Lots of small jobs and getting closer to sailing

Here is the list of jobs for the weekend. The ones crossed through are those we completed today!

• Solder cables in for'ard locker
• Prattley glue muffler to engine room floor
• Finish fitting for'ard heads door
• Finish for'ard cabin woodwork
• Reinforce sail locker floor
• Step for sail locker
• Fit chain wash switch
• Fit danforth anchor cradle in sail locker
• Varnish for'ard cabin
• Buy & collect Raymarine equipment
• Varnish rubbing strip
• Varnish dashboard
• Cut outs for Raymarine equipment in dashboard
• Fit Raymarine wind sensor at top of mast
• Connect generator to domestic wiring system
• Make gangplank spreader
• Make stern locker storage
• Fit Raymarine electronic compass
• Run wiring for Raymarine speed sensor
• Buy plumbing parts for generator anti-siphon overflow
• Fit generator anti-siphon overflow

Seems like a big list but what was amazing was how many tasks we completed. It was very therapeutic - the week had been quite stressful, partly it was work, but the non-delivery of the electric drive chain was stressing me too. Tim kept saying 'Relax, it will all work out'. He was right. The Zivan battery charger finally arrived at EVE on Friday lunchtime. The flange was galvanized and if all works out correctly it will be dispatched on Monday and we will get it Wednesday or Thursday.

Today was a race day for one of the sailing clubs at the marina so we watched the yachts going out and coming back longingly. Soon, very soon, we should be sailing ourselves.

Making the sail locker step had not been on the original list for the weekend, but since we were re-inforcing of the floor I thought we might as well do so and we completed it! We cannot use it for a week or so as we have used epoxy glue to hold it in place. The Epidermix epoxy is mega-strong but takes a week to reach full strength.

Costas delivered all the Raymarine equipment to the boat. He wasn't at the shop this morning, and by the time he came I had forgotten that I wanted to ask about deck glands to bring the wires from the solar cells into the boat.

We had discussion again about the control unit for the autopilot. Tim and I are happy it should be in the location from the panel for the old diesel engine, but Costas thinks it should be mounted on the wheel pedestal. He may be right, but I think this year we will mount it in the old diesel engine panel and see how it goes. If it doesn't work there, then we'll move it to the pedestal.

We cut out the dashboard and the Raymarine equipment looks great mounted in it; although it's not actually there right now we took it out so that I could put an extra coat of varnish on the dashboard. I was going to make the dashboard mirror smooth and really smart, but we decided to have an A70 navigation system this year and put off the radar till 2011. Next year it will be a C90 with digital radar probably, which is wide screen, significantly larger and will need careful planning and probably a new dashboard. So... the dashboard will look great, but not 110%.

I was really pleased to reinforce the sail locker floor. The floor is paneled and one side is not supported as well as I thought it should, making the floor feel slightly spongy. So we added a couple of extra supports and it now feels really firm.

The rubbing strip varnishing wasn't as encouraging as I had hoped. We had been told we would need 5 to 7 coats of varnish. I did the first two a couple of months ago and it looked absolutely great. Then I went to the UK and had a gap of a month when no varnishing was done. I came back to see the cracks in the wood blistering from the varnish. It looked sad. 

Today Jacob lightly sanded down the rubbing strip and I put another coat on it. It looked better than it had done but sadly not great like it did originally. Maybe with another few coats it will look great again. We have enough varnish for about 3 more coats. Tomorrow I will do another coat and hopefully two more on Monday and Tuesday.

Three extra jobs we became aware of

• Fix binnacle light
• Make metal bracket for autopilot connection to rudder quadrant
• Fix autopilot drive (glassfibre)

Tomorrow the main priority will be getting the Raymarine wind sensor connected and doing as much of the navionics as possible. We have a lunch engagement, so don't have the full day, but after lunch Daniel will come to help and Becky to take photos. We helped hoist Costas from the next door boat to the top of his mast today - his wind sensor had stuck and he wanted to spray it with WD40. It was helping there that made us realize two things - firstly getting to the top of the mast was not so difficult and secondly having two guys on the deck is pretty much essential.