This has gotten to be an overly long post as we have neglected any blog updates, so dear reader, you will have to bare with us as we detail our non-cruising “adventures”…….
We have been making slow but steady progress on Freedom this summer. We sorted out the hot-cold-hot-cold water issue. It turns out there was an open valve between the hot and cold lines on the water heater. There were valves on the inlet and outlet and a third valve to bridge the two lines for a reason that we will probably figure out in the future.
The starboard cap rail has been wooded down and re-varnished after we removed the stainless rails on the forward part of the boat. It was obvious that we weren’t the first people to have done this job although it appears we were the first to remove the rails and bases to do the project. The stanchion bases were sitting a little high as prior owners simply sanded around them when doing the refinishing.
Eating dinner aboard has been a challenge at times. Not because it is hard to cook; we made and mounted a propane “locker” mounted on the stern so the stove is functioning and we use our infrared grill.
The problem is were to put the dinner plates. We have been using our round table as a dinner table but it is small and unsteady. Somebody is going to spill the wine.
We planned on finding a “table” at Goodwill and trimming it down to fit on the boat and the Mate suggested we use the aft hatch on the boat. The plywood piece covers the hole until we re-core the back deck.
The teak planks almost fell off the hatch so once we cleaned up the underside we could epoxy them to a piece of 1/2″ plywood. The edges of the hatch were then banded with some mahogany that was once floorboards on an International 21 sailboat that was built in the 1950’s.
The new “table” is kept folded against the cabin side most of the time.
Seeing how we have our fuel delivery issues under control and are able to confidently leave the dock knowing we will return with out incident we set our sights on finally being able to motor out into the lake and to the beach. Of course this requires that we anchor. When anchoring, it is nice to have a windlass (in our case it is technically a powered capstan) to raise the anchor.
Our electric capstan. Note how close the anchor is to the capstan, there is no room for any chain.
We knew it didn’t work but it has been low on the priority list until recently so it was time to investigate. The wires that power the capstan run through the anchor rode locker located beneath the fore deck. It turns out that duct tape doesn’t do a good job of securing the wires so when the old, very stiff 3/4″ anchor rode gets shoved down there it lands on top of the wires, pulling them apart. It was a simple enough job to splice the wires together again but still no joy as far as turning the capstan drum. There is no foot switch to control the unit on the foredeck which is strange, only a switch in the electrical panel at the wheel at the lower steering station. All the switches are fused and this had a burned out fuse, a 2 amp one. Specs for the unit call for an 80 amp breaker so it makes sense that if any load is put on the thing, the 2 amp fuse will do it’s thing. We have a 80 amp breaker that we took off Liberty when we upgraded our windlass (the new one needed a 100 amp breaker), but that item was in Florida. For now a 35 amp fuse will have to suffice and when we come back from Florida next spring we will bring the 80 amp breaker back with us. At that time we will also install a solenoid activated foot switch and proper sized wiring direct to our battery bank.
Of course we needed to do something about the 220 feet of stiff 3/4″ three strand nylon anchor rode that refused to go back into the rode locker after we removed it. Out came the credit card and Defender shipped us 150′ of 5/8″ eight strand nylon. Eight strand (commonly called plait) stows easily due to its construction and will drop into the locker with out having to feed it in inch by inch. We thought we would save $25 by splicing a thimble in the end ourselves. Our anchor snubbers on Liberty are eight strand and we spliced in eyes in that line in 2014. We must have a short memory as we forgot how much fun that was.
Two hours later we had our thimble spliced into the end of the rode.
During this process we started tearing the teak off the front deck as we wanted to see how bad of a job this was going to be, the entire teak deck is eventually going to be removed and not replaced. We also wanted to make sure we fixed the leak in the forward cabin so pulling the deck and filling all the screw holes that held the teak on would contribute to that goal.
We found that by cutting the teak on both sides of the fasteners we could then chip out the narrow pieces of wood and remove the screws with vice grips.
Since we finally had the anchor rode out, we could inspect the rode locker before loading the new line. Now that we could see inside, the news wasn’t good. There is a Sampson post that supports the plank the capstan sits upon. Evidently there has been a leak around that post for a long time. The short version is the post was (really) rotten, the deck was rotten around the post, the bulkhead where the post attached below decks was rotten and the floor of the anchor locker was rotten as the drain in the locker had long ago plugged up. We scooped out two bags of compost (ex plywood) from this area and started rebuilding the region, putting a damper on our plan to motor out to the beach.
We cut though the thin layer of glass the covered the floor of the rode locker to find most of the underlying plywood rotten and lying in the bottom of the boat. It smelled as good as it looked. The teak Sampson post was also rotted away.
There was a “bit” of rot in the post above deck level also.
While we could build a new Sampson post from wood, we have enough white oak or maple to do the job, it was decided to forgo that as it is virtually impossible to get a good seal at the deck.
We fabricated an aluminum weldment that will support the inboard end of the anchor pulpit. Power cables will be run inside the tube so they are not just hanging out in the weather. The three sets of blue tape cover the holes where we removed the supports for the bow grate, an impossible to maintain item that looked neat but is not going to return.
Painting the area that gets the smooth coat.
The bow after the non skid and deck hardware has been re-installed.
Now we can take the boat out of the dock and maybe go to the beach. Not so fast. Somebody decided to begin tearing the teak off the back deck (actually started while we were still painting the fore deck). The steps (more like a vertical ladder with wide rungs) needed to be taken down to do this job. This means no access to the boat deck which means no leaving the dock as the lower steering station is almost impossible to drive the boat from.
With the ladder down, we can start pulling off the teak.
Once all the teak was removed we could cut into the deck and re-core the area as it was rotten and the deck felt like a sponge when you walked on it. We knew it was like this and planned to do it all along so there was no surprise here.
Scraping out the 3/4″ coring material that was totally delaminated and rotting.
The plan was to remove the core that was between the upper and lower fiberglass layers, slide new core in set in epoxy and then fill in the field before gluing and screwing the top glass back down. How hard can that be?
We needed to carve out the wood between the layers of glass.
Plan A was to use our Fein Multimaster to whittle out the wood. The normal cutting tools have fine teeth, too fine for what we wanted to do. We took a sawsall blade, cut it into a few pieces and welded this on to the normal blades. While it had a thick, aggressive tooth style, it only lasted a few minutes in use as the welding took the temper out of the original blade and it simply fractured.
We ended up with a Bosch tool that had larger teeth (tool on the left) than the standard tool. It wasn’t any thicker so it still somewhat of a major effort to remove the wood in the gap.
Port side cored and waiting for the deck skin.
Starboard side cored. We probably should have cut out the same size area as on the port side but there is a limit to how much extra work you want to create for yourself at times.
There is an endless amount of fairing that needs to be done, all the old screw holes that held down the teak and all the new screws that were countersunk into the deck skins to clamp things together while the epoxy set up. $300 worth of epoxy went into this back deck re-coring project.
What is that hose that disappears below deck in the above picture. There is a story there (of course).
We have been fighting water issues all summer. While there is an in-line water filter stuff has been getting by it (incorrect filter) leading to clogged faucets at times. One morning we awoke to no water. OK, I must have let the tanks go empty. Refill the tanks, which took almost no time and still no water. Obviously there must be stuff clogging the tank outlet for that to happen. Out comes the electric pump, the inlet hose goes into our tank fill and we then proceed to pump all of our water overboard.
Time to remove the tanks and investigate. Of course getting them out was no mean trick as the are sized to exactly go through the hatch in the back deck. One needed to be turned 180 degrees, and cocked just so to get it out. Once on the dock we cut another access hole in the top of our second tank so we could flush it and installed a fill. The junk that came out of the tank was incredible. As near as we can tell the tanks must have had some coating in it that finally failed as the stuff, when it dried out was a crumbly rubber substance.
This is just a small sampling of what was in the tanks.
Anyhow, about this time we thought that since we spend most of our time tied to a dock, why not use city water directly and bypass the boats tanks and pump system, hence the hose running through the deck on a temporary basis until we got a shore water hook up installed.
Another easier said than done. First we gave Defender some money for a Jabsco water pressure regulator. After it came we drilled appropriate holes in the transom of the boat for the fitting to find that the outlet didn’t match with 1/2″ NPT Pex fitting we purchased for this application. The Jabsco specifications said it had tapered pipe threads but we found them to be parallel threads. Defender nicely offered to take it back but the holes were already drilled in the boat. They gave me the phone number for Jabsco so I could talk to their people and I left a message concerning the outlet threads. They left me a message assuring me the fitting had tapered threads as all of their product have them. I then left them another message stating they better check their inventory as this Chinese manufactured product certainly did NOT have tapered threads. Jabsco then called me back and told me I was correct, that they were going to have to change their packaging to indicate that the outlet had parallel threads.
Installed pressure water fitting
Back deck faired and painted
We are finally done stripping the (rotten) teak off the deck. No more teak decks for us.
All the holes in the deck are filled, we will be sand, fair and paint the side decks next year.
Other news of note:
- Liberty survived hurricane Irma without a scratch. After Irma barreled through the Keys and started up the west coast forecasters had her going pretty much right over the boat. While we have insurance (deductible is $9k for a named storm) we weren’t interested in having to deal with an insurance claim in any manner but mentally prepared ourselves for the worst. We spent the late afternoon and early evening glued to the Weather Channel as they gave reports of the storms progress. Fortunately for us it came ashore in Naples. By the time Irma got to the Punta Gorda area the eye wall was falling apart as it passed by about 15 miles to our east. Friends from Burnt Store drove over to Safe Cove a few days later and upon going aboard found everything to be in perfect order. There was no water in the bilge, the batteries were at 100%, the yard (and therefore boat) had power and all fans were operational. She was OK. The storage facility right next door that had most of our interior tucked away also sustained no damage.
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Sue, another boater from Burnt Store Marina drove over the day after the storm to check on her boat and sent us this picture of the exterior.
- We actually used our Star class sailboat more than the previous years which still isn’t saying much. The boat went out day sailing twice, and we sailed a fair number of races. ending with seven first place finishes and one second place finish in class.
The next post will be after Liberty is launched at the end of October. Right now we are off to Seattle for a week.
Dave & Bobbi
Life aboard LIBERTY 