Thanks Sweetie is back on the water for the 2019 season, earlier than I expected considering it had been stored off site for the winter to get some needed maintenance complete.
Over the winter we had some longer term and recurring maintenance done that was mostly dependent on a haul-out. Our marina is capable of only the most basic maintenance, mostly oil and gear lube changes and winterizing and the nearby marina which serves as its preferred shop for more complex engine and mechanical work has stopped being available to other customers besides their own.
We got lucky last year after not being able to get any response from the "preferred" vendor to make a relationship with this year's storage/maintenance facility, Indoor Boat Storage. They have a really talented mechanic who sorted out our fuel consumption problem (detailed in previous blogs) and it made sense to have them perform some remaining and recurring maintenance -- pull and inspect the drives, replace the drive bellows, the generator exhaust hose, as well as the biannual replacement of water pump impellers on both propulsion engines and the generator.
It was an expensive diversion from the marina's storage, which is inherently cheaper since there's no hauling off site. Indoor Boat charged more overall and for winterization, but there was no easy way to get the drive service and impeller replacement done at the marina so it was a cost that I had to bear.
I was worried that spring delivery would be late -- the storage facility is 30 miles away, and there's always a mad rush and queue to get boats back into the water, and with ours on the larger side it's a bigger time commitment. I got lucky and called the same week as ice out and was pleased to get a commitment to deliver the boat on May 4th, within about a week of when the boat would have been back on the water even with on-site storage.
As it turned out, I scheduled this for the same weekend as a trip to Chicago. This isn't really an issue, the storage people plus the marina can handle the tie-up. As it happens, the storage people were delayed (and quite apologetic about the delay) and didn't deliver the boat until the Monday following the planned previous Friday delivery.
I didn't mind the delay since I was out of town, and as it happens it worked to our benefit because the snowy February and somewhat rainy spring has the lake level quite high. This can complicate launch, especially from an off-site delivery which uses a public boat ramp and requires transiting the relatively low bridge in our bay. The delay of a few dry days allowed a couple of inches of drop in lake levels, insuring channel clearance.
More importantly, it guaranteed we'd fit in under the slip cover. Out boat is, to borrow a related maritime phrase, "panamaxed" to our slip. ("Panamax" refers to ocean freighters built to the maximum size to clear the Panama canal, which is smaller than many modern ocean freighters). The slip is 34' x 12' and we are 33' 6" x 10', and the slip cover is proportionate to this. During normal summer water levels we have about 18" of aerial clearance between the high spot on the boat (TV antenna) and the frame.
But with the lake up nearly 8" at maximum, I was really concerned we'd be risking not fitting under the frame and cover. This isn't totally fatal, as the frame and cover are removable, but then I lose weather coverage probably incur a fee for removal and reinstallation when water levels went down.
The delay helped here, and the water levels declined and we fit in with just enough clearance. We had intensive rain two days after delivery, and the lake went up two inches. I was really concerned we'd start pressing against the canvas cover, but a visit yesterday indicated we have a good 6" before this happens, and then the solution is just to remove the TV antenna and lower the all-around light staff.
Right now we are probably danger close to clipping the TV antenna if we move the boat out of the slip, but with our schedule this weekend and fairly cold weather we won't be taking it out this weekend and hopefully the lake will start dropping again. The outlet of the lake is into the Minnehaha Creek and the watershed district which controls the dam has been restricting outflow due to the creek running "bank full" and flooding some low lying areas along its path.
With any luck, we'll have dry weather, the watershed district will keep the dam at least at 250 cfm (if not 300 cfm at some point). Several warm sunny days will also help, driving some evaporation losses as well which will help get the lake back closer to nominal normal water levels, 949.4 ft above sea level. It's 949.88 at current writing, about 6" over the datum and probably 8-10" over typical summertime levels.
What's nice is that the water levels are my only big worry with the boat this summer, having had nearly all my mechanical issues sorted out. It doesn't mean the boat isn't without potential projects, but the ones I'd really like to do are way too expensive to ponder for this year -- MFD/sounder replacement, cockpit carpet replacement, and anti-fouling painting of the stern and drives (which requires a haul-out anyway).
I did get some cheap self-service stuff done. The aging cockpit carpets got their lease on life extended this spring. The first year I had the boat, the carpet backing, a black rubber coating was crumbling badly. I sprayed it with "Plasti-Dip" then, which helped encapsulate the rubber and stop the decay. But spray Plasti-Dip proved frustratingly poor in coverage (I used 4 cans I think), and it was starting to wear. I discovered the paintable version of Flex Seal, and used it to re-coat the carpet bottoms. Much better coverage and a more durable, silicone-like rubber which ought to outlast the carpet itself which is pretty worn and hard to get anything like "clean".
The only downside was that the coating shrinks as it cures, and this made the carpet a bit of a pain to get snapped down, requiring a pliers to stretch it to get the snaps snapped. But it's in, and it should hold up for at least another year or more until we decide if we want to invest in a replacement, which ideally with be an EVA foam like "Sea Deck" which is glued down and semi-permanent. It runs thousands of dollars custom installed, so it will probably be something I will have to do myself with a knock-off version sourced from E-Bay. But not this year!
The other project I managed to knock out within a week of returning to the water was extending and repainting the anchor chain. I replaced the original chain and rode combination last year with an all-chain setup, 125' of new 5/16" chain. It runs much better than the rode through the windless in addition to supplying a pound per foot in weight, which aids in anchoring and anchor hold.
I still had the old rode and 25' chain. I had cut the rode from the chain and washed it in the washing machine -- it's like new now, but I probably won't ever reinstall it as we have little use for an anchor setup which would exceed 100' of anchor rode, and certainly not a situation where I would need to play out 150' of chain plus any length of rode. The lake isn't deep enough we'd ever need this, and where it technically might be, we'd never anchor, nor would we anchor out deep enough and in poor weather where such a scope ratio would make sense.
The 25' of chain seemed a waste to throw, but connecting it to the new length of chain in a way that would run through the windlass was a challenge. Sourcing a machine shop which could weld the links proved difficult, so I thought I'd give a "monkey link" a shot. These are galvainized half-links of chain which link chain segments, and mate together to form a continuous link. Small barbs extend through and are hammer peened down to make the link connector solid. It was kind of a challenge to hold the link on my tiny vise anvil and hit them hard enough with a ball-peen hammer, but I managed to do it and only hit my hand once.
The 125' chain I painted last year got sprayed neon green at 10' intervals, with the last 10' painted neon orange as a warning indicator. This worked great, with the conceptual error on my part of painting the "first" 10' up to the anchor green as well. Unless you count closely, you have no visual indicator that the anchor is almost up, it's just another green segment.
So the overall plan was to extend the chain with the original 25' and paint the entire 10' segment closest to the anchor a unique color. I ended up painting the 25' segment "stop red" and the first 10' of the 125' segment white for contrast.
The real problem with all of this was the need to take the entire chain and anchor off the boat. The issue was that I had connected the bitter end of the chain with a large stainless caribiner to the anchor eye inside the anchor locker. When I did this last year, it was a major challenge. There's an access port, but it's about 8" in diameter and the anchor eye is deep inside the anchor locker, deeper than I could get my arm into. Some deep frustration, blue tape and a boat hook got it done, but removal seemed impossible.
I bought a "grabber", a tool with a set of jaws and a 4' handle with a grip that activates the jaw thinking I could use it to grab and release the carabiner. This proved worse than the installation. I finally got clever, however, and realized if I could get he anchor locker strut removed, I might get my arm another 4" into the locker and be able to actually grab the carabiner with my hand. It worked like a charm, and I was able to get it released and bring it home.
I applied two coats of paint over the next day, and brought it back to the boat when I went yesterday. I'm thrilled to report that not only did the monkey link pass through the windlass with no problems, I was also able to easily reconnect the carabiner, reconnect the strut to its mount without losing the screws and it's all back, ship-shape as they say, and it's done for the season or longer, plus I know I can disconnect it at some point in the future when the paint wears off.
I primed the chain where I neon painted it last year, but didn't prime the new paint areas. The red 25' length will probably never get played out, so the only wear it will see is in the anchor locker, but the white enamel will probably wear quite quickly, and even the primed areas neon painted are wearing, mostly because you can't get a very durable neon spray paint, in addition to the general wear factor of the anchor rollers, water and windlass. But knowing it can be re-done fairly easily is good.
Other than that, I'm kind of coasting into boating season with everything pretty much ready. I'm sure the Vacuflush system will give me some kind of trouble this summer. The toilet-to-pump hose length I think is somewhat permeated, but this is an impossible replacement job. I've got vague ideas of trying to coat it with Flex Seal or EPDM roof sealant on the inside, but that will be a desperation move and I'm not sure what this would really involve -- probably multiple passes with a rag on a strong pull string to dry the interior, and then pouring the lining liquid into the hose. The challenge here is probably using up couple of gallons in the process @ $120/gallon, not making a colossal mess doing it, whether you can get it sufficiently coated to the hose interior, and whether it would "work".
But that's not a project for this year, right now it's waiting for the weather and some good boating!
