Raining Varnish

Busily beavering away on the brightwork at the moment. I am hoping to have the whole upper port side done by the end of this week (which would be good since we are heading away on Kamalii for Easter). I will hold off posting pics until then.

Over the last fortnight we have given the main engine fuel system a full go-over, which it desperately needed. Also set the valve lash, and now just need to set the injectors, but already she is running so much smoother.

On Sunday we emptied out the forward fuel tank, the one that had fuel in it when we bought the boat and which probably dated from the late 1990's... Yep, it was mostly water and sludge, with trace amounts of diesel. We've purged it all out, run large amounts of meths through the tank, and have now put some clean diesel back in the tank along with a heap of biocide, which we will let slosh around over Easter before we drain it again.

Starting in on converting the house power outlets from 115V to 230V. Conceptually straight-forward, but once I've finished the conversion we will need to install an isolating transformer before we can hook up to shore power, and they are not cheap. Just keep telling myself, one thing at a a time...

How Do You Eat An Elephant?

...one bite at a time.

Chipping away at the jobs. More removal of old varnish (this lot was remarkably hard to get off). A big thanks to my Dad who has been putting in lots of hard work sanding and scraping.

Test fitting the new locker top in the cockpit, before painting.

The Smell of Sawdust

We have started on the scary job - the topside brightwork. Here's some shots of the first section after we sanded it back. Looks good, smelt even better! I actually have a few coats of Uroxsys on now, and it looks like sex on a stick, but will wait until we have all coats on before I post some pics.

Breaking Radio Silence

So, I have not posted anything for some time. This is basically because I have been too bloody busy.

In any case here's a round-up of what has happened over the last couple of months:

• Kamalii has been CLEANED. Amazing when you get a clean-Nazi like Sharon on the case how things transform. What we thought was tired old varnish was just covered in a layer of gunge, paint that we thought was stuffed now sparkles and gleams. Of course, having a family of five + guest on board means keeping it clean is another story...
• We have cleaned, sanded and polyurethand the cabin sole. Looks fantastic, except the tin of urethane used on the last few coats of the upper saloon turned out to be mis-labelled and was matt instead of gloss, so still need to sand and redo that.
• The engine room has been given much love by my Dad, Rob. It too now gleams. Fuel filters etc have been done, and we will now be giving the engine a full service - tappets, injectors, etc.  
• We fixed the mystery 24V to 12V leak and source of stray current - as suspected it was the bilge pump float switch in the engine room. Zinc fizzing has ceased.
• Much plumbing work has been done (seems that never ends); replaced the engine room bilge pump which failed on the way down, fitted a new through-hull and re-plumbed the aft bilge pump, fixed leaking valves on the water tank take-offs, etc.
• Finished the nav station; now nicely varnished with full nav computer display mounted etc.
• Washed all the squabs - it took WEEKS to wring all the water out! Won't do that again, and currently looking at replacing a lot of the foam.
• Got the mainsail all fixed up, with the batten pockets and closures done properly, and new reefing cringles fitted. The work done by Doyles in Newport Beach was an abortion - I got screwed on that job.
• Have re-coated the mizzen and booms with Uroxsys. A great product but a shit to use. Simon provided his climbing services for the mizzen mast, now we just have to build up some courage to tackle the main mast.
• We have started the big job - sanding and scraping back the old topside paint and varnish.

Jonathan has been staying with us on board, which has been great. He looks close to landing a nice gig on a boat travelling from Germany to the Caribbean, so fingers crossed for him, but it will be a sad day when he heads off.

I will endeavour to post more often now and put some pictures up of the work as it progresses.