We have decided to add a bit more purpose to entering the race as well as trying out sailing off soundings. We will now be raising funds for three charities. These will be:
Action Medical Research is supported by my friend Peter Osazuwa at work and we are pleased to be able to help his charity out.
Action Medical Research
The RNLI is an obvious one and works to save lives at sea in the UK and Ireland
RNLI
Finally, my Mother is heavily involved in supporting a childrens home in Nairobi called Shangilia.
Details on how we will be fundraising area bit sketchy at present but we will work out details and suitable publicity in due course.
As ever: watch this space!
Sunday 31 January 2010
Wednesday 27 January 2010
Grit blasting done
Symblast came down and did the deed yesterday. We had originally planned that it should be done today but they had a space yesterday and I couldn't rearrange my day off so I went down today to have a look.
As before, when they did Kemara, they have done a thorough job and she is now all ready for the coppercoat. We now have to hope for a suitable weekend to crop up before Easter so that we can get it done.
This picture says it all! If anyone wants to have years of accumulated antifoul removed, I can certainly recommend Symblast. Usual stuff about no relationship and all that sort of thing. Click here for their website Symblast.
Sunday 24 January 2010
Flares and lack of them
Bloody flares. I am sure that the details on Sarah G said that she had flares that were in date till 2010. Turns out they all expired in 2004 so we have no flares. The things are quite expensive as well. The AZAB/ORC/RORC regulation pack is around £200. An offshore pack which doesn't include white anti collision flares. Other packs come down appropriately in price but the simple fact is that they are a lot of money for something that you want to have to throw away when they go out of date. Even worse than your average consumable which at least gives you some use.
Oh well, we will have to see what we can find.
Oh well, we will have to see what we can find.
Saturday 23 January 2010
Bit of work Done
We managed to get down to Sarah G today and had a nice but cold day doing things.
The biggest bit was to get a length of multiplait rope spliced onto the end of the anchor chain. The process is actually quite easy but of course I managed to make a small mistake that contrived to treble the amount of work involved.
I had picked up a bargain from ebay and had 50M of 14mm multiplait rope. A good little extra was that it had an eye with thimble spliced into one end.
Anyway, I pulled all the chain out of the locker and fed it over the bow roller. I then unrolled the rope from the drum it came on and managed to make sense of the instructions I had downloaded for the rope to chain splice. It was quite easy and I was feeling quite pleased with myself. The next step was, of course, to restow the much longer anchor line in the locker. I passed the eye end of the rope onto the foredeck and climbed aboard. Now, you will be able to work out my stupid bit! The eye was never going to fit down through the tube which the chain comes up. We therefore went through a great complicated rigmarole of feeding all the rope and chain into the cockpit and then through the cabin and into the locker. Finally, I dropped a rope down the chain pipe and Audrey tied it to the end of the chain and pulled it up. Now all I had to do was feed all the rope and chain back down to the ground again prior to stowing it properly in the locker.
We do at last have 90M of anchor warp and I have also had the option to inspect the chain link by link twice!
Anyway, here is a rather gray picture of how she is looking at the moment.
The biggest bit was to get a length of multiplait rope spliced onto the end of the anchor chain. The process is actually quite easy but of course I managed to make a small mistake that contrived to treble the amount of work involved.
I had picked up a bargain from ebay and had 50M of 14mm multiplait rope. A good little extra was that it had an eye with thimble spliced into one end.
Anyway, I pulled all the chain out of the locker and fed it over the bow roller. I then unrolled the rope from the drum it came on and managed to make sense of the instructions I had downloaded for the rope to chain splice. It was quite easy and I was feeling quite pleased with myself. The next step was, of course, to restow the much longer anchor line in the locker. I passed the eye end of the rope onto the foredeck and climbed aboard. Now, you will be able to work out my stupid bit! The eye was never going to fit down through the tube which the chain comes up. We therefore went through a great complicated rigmarole of feeding all the rope and chain into the cockpit and then through the cabin and into the locker. Finally, I dropped a rope down the chain pipe and Audrey tied it to the end of the chain and pulled it up. Now all I had to do was feed all the rope and chain back down to the ground again prior to stowing it properly in the locker.
We do at last have 90M of anchor warp and I have also had the option to inspect the chain link by link twice!
Anyway, here is a rather gray picture of how she is looking at the moment.
Saturday 16 January 2010
Back From the Boatshow
We had a very enjoyable time at the boatshow yesterday though we do have a lighter pocket as well. We had always intended to spend a bit of money but after looking at the various AIS options, we did plump for buying the Simrad AI50. This is a self contained transponder. It is a class B unit but has a small screen with a basic world map to display on and allows you to get the information on ships in your vicinity. In an ideal world I would like to be able to overlay this information onto the radar. This is not, unfortunately, possible with our set up as our radar is deemed too old to be able to be upgraded to accept AIS input. Eventually, we did a bit o humming and hahing and decided to take the plung, thus making the day of the sales woman on the Simrad stand.
On other stands, we did quite a lot of talking to different people about things like different anchors (Rocna vs. Delta), supplies of multiplait anchor line, satellite phones, liferafts, new engines and holding tanks. Some of the information was very useful. The satellite phone guy was very interesting. I have, so far been in favour of renting a phone but he was adamant that the best bet would be to buy one and then sell it on once we had done with it. I have a suspicion that, in this case we might well hang onto it. They are however pretty expensive though, starting at £1100.
The liferaft thing was also interesting as it is not clear from the AZAB and ISAF rules whether the ISO9650 certification is adequate but the word from the people at the show was that this is the case so may make the case for buying a liferaft more of an option.
Of course, we also verified that the Guiness was still up to scratch though it was a bit of a shock to see the Guinness stand selling other stuff like Kronenbourg!
Anyway, onwards and upwards. The grit blast guy will be down next Friday and we will spend the weekend working out how to get our new electronic toy installed and also where to site the arial that AIS needs. We can also make a start on more mundane stuff like sanding the toerail and generally cleaning and polishing her.
And so the saga goes on!
On other stands, we did quite a lot of talking to different people about things like different anchors (Rocna vs. Delta), supplies of multiplait anchor line, satellite phones, liferafts, new engines and holding tanks. Some of the information was very useful. The satellite phone guy was very interesting. I have, so far been in favour of renting a phone but he was adamant that the best bet would be to buy one and then sell it on once we had done with it. I have a suspicion that, in this case we might well hang onto it. They are however pretty expensive though, starting at £1100.
The liferaft thing was also interesting as it is not clear from the AZAB and ISAF rules whether the ISO9650 certification is adequate but the word from the people at the show was that this is the case so may make the case for buying a liferaft more of an option.
Of course, we also verified that the Guiness was still up to scratch though it was a bit of a shock to see the Guinness stand selling other stuff like Kronenbourg!
Anyway, onwards and upwards. The grit blast guy will be down next Friday and we will spend the weekend working out how to get our new electronic toy installed and also where to site the arial that AIS needs. We can also make a start on more mundane stuff like sanding the toerail and generally cleaning and polishing her.
And so the saga goes on!
Wednesday 13 January 2010
Two Bits of Good News
Now there are four Rivals in total in the AZAB. Tantine, ourselves, Emanon and Dequila. Emanon is even a 34 so we can be some sort of counterbalance to the flotilla of Contessa 32s. Dequila is a 41 but she is still a Rival.
I also had some fun today as I have commissioned a company to grit blast Sarah G and he will be doing it next Friday. It is a bit pricey but paying for the grit blasting and coppercoat is definitely a good idea. We did Kemara, our old Hurley 22 three years ago and it has been a great success though you do seem to need to plan a quick dry out and scrub off mid season.
The grit blasting is a very interesting experience as it makes and incredible noise but is amazing to see the old antifoul come off. Putting the coppercoat on is another interesting experience but also quite exciting and satisfying when it is finished though the deep reddish brown copper colour quickly corrodes to a verdigris green. It is nice though only having to pressure was off each season rather than go through the chore of applying loads of evil gunk from Blakes or International each spring.
I also had some fun today as I have commissioned a company to grit blast Sarah G and he will be doing it next Friday. It is a bit pricey but paying for the grit blasting and coppercoat is definitely a good idea. We did Kemara, our old Hurley 22 three years ago and it has been a great success though you do seem to need to plan a quick dry out and scrub off mid season.
The grit blasting is a very interesting experience as it makes and incredible noise but is amazing to see the old antifoul come off. Putting the coppercoat on is another interesting experience but also quite exciting and satisfying when it is finished though the deep reddish brown copper colour quickly corrodes to a verdigris green. It is nice though only having to pressure was off each season rather than go through the chore of applying loads of evil gunk from Blakes or International each spring.
Friday 8 January 2010
Bloody snow
Although I usually enjoy a bit of snow, this one is proving to be a right pain in the backside. As it has effectively brought the SE of England to a standstill and I am really not likely to want to try sanding the toerail in freezing temperatures any work on the boat or even a bit of messing around is now on hold.
Oh well, we should be able to get down there sometime soon anyway.
Oh well, we should be able to get down there sometime soon anyway.
Tuesday 5 January 2010
Pre boatshow update
Not a lot of activity of course but we have been thinking about what to look for at the boatshow (apart from AIS of course).
I have also been making arrangements for Sarah G to be grit blasted and copper coated. We have become firm converts to Coppercoat after putting it on our last boat Kemara.
I have also been doing some testing on a revamped AZAB web site which should be going live soon so I will be linking to it from here.
I spent the commute into work this morning going through the ISAF Special Regulations and highlighting in green the things we will have to check on and probably spend money on as well.
Happy times!
I have also been making arrangements for Sarah G to be grit blasted and copper coated. We have become firm converts to Coppercoat after putting it on our last boat Kemara.
I have also been doing some testing on a revamped AZAB web site which should be going live soon so I will be linking to it from here.
I spent the commute into work this morning going through the ISAF Special Regulations and highlighting in green the things we will have to check on and probably spend money on as well.
Happy times!
Friday 1 January 2010
Aries work
We started looking at our Aries today. It is basically fine though a couple of the alloy castings are cracked. The springs in the ratchet controller are a bit ropey but generous doses of WD40 are working their usual wonders. Critically, the main bearing on the rudder appear to be fine. All in all it is looking good. We have a few parts to buy from Helen Franklin and we need to replace the control and tiller ropes but a visit to a chandlers should sort that out.
The Aries really is an amazing piece of equipment. There are literally less than 90 parts to it though some of those are quite large and industrial like. It will be fun getting to grips with it and we will need a name for it. Captain Haddock is one but not a very original one. The autopilot has already earned the name of George so we need something different for Aries - perhaps something to do with a star near Aries in the sky.
On other fronts, I think that we have solved the problem of what to do with the AIS. Silva make a transponder that has it's own display so will not require the purchase of a chartplotter or new radar. Reports from others are that AIS is a fantastic invention and makes traditional radar more or less redundant. If this truly proves to be the case, I could recoup some of the cost of the AIS by selling the radar on ebay. I will have to have a close look at all the options at the boat show.
Time is passing now we are in 2010. 18 months to the start which is making things seem nearer anyway!
The Aries really is an amazing piece of equipment. There are literally less than 90 parts to it though some of those are quite large and industrial like. It will be fun getting to grips with it and we will need a name for it. Captain Haddock is one but not a very original one. The autopilot has already earned the name of George so we need something different for Aries - perhaps something to do with a star near Aries in the sky.
On other fronts, I think that we have solved the problem of what to do with the AIS. Silva make a transponder that has it's own display so will not require the purchase of a chartplotter or new radar. Reports from others are that AIS is a fantastic invention and makes traditional radar more or less redundant. If this truly proves to be the case, I could recoup some of the cost of the AIS by selling the radar on ebay. I will have to have a close look at all the options at the boat show.
Time is passing now we are in 2010. 18 months to the start which is making things seem nearer anyway!
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