New Dodger & Bimini

Dodger and Bimini Before

Dodger & Bimini In Progress

Anchor Alarm

Our Furuno chart plotter has an anchor watch feature that you can set in the cockpit and at the nav station independently of each other. What's nice is that it draws a diameter of the limit you set. That way, you don't have to guess what to set it to. Our first night at anchor, we set .010nm (60ft). The anchor alarm went off in the middle of the night and we woke up, flashed the spotlight and tried to determine if we were dragging. The location indicator for the boat was hovering near the edge of our swing radius. After deciding that we were not dragging, and that our swing radius was set too small, we decided to set the anchor watch to .020nm (121 ft). Below are our anchor alarm circles for 2 different nights. The red marks inside the circle are our tracks from swinging at anchor.

Tomato and Mozzarella Fans

On our way back to Hayden Island, Geralyn made this beautiful and delicious lunch. It's a recipe from a Jaques Pepin cookbook that we like; Fast Food My Way.

Martin Island

We found this cool little anchorage called Martin Slough, on the north side of the Columbia. The approach is a little shallow, but no problem at this time of the year, with the river near flood stage. There were a few boats in the anchorage already, so we picked a spot we thought was far away from the other boats, but once we had let out our anchor chain, we thought our swing radius was too close to a trawler. We didn't want to worry about it, so we raised the anchor and dropped it again about 100 ft back. This time, we landed pretty close to shore, but after monitoring our swing, decided it would be ok. Our Furuno chart plotter has an anchor watch feature that you can set in the cockpit and at the nav station independently of each other. During the evening, we set both so we could hear the alarm in either the cockpit or in the cabin. At night, we set the anchor watch at the nav station only, to conserve amps. We also have a handheld Garmin GPS that has an anchor watch, so if we are worried about dragging anchor, we can set the handheld anchor alarm in the forward berth as well. Depth was 30ft, so we let out 200ft of scope (almost 7:1).

Martin Island

Broken ATN Spinnaker Sock Block

A couple of weeks ago, we had a try at the cruising spinnaker. The conditions were perfect with light NW winds. Our cruising spinnaker comes in this ATN spinnaker sock, which no one onboard was familiar with. We have flown traditional spinnakers before, with a turtle, topping lift, downhaul and sheets, but never a spinnaker with a sock before.We connected the spinnaker halyard to the head of the sail/sock. Then, we hoisted the sock with the sail in it. We connected the tackline to the bow roller since it is forward of the bow pulpit. We had attached two blocks at the stern, to control both sheets and ran the lazy sheet in front of the headstay. We hoisted the sock halfway up, and started to run into some resistance, so we lowered the sock and tried hoisting again. This time we noticed some fuzzy bits flying out of the top of the sock. We all agreed that this was probably not a good thing, so we lowered the sock on deck. There is a block at the top of the sock that has a loop running through it. Apparently, the line that is used to hoist the sock, must not be cleated or secured tightly (which is exactly what I did). This made the line come out of the block and start to chafe on the frame of the block. I contacted ATN and they sent me a replacement, which has already been installed. We tested raising the sock at the dock and it went up no problem. We'll have to try using the cruising spinnaker again soon!

Sailing & Fishing

Ram Ball Joint - done!

The ball joint that joins the autopilot hydraulic arm to the tiller arm was so corroded, that I couldn't pull the clevis pin out. I ended up using a puller and a hacksaw to get the pin out (previous post). Since Simrad makes the hydraulic linear drive, the ball joint is kind of a special part (metric). I found a company that sold me the ball joint, and another company in the UK that sold me the metric (12mm) stainless steel clevis pin to fit inside the ball joint. I was a little worried about buying something from overseas, but fortunately Boneham Metal Products have great customer service and the UK Royal Mail rocks! Six days later I received the clevis pin. Last night I put the pin in. It was a tight fit as there is no wiggle room inside the ball joint, but it worked.

Water Heater Leak

We have an 11 gallon Isotemp 40 water heater onboard. The heater works off AC power when the boat is connected to shore power. When the boat is not on AC power, the water heater works off the engine hot water return. The engine hot water is at 130 degrees, so through a thermo-mixing valve, we get more than 11 gallons of hot water for doing dishes or taking showers.

A while back, we noticed one of the fittings to the water heater had sprung a small leak. The liquid coming out of the fitting was pink. The engine coolant is pink, so we found out the leak was at the fitting for engine hot water return. We didn't want to be without hot water for the weekend, and the leak wasn't too bad, so we put an absorbent pad under the fitting, to monitor. After this weekend, we decided to make this project a priority since a coolant leak could make the engine overheat. It was hard to tell where exactly the leak was coming from, but after we took the fitting off and cleaned the area, we identified the source of the leak. The coolant was leaking out of the threaded connection from the heater to the hose. We put a small plastic container under the fitting, and disconnected the hose from the heater. A little coolant came out and spilled into the container. We cleaned up the threads on the heater side (stainless steel) and the hose connector (brass), then applied thread sealant to both. The heater manufacturer called for Loctite 577 or Bondline thread sealant, but we couldn't find them. We found high strength Loctite and Medium strength Permatex though. After a quick consultation with Geralyn's sister in Iowa, Pam, we decided to use the medium strength over concerns that the high strength thread sealant would create too strong a seal and damage the heater if we ever had to take it apart again. The thread sealant takes 20 minutes to set and 24 hours to cure, so later on this week, we will top up with coolant to replace what we lost when we took the fitting off. Then, with the heater exposed, we are going to crank up the engine at the dock and look for leaks.
Before


Before

During

During

After

Anchor Chain Depth Marks

Usually, folks will mark their anchor chain so they know how much chain has gone out. This is helpful for calculating scope. Scope is the length of anchor line relative to the distance from your boat's deck to the sea bottom. Geralyn and I usually do 3:1 for lunch or fishing and 7:1 or more for overnight anchoring. We've noticed our anchor has marks on it, but never knew the system that was used. This past week, we took all the chain onto the dock and documented the previous owner system for marking the anchor chain. We like the system, so we won't change it, just touch it up a bit so the marks can be seen more clearly. We keep a copy of the system posted in the cockpit and the bottom of the anchor locker door.

Here is the system:

w = white
y = yellow
g = green
o = orange

30 ft = W
60 ft = WW
90 ft = WWW
120 ft = Y
150 ft = YY
180 ft = YYY
210 ft = G
240 ft = GG
270 ft = GGG
300 ft = O
330 ft = OO
360 ft = OOO
390 ft = Long O

w = one white mark
ww = two white marks
www = three white marks

Primary Anchor - 35lb Delta G4 5/16 chain

Secondary Anchor - Fortress. 135 ft rope. 15 ft chain.

Engine Access

Whenever I check the transmission oil, I have to remove the companionway steps and lay on top of the engine. Taking the steps out is a minor nuisance and laying on top of a warm engine is a little unsettling. Dave, from Lightspeed, suggested checking the oil from the opposite side by going through the lazarette and laying on top of the battery cover. However, he noted that I should cut the screws down on the cover so that I could lay on top of it without having them jab me. While I was rerouting the battery cable, I took the opportunity to cut one of the screws down with a hacksaw. It was a great idea. I will finish cutting the rest of them off soon.

Stereo Cable Wired to Starter Battery

I noticed a while ago that the stereo battery was wired to the starter battery. I knew if I didn't remove the cable and the stereo was left on, it would drain the starter battery. I rewired the cable to the house battery today.
(The yellow cable is the stereo cable and the other two are for battery monitor and echo charge).

Stereo Cable connected to Starter Battery

Stereo Cable now connected to the House Battery.

Mother's Day

We spotted this new family on Mother's Day. This may be the hen that visited us before. :)

Winch Reassembly Part 2

With our missing part in place, we finished the assembly of the winch. Notice the motion of the boat, and the testing at the end with winch handle and jib sheets.

Winch Reassembly Part 1

We started putting one of the primary winches together, but realized we had forgotten a part, so we had to take it apart and start over.

Winch Maintenance

This weekend we took some time to clean and lube our Lewmar winches. It was a bit intimidating because it was our first time. We read that it can be a bit tricky reassembling the winch, but in the end it wasn't too bad - actually kind of fun. We managed to complete four of them, 2 44s and 2 50s. We will complete the two 30s on the mast next. Bring it on!

This one definitely needs some cleaning.

Cleaned and ready to be reassembled.

Ram Ball Joint Final Chapter

I borrowed a puller and put it on the ram ball joint. I was able to push it out enough to cut the rest out. Wow, this little sucker gave me a hard time! Now it's time to find a replacement joint. We can still sail and steer, just no autopilot. The autopilot ram is hard over and the switch is taped over so it can't be energized accidentally.

Diesel Heater and Salmon Fishing

Last weekend our Wallas diesel heater quit working. Our digital display read "flame out". We called Scanmarine and they said the combustion chamber probably needed cleaning. So we disconnected the unit and sent to Seattle. Scanmarine cleaned the chamber, upgraded the software on the unit and sent it back. We spent Saturday installing the unit, and now we are getting "undervoltage". I'll have to call Scanmarine on Monday to find out what may be causing the unit to report low voltage. The voltage is fine otherwise. I have several appliances that are voltage sensitive and they are all working fine.
Salmon season has been extended on the Columbia River, so on Sunday we decided to take a little break from boat projects and go fishing! It was a little chilly without heat, but with the propane stove, we made some hot tea and lunch, so no complaints. We didn't catch the big one this time, but we know there's a big salmon out there looking for our very enticing lure!
Getting the heater in here involved a little "boat yoga".


This is the space where the heater goes.

Refurbed heater ready to be installed.