Sailing

A couple of the latest sailing trips, short trips out into the Bass strait while i am slowly getting confidence that the new rudder wont fail me.

Mainsail Halyard replacement

The mast has not come down since we launched the boat almost four months ago. So when my mainsail halyard came loose in a storm and went up through the block on top of the mast i was literally about to do my first mast lowering (when the weather improved) and being on the water we needed real calm conditions.
Once again i had a good instructor, Mike from the Wynyard Yacht club to help me lower the mast and replace the halyard.

 The 33 year old rope wire halyard is now replaced with a 2mm thicker all rope halyard.

Rudder drama

The rudder 2 months ago split in half,

This left me without a rudder for a month while with some help from the local mens shed and a whole lot of West Systems expoxy applied i made a new rudder, this time i put a bull nose on front of it and a more gradual but longer slope towards the rear.

On the base i put 5 coats of expoxy, fiberglass and polyurethane coat over the top. The logic of the white polyurethane coat is to A. show me if a split is starting and B. it is soft, like rubber so gives a little amount of protection if we run aground.

The new rudder has done 20 hours so far on the water with no issues so far

Fishing

SV Christina is turning into one great fishing vessel, now all it needs is one great fisherman on the boat. I have managed to loose more gear over the side of the boat than fish i have caught but here are some pictures from the past three months fishing.

Day two of painting

A good 4 hours inside the boat painting today and working on the wiring inside. All navigation lights now working, mast head light working and the anchor light is about all i have left to wire up. Internal lights are all in great shape as well.

Even had time to test the table out with a homemade cocktail

Painting begins

I wasted a few hours trying to fix the Mercury outboard on the boat, so put that job to one side and leave it for a mechanic to examine.
So i began the task of painting the inside of the boat, Christina is 33 years old and no painting down on her inside before. So today the first coat started, not easy work as lots of small spaces to squeeze brushes and rollers into.

Also being a day of light rain gave me very little time to paint outside, but i opened the hatch and gave the cabin roof a little bit of paint and i have to say that looked very good.

Walk around the boat

A short video walking around the boat

A long journey to her new port

9 hours it took to drive the boat overland home to her port across the island, is quicker than a 5 day sail.

The journey started off like the ending of the Titanic movie, took us nearly 3 hours to just hook up a boat onto the 4wd, coupler was rusted solid and a good hour of hammering it and pouring lubricant into it to finally get it to work.

The cover on the boat was shredded over the cockpit which left the cockpit in a bit of a mess with leaves etc. The rest of the boat cover buckled a few stainless steel guide posts on the deck and part of the boat cover was wrapped around the axle of the trailer.


So after those 3 hours to couple and remove the cover we hit the road, 1 km, yes 1 km later the tyre blew on the trailer and the next tyre started smoking badly, we limped into the service station at Kettering to find a rude non Australian behind the counter who refused to help us, we then crawled to the next town and got told a 14km drive to the next town was needed to find a mechanic to fix the trailer.
This was after 4pm, as we pulled into the mechanic shop in Margate we had a mechanics van pull up beside us, he mentioned he noticed our trailer issue and went into his workshop, got two mechanics on the job right away. Spare wheel was fitted, grease added to the smoking bearing and i was told to drive no faster than 70km an hour back home.

Trailer has 4 wheels on two axles, mechanic said if the bearing fails you will still make it home on 3 wheels, we got home on 4 wheels doing 60km an hour, arrived just on Midnight. So all up on the day we left home at 530am and got back here 19 hours later,

Boat was worth all the effort to get her here, she is in good condition, the outboard motor is not shifting out of neutral but does run fine in neutral, looks like a cable from the tiller to the motor is broken, a cheap fix, the flares that came with the boat sale were out of date March 2015, so i have to dispose of them and the cockpit needs a good clean up to remove the tree litter, the outside white of the boat is faded and needs repainting but still i love the boat and am very thankful to the former owner for selling me this wonderful cruiser. Also i added a battery, found the internal lights working fine and the 27MHZ radio is working fine as well.

Christina from space

Christina is moving off the farm this week, an almost 500 km drive up to her new port. I found her on google earth, easy to see Christina and the tender boat from space.

Hartley boat specification

Christina is a Hartley built in 1981 to 83, named after the builders daughter. I do not change boat names, too much bad luck doing that and the name is really okay for me. Nice tradition to maintain. Below is the Hartley page specifications for the TS 21 ft boat. The difference with Christina is she has 400 kilos split over two bilge keels, so slightly heavier but more stable than the drop keel version. Also perfect as we have 3 metre difference between high and low tide here in Tasmania, so the vessel can sit on her keels if need be. TS21 Specifications Length : 6.401m. Beam : 2.413m Freeboard : forward 1.092cm, aft 63.5cm , Depth of hull amidships 91.4cm Draft : centre plate down 1.524m, centre plate up 30.5cm Sail Area : 3/4 rig mainsail 15.8m2, working jib 8.5m2 Mast head rig mainsail 10.2m2, working jib 8.8m2, Genoa 12.5m2 Length of mast : 3/4 and Mast head rig 7.315m Length of boom : 3/4 rig 3.430m, Mast head rig 3.200m Headroom in cabin : 1.168m Minimum Weight : including ballast approx. 907kg.

SV Christina is tied up for the winter, we picking her up in September when the warmer calmer spring weather arrives. In the meantime will post here more details of sailing plans as the winter drags on.