root cause of this whole exercise.  I cleaned up and polished the old shaft and its two brass keys.

The steel coupling was in good shape, and with a little work I cleaned it up to remove rust and make it easy to slip on the shaft, which was important since reassembling all this in the boat later would be a trial in itself given the limited space available.  I ordered replacement bolts for reinstallation.  Once I was satisfied with how it fit on the shaft, and had cleaned up the exterior sufficiently, I sprayed some primer on the coupling to prepare it for paint that would limit further corrosion in years to come.

I cleaned up the bronze packing box as needed, and applied grease to the threads, which would keep it working well for many years.  Now I cut new packing rings from graphite-impregnated packing, which was slippery and greasy where old flax was dry and hot.  I tried for four rings within the nut, but this filled it too far to thread on, even after I tightened the nut (with three rings inside) onto the packing box body to attempt to compress it.  Graphite packing doesn’t compress the same way as flax either, likely a good thing over time.  In the event, and satisfied with three rings, I set the packing by installing the packing box over the shaft in a  mock installation, which formed the packing nicely to the shaft and prepared it all for reinstallation.

To allow more room for assembly and later packing box maintenance, before Jason had left we’d determined that the packing box hose could be a bit shorter than original.  The old hose was already longer by a bit than the replacement, but to maximize room for the coupling and packing nut I trimmed about another 1/2″ from the new hose (taping off a nice straight cutting guideline first), which left plenty of hose for four clamps but didn’t waste any space.  Frankly, the use of cheap clamps with non-stainless adjustment screws on the original hose had directly led to the potential failure of the whole thing–and this project.  The hose itself was suspect only because the clamps had cut into it badly, and the rust from the clamps never did anything nearby any good.    Better original materials might have saved a couple man-days of labor.  The new hose and all-316 clamps cost a grand total of about $20, by comparison.

This all certainly took most of the day, but at the onset, before things got more complicated, I managed to steal several minutes here and there to work on the teak platform extension for the windlass.  A little fine-tuning of the contour allowed the top to be flush with the adjacent platform, and with this complete I could lay out and cut out the shape according to the windlass base itself.  I initially cut the platform 1″ larger than the actual base, but upon reflection I thought this was a little large, and I planned to trim the excess by 1/2″ for better appearance.  But I didn’t get that far on the job on this day.

Total time billed on this job today:  7 (Tim) 4 (helper)

0600 Weather Report:
35°, cloudy, snow just beginning.  Forecast for the day:  Snow, 3-6″ predicted.  8-10″ received.  Ground very soft from several warm days.

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Thursday

Errands for another project and unrelated chores took up most of the day, but back at the shop I got to work again on the pedestal, sanding and preparing the new epoxy-faired areas and applying additional material to those areas required (just the base).

The new port gaskets appeared to set up well and were well-adhered after being pressed overnight.

One of the first steps required before installing the new windlass was to prepare a new deck plate to equal the height of the adjacent bow platform and support the windlass.  To begin, I finalized my installation template, testing it against the gasket included with the windlass to ensure it was the right one (the manual and online offered several templates that looked similar, but were different).   Then, I cut out the paper template, which I’d use during the next phases of installation prep.

With the new template and a couple pieces of scrap teak, I repaired to the foredeck to mock up the new windlass base.  The two pieces I had were oddly-shaped, but together made the thickness almost perfect–just a little high, which was ideal.  Satisfied, I epoxied the two pieces together to make one, thicker piece from which I’d later cut out the new windlass base as required.

Another early consideration was the eventual placement of two foot switches.  Space for these was limited by several factors, first and foremost being the location of the chainlocker bulkhead (represented by the forward edge of the green tape in these photos).  The switches needed to be located forward of this line to allow for wiring.  The existing bronze chain pipe was also a complicating factor at the moment, as it severely limited where the new switches could go.  I mocked up three different versions of the switch placement, the third of which approximated how the switches might be located if the chain pipe were removed.  Though we’d earlier discussed leaving the chain pipe in place, it was no longer needed (and there was another on the port side, and I leaned towards removing it to allow for the fewest impediments to the switch placement.  In small boats the options are rarely ideal (nor, come to that, are the windlasses that carry the name), but one must work with what is available.

Total time billed on this job today:  3 hours

0600 Weather Report:
45°, cloudy.  Forecast for the day:  foolishly warm, 50, possible showers then sun

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Wednesday

Back in the varnish room, after the usual round of sanding I applied the fifth coat of varnish to the swashboards and cockpit table (bottom side).  Meanwhile, with sufficient base coats on the cabin sole hatches, I switched to the rubbed-effect interior satin varnish for this coat.

The steering pedestal wash showing some age, and had been touched up a few times in the past.  The original coating, where in good condition, was well adhered and immobile, but there were the usual flakes of bubbly corrosion here and there, calling for a spruce-up.

I removed the wheel and winch handle pocket for better access, and spent some time scraping and sanding as required to prepare the pedestal for new coatings.  Attempting to remove all paint would have been an exhausting fool’s errand, so where the existing coating was in good shape I lightly sanded as needed, and focused on those areas where the old coatings were failed, feathering the areas together as much as possible.

After cleaning up and a solvent-wash, I applied some epoxy fairing compound as needed to clean up the transitions between the bare spots and surrounding areas, particularly on the pedestal base where previously some sort of heavier material had been applied at some point (it was a different color and clearly not an original treatment).  There’d likely be call for another round of this minor filling before the pedestal was ready for new paint.

Next, I turned to the port gaskets, which required replacement.  The old gaskets appeared original, and were actually in fair condition, appearance-wise, still with some flexibility, but clearly they’d been around the bend a few times.

With new gaskets from Spartan Marine on hand, which were pre-assembled into the proper lengths to fit the oval ports, I got started by removing the old gaskets, which were glued in place.  I found that a small, old utility chisel worked well to remove the old gaskets.  At first, I found that the gaskets came out in many pieces, but as I honed my technique over subsequent ports the process became a little smoother, depending on how much glue had been used originally.  I got one of the eight out in a single piece, shown below next to one of the new gaskets.

After I’d removed the gaskets and scraped out as much of the old bits remaining as possible, I lightly sanded the cast cove (which contained the round gasket material) to clean it, then washed with acetone.

I installed the new gaskets with gasket adhesive, which seemed little different from ordinary contact cement.  According to product directions, I applied the adhesive to both surfaces–gasket and port body–and pressed the gaskets into place, where they stuck into the cast grooves.  Then, I closed the ports and dogged them down tightly to press the gaskets into place and, hopefully, set them permanently.

Total time billed on this job today:  6.5 hours

0600 Weather Report:
25°, cloudy.  Forecast for the day:  mixed precipitation changing to all rain and warmer, 46°

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Tuesday

I began the day as per usual with sanding and varnish for the loose hatches (4th coat).

I continued–and completed–the removal of the old windlass cable, including the solenoid in the hanging locker and another small control wire that went with it.  For ease of removal, I’d planned to cut the cable into smaller sections, but my old cutters weren’t up to the job, so after struggling with one set of cuts I pulled the rest of the cable out whole.  Overall the cable had been in fair condition, but new cable would be better and of higher quality, as the original cable was not tinned and was less flexible than the good marine cable.  At a few places where the cable disappeared behind lockers, I pulled through a length of messenger line to make installing the new cable that much easier.

Afterwards, I removed some old wire ties and mounts from the chainlocker, and removed the original foot switch to make way for the new pair that I’d be installing along with the new windlass.  I finalized the order for installation materials and cable for the new windlass, so that would be along soon so I could continue the initial parts of the installation then.

Next, I reinstalled the various bits of hardware I’d removed for the exterior varnish project, using mainly new (and mostly bronze) fasteners to replace the originals.

During a session of what he’d hoped would be routine stuffing box maintenance, the owner discovered that the stuffing box hose was in less-than-ideal condition, with rusty clamps and a suspect appearance.    Coupled with the fact that the old packing deep in the nut was highly compressed and impossible to move,  he decided, with my input, that we should go ahead and replace the stuffing box hose, which would also allow repacking of the existing packing box down on the bench since replacing the hose would require removal of the propeller shaft.  This job had been on and off the theoretical work list a couple times so far, but now it was clear the path that was required.

Access to this area, other than the convenient way I could hold a camera from the engine room to photograph the shaft and stuffing box above, was limited to a tight crawl space beneath the cockpit, which required the flexibility (and size) of a gymnast.  Permanent cabinets around the engine room prohibited access from there, and while I’d already been in both cockpit lockers a few times during earlier stages of the project, I was pessimistic about the prospects of gaining realistic access to the shaft myself.

Nonetheless, I determined to try.  Access into the cockpit locker was pretty good, but maneuvering space within was quite limited by the placement of two bulkheads and a large seacock, and once there, while I thought that theoretically I could get myself into the cozy space on top of the battery shelf, which was required in order to see–and work on–the shaft and coupling,  ultimately I decided that it’d be more efficient and prudent to call upon a helper to work in the space, so I made arrangements for a few days hence and in the meantime planned to collect the new materials required so we could complete the job on one sitting.

To mollify myself, I went ahead and removed the propeller so that the shaft would be free to move aft as required for the rest of the job.  The shaft zinc, nuts, and propeller came off without drama nor issue.

 

Total time billed on this job today:  5 hours

0600 Weather Report:
35°, mostly cloudy.  Forecast for the day:  clearing, colder, high around 38

 

 

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Monday

Continuing the varnish work on the loose hatches, I sanded, cleaned, and applied the third coat of gloss finish to all pieces.

The cabin sole was looking good, and I declared it complete, so I went ahead and removed the masking tape.

Earlier, I’d built a simple teak cover for a square hole in the cabin sole beneath the table.  Now was my first opportunity to test-fit the piece (shown here in newly-sanded varnish prep form).  If fit as expected, so I continued the varnish work on the new piece.

Next, I worked on the  genoa track extensions.  There was just under 5′ of space available between the mid-rail chocks and the existing tracks, and I left a little room for the end stops, eventually choosing to cut the new 72″ track sections to just over 59″ long for each side.

Taking care to align the new track end with the old, I dry-fit the new tracks on the toerail leading forward.  Despite extra care at the beginning end, I found that as the track bent into position, the end became slightly misaligned when all was said and done.  This was exacerbated by the fact that the ends of the original track sections were not necessarily pointing in the ideal direction to mate with a new section, but with a little fine-tuning of the seam between the two it was no problem to slide the lead car across the joint.  For each fastener location, I drilled and tapped the fiberglass deck and hull flange for machine screw threads, with a slightly larger pilot hole through the teak toerail.  Before installation, I masked off the newly-varnished surfaces on either side to protect the finish.

I removed the track and cleaned up the spoils, then installed sealant and secured the track in place, cleaning up excess sealant once the track was tightly secured.  I found that the position of the toerail so far outboard meant that the fasteners did not leave room for nuts and washers in most cases, with the screw threads often partially spun into the edge of the hull laminate.  There was nothing I could do about this, and while I’d intended (and certainly hoped) to install washers and nuts, it was not to be.  Fortunately the machine screws were threaded through a thick inward hull flange as well as the solid deck edge, and with their close fastener spacing and numerous screws I was confident the threads would hold nicely.

I repeated the dry-fit and installation process on the port side.

With the track extensions complete, I moved on to some smaller jobs to round out the day, beginning with what I thought would be a real quickie:  replace a non-functional hook latch “securing” the gimbaled stove with a proper slide bolt that would actually prevent the stove from swinging.  The existing hook didn’t hold the stove in a proper fixed, horizontal, position, and also allowed a couple inches’ movement.  This photo, taken at an earlier time in the project, shows the original latch.

This seemingly simple project self-extended through various means, from requiring several tools that weren’t handy on board (each discovered singly and at the most inconvenient moment possible), and eventually requiring removal of the bottom section of the stove to remove–and then install new–nuts and washers on the fasteners, since the micro-thin sheet metal was unworthy of holding screws on its own.  Of course removal turned into an event of its own, as the whole hinge mechanism sort of self-destructed into several component pieces that required laborious reassembly.  In the end, I managed to get it all together, and the new slide bolt fulfilled all requirements nicely.

Finally, I began the process of unfastening and removing the old windlass power cables, which I’d be replacing with new.  I went through parts of the boat, clipping old wire ties and generally freeing the old cables, and before the end of the day freed the forwardmost ends from the chainlocker and into the forward cabin.  I’d continue the process next time.

 

Total time billed on this job today:  8.25 hours

0600 Weather Report:
35°, partly cloudy.  Forecast for the day:  clouds and sun, maybe a shower, highs in the mid 50s

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Thursday

After a morning away from the shop at an appointment, I returned to the cabin sole, and went through my process of sanding, cleaning, and another coat of the satin varnish.

Meanwhile, I continued the varnish work on the loose hatches and companionway:  coat #2.

The new windlass and its related equipment was now on hand, and I temporarily unpacked the box to check it out.

Total time billed on this job today:  2.5 hours

0600 Weather Report:
15°, clear.  Forecast for the day: