A Catch Up

A Catch Up
"Mogane" in the cradle after pressure washing.

OK so it’s been ages since I last posted in the blog. It’s not because I have forgotten about it but I suppose that I have dropped the habit or something like that.

Since mooring “Morgane” at the Canache in Stanley, in March, this is brief chronology of what I have been up to:

  • a few weeks running a hydro-graphic survey boat surveying in and around Port William
  • cut six floor access panels to access the saloon bilges for storage and maintenance
  • fit several lourvers to ventilate various lockers and spaces.
  • catch a rat that managed to get aboard
  • building a new galley
  • building a new nav-station/desk including DC switch panel and built in boat computer
  • flew to South Africa
  • refit “Pelagic Australis” including; a new engine, new electronics, new radar arch, dry dock, DNV survey
  • sail back to Stanley from Cape Town – 21 days.
  • back to working on”Morgane”
  • painting white work in saloon
  • Saloon upholstery
  • re-wiring main DC distribution, switch panel, and lighting including red-lighting circuit
  • re-install Ā Refleks heater in stainless steel tray and create a drying locker space.
  • new anchor and chain
  • build a tender

That just about takes us up to Christmas. In amongst all of that I have sold my big old house and a new smaller more practical house for me is taking shape and should be complete in a couple of weeks time.

“Morgane” is now on the beach. She was quite a sight when she came out with a complete ecosystem attached to her bottom. I don’t actually know when she was last out of the water but probably about six years ago; therefore there was no anti-fouling paint left on her. Sitting on a pontoon in the Canache in Stanley since March with it’s high currents had been a perfect breeding place for all the critters that like to live on the bottom of boats. Ā After a thorough high pressure wash down her bottom was revealed and there were no nasty surprises lurking; the anodes have done their job well and the few small areas of exposed steel were in good condition.

I have now cleaned up her bottom and fixed some paint defects that were mostly small blisters caused by scratches. I have pulled the propeller shaft and have ordered a replacement cutlass bearing, bushes for the drive coupling and a new rubber boot for the PSS shaft seal, all of that should be in my hands next Monday DHL permitting.

I have also cut a hole for a new transducer for a furuno sonar/fishfinder that I am installing, and tomorrow we will be welding up an old unused transducer hole that I considered to be in a poor location for the new sonar transducer.

I have painted the starboard side underwater sections with a Vinyl chloride resin paint that will be the base for the new anti-fouling; the port side will be painted tomorrow after the welding is completed.

TTMorgane
The new tender takes shape.
The new upholstery
The new upholstery
The nav station
The Nav station, comms, and DC switch panel.
A dirty bottom
After hauling; a forest of tunicates with a few mussels and barnacles thrown in.
After pressure washing
“Mogane” in the cradle after pressure washing.

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