
We hope we are getting close to being ready to paint the boat. We spent this weekend getting stuff checked off our to do list. Most of it is not really photogenic, so what Nina shot on her phone is what you get. Still to do is align the engine so that it runs smoothly. New engine mounts were installed. This involved taking the old mounts off and replacing them with the ones in the photo. The red rope at the top was hooked to the hoist in the shop and lifted so that the mounts could be replaced. It can be quite mesmerizing watching chain go up and down if you’ve never played with a 5 ton hoist before. The old saggy mounts came off (they’d sagged about 1/2 inch) and the new ones were installed.

Our alternator, which charges the batteries when the engine is running, has had problems delivering its charge. Tom discovered that we didn’t have the correct mounting bracket, and that the way the alternator was installed made it difficult to get it into alignment and keep it in alignment so that the belt to the engine doesn’t wear down and throw black rubber dust all over the engine. This will all get fixed and readjusting the alternator tension should actually be easier from here on out.

Ok, so the bit of shiny plywood is not exciting, but it is a stand in for the work that was accomplished over the weekend but did not got photographed. Bill got an extra day in the shop and worked on the windvane alignment. He finally got it all in place, and was so excited to get it fit that he took it down again without taking any pictures of either the windvane in place, or the location of its mounting brackets. Thus photo of a 9″ by 4″ piece of wood. Nina is getting pretty good at designing plywood pieces to install, especially when they are simple shapes. The autopilot platform is waiting to be glassed in place. One of the delays here is that there is now a thru-hull going right through where it will be fiberglassed to the hull and we still have to locate the engine exhaust routing and thru-hull, so that platform is sitting there, making crawling in and out of the locker both easier and more challenging (think shimmy and twist in an awkwardly shaped hole but the floor is now level instead of sloping). Meanwhile, the small plywood piece will help secure the furnace bracket to the shearclamp. Nina’s light reading this week is the installation manual for the furnace. Thankfully, there is a version in English.
Other miscellaneous tasks we completed: the ceiling in the cockpit locker was primed; thru-hull hardware was sanded so that it can be laquered (sealed so that any moisture will show up more easily); and the stern pulpit was fit so that its mounting holes could be cast. Bill aligned blocks to lead the windvane stearing lines forward to the tiller. Tom installed backing blocks for the thru-hulls and added pipe fittings for the engine exhaust and the manual bilge pump on the transom.