September 2015 – GypsyKramer

Week 36: White bilges

Last week we announced our party for Gypsy this Sunday. The time is 4:00-7:00 pm. I hope to see you there. We also continued to work on the cabin.

Wine tasting plans for Sunday fell through so we washed the bilge. Gypsy’s bilge was never painted. It was just bare fiberglass and mahogany floors, the big timbers that span the bilge. Considering that Gypsy is 44 years old the bilges were pretty clean. We wanted to paint them to spruce things up and to make future cleaning easier. We vacuumed them all out and washed them down with TSP. We changed water three times as we cleaned. For cleanish bilges, they still had all kinds of stuff in them. When the bilge was dry, we sanded, vacuumed and wiped with acetone. We were now ready to tape off and paint.

painted_bilge — It is amazing how much each addition of white paint brightens up the cabin.

The primer went on with a small roller and a brush. With the hatches and ports open it was not too stinky. After the party (Monday) we will put on the first coat of Interlux Bilgekote. It is a shiny, tough paint for bilges.

painted_bilge_II — We left the tops of the keel bolts unpainted. This way we can see if rust ever becomes a problem.

We are trying to get all of the projects done that need a clear space to work in. Getting the furniture bulkheads built in means that we know where we can install the plumbing, wiring, insulation and ducting for the furnace neatly and logically. The other thing you can see in the photo is our new LED trouble lights. Nina likes them because they are not hot. Incandescent lights in a small space are not a good thing for slightly beyond middle aged women. Bill likes them because the bulb doesn’t break if you bump it and Nina is happier.

Week 35: Invitation to a party

It is time to celebrate. Gypsy is back in her slip and while there still is lots of work to be done we have passed a milestone. We want to invite all of you who have been following our adventure to come and celebrate with us. If you are in Portland Sunday October 4th please drop by. The time is from 4:00 to 7:00 pm. The place is Rose City Yacht Club (RCYC). It’s a potluck party and BYOB so drop by and see Gypsy and have a good time. We will have food in the clubhouse and tours of Gypsy.

So besides thinking about throwing a party, here’s what we’ve been up to inside the boat. This week we started working on building the cabin furniture. To make sure it will fit, we are making templates that we will use to cut out the plywood parts. Then we can epoxy in the new pieces.

The templates form the seat and will be used to cut out the plywood. There will be another bulkhead in the middle of the seat, and another on the left side of the picture (not shown).

A close up of the templates. — A close up of the templates for the port settee.

stbd_side — The backrest for the starboard settee. This will be new storage. The port side will also have similar backrest/storage.

Week 34: Taking it easy, sort of

It is great to have Gypsy back in her slip. What a difference a ten minute instead of an hour commute makes. We went down on Friday night and had dinner on Gypsy. Sandwiches, chips and a beer. It was great. We did some work too. We put the boom on the mast and set up the main sheet on the traveler to control the boom. We also installed the vang.

Sunday we were back for a day of cleaning. First thing Bill wired up the shore power cord inlet to a temporary outlet so we would have power on board. This let Nina plug in the vacuum. Bill then washed the outside of Gypsy while Nina vacuumed and washed the inside. The outside went much faster than the inside. When Bill finished washing Gypsy, Nina had finished cleaning the vee berth and anchor locker.

Bill discovered the bag of fender covers that had been dropped off and went to put those on. Nina kept cleaning. The fender covers are bright burgundy. They fit Gypsy to a Tee. Nina thinks they need gold tassels. It was time for lunch so we went home and had lunch.

Aren't the fender covers great! — Even at dusk, aren’t the fender covers great!

After lunch, Nina kept cleaning and Bill installed the furler blocks and the spinnaker tack line blocks on the stanchions. We called it a day and went home.

Monday morning we finished cleaning the cabin. We still have the cockpit lockers to clean, but it was raining and you have to crawl into the lockers from the outside, so we decided they could wait for a sunny day. We did notice that we had installed the vang upside down and we fixed that. This seems to be a problem we are having. I think the solution is to go sailing.

Week 33: She Floats!

Gypsy has been launched. The blessed event has happened and we survived. Wednesday was filled with excitement, anxiety, waiting, and last minute tasks.

Gypsy is ready to be off loaded from the trailer.

We met the truck carrying Gypsy at Danish Marine at 9:00 am. While preparations for launch got under way we got the mast ready. The mast was rigged and wrapped for transport. We unwrapped it and started to put the radar, VHF radio antenna on and the wind instrument. And this was when we discovered that we had installed the wind instrument cable upside down. Pull all the wiring out of the mast, cut all those cable ties, flip the wire, rebundle it all with new cable ties, and pull it back up the mast. It’s not as neat as the original job, but it will do, and the job did go much more quickly with four of us working on it (and now Tom has at least one good story about us). Next attached were the spreaders to the mast and shrouds. About now the yard decided that there was not enough water to launch. Consulting the tide charts showed that we would have to wait until about 5:00 pm. This did give us plenty of time for those last minute changes to the mast.

On the days leading up to the launch all the last minute things were done. The engine was started for a test run, the mast had the rigging attached, the boom got lashed to the deck. All that was left was the waiting.

The mast is padded and wrapped to get it ready for the truck.

About 4:00 things started to happen.

Stepping the mast. This involves stuffing the wires down through the deck and then attaching the rigging wires to hold the mast up.

We cast off from Danish about 5:30 and arrived at RCYC at 6:15.

Week 32: The Last Weekend

Big things happened this weekend, and it was, if you are not actively working on the boat, more of the same. When we arrived on Sunday, Tom had the engine hooked up and hoses installed. We still had plenty to do. Bill set to work wiring the engine so that it was connected to the batteries, which he had to haul up from the basement. There are 5 batteries and they each weigh 65 pounds. Nina installed the rest of the rub strips and learned to bend stainless trim. The dodger was attached, the traveler installed, and the mast had the shrouds attached. What’s left to do?

The dodger and the traveler installed. The dodger, other than being bulky and awkward to get up the stairs to the boat, went on quite smoothly. The traveler took some readjustment, but worked out fine in the end.

red_doors — The last of the signature look for Gypsy, the red doors will be temporary. We reinstalled the old doors after touching up the paint and we’ll eventually be replacing them with drop boards. Too many projects, not enough time.

Hoses were installed during the week while we were not at the shop. This is a new seat drain hose connected to the new deck drains.

auto_pilot — The autopilot finally bolted in place. Chris got to crawl down into the new tight locker and get the arm bolted in place and install the cable brake to the rudder post fixture. It all looks lovely down there, but there really is no room for anyone larger than a six year-old. We will be building a platform over the autopilot arm so that all the gear that gets dropped in a locker won’t impede the arm.

One of the last things that Nina worked on was re-rigging the mast. All the shrouds went back on. Everything was neatly labeled with tape so the installation went fairly quickly except for bending cotter pins: fussy business, much better done on the ground than in the air.

dodger_rudder — One last shot from the upper door. The dodger is installed but the doors are not yet on. Most of the rub strips are on and Tom is giving the boat a quick once over.