Greasing, Leaking & Cat Housing

 Category: Engines, Deck work & Cat

Maintenance/Repair Details: Finally got round to greasing all the grease points on both shaft universal joints, the main shaft bearings and the rudder stocks and joints. 

Also dealt with a large water leak which originated in the centre of the windscreen, travelled along the bottom of the screen on the starboard side, entered the wheelhouse in the front corner then ran along the stbd side dash top dropping smartly on to the onshore power box (!) before running down the wheelhouse side and disappearing into the stbd engine bay. Have now completely renewed the water seal along the total lower edge of the screen.

Lastly, having had a display case especially made to protect our boat mascot who's been with us since  2007. 'Vann', our fake Turkish swimming cat, is safely covered to prolong his 'good looks'. He may be getting on but there's no way he's jumping ship using the age card.

New Season Preparation

Category: Woodwork, Hull Work

Maintenance/Repair Details: Now into the New Year and some 6 weeks to lift-in for the 2024 season work has begun on prepping the boat in readiness for lift-in.

22 January 2024: First thing was to remove the old anodes, clean the area where they were fitted and wire brush all the nuts and bolts. The new anodes won't be fitted until the hull has been anti-fouled,

26 January 2024: Next the hull has been washed down, marks and abrasions removed and then given a light polish to protect it from the elements until the final wax and polish just before re-launch.

28 January 2024: We have decided to remove all vanish  from the wooden rubbing band as by the old of a year its flaking and looking shabby. The rubbing band has been sanded down to bear wood, given a water proof treatment and any chips; knocks and dents duly treated.

31st January 2024: Using cutting paste and polisher the starboard side of the hull was completely cut back, then a coat of Teflon polish was applied and buffed off.

2nd February 2024: Fitted lost 22mm pegs in rubbing band, prepped port side hull ready to cut back, removed 'Chatham' stern location named (from our time moored in Chatham Marina 2016 to 2020) and replaced with 'Medway' plate and cleaned and rubbed out toe rail on the deck.

3rd February 2024: Cut back and polished hull and scrubbed all fenders.

10th Feb 2024: Recoated all deck with a new coat of Plasti Dip paint & scrubbed off faux teak aft deck and hatches.

3rd March 2024: Commenced anti-fouling the hull with first coat of paint.

9th March 2024: Completed anti-fouling of hull by applying third and final coat. Checked all systems onboard & around the boat in readiness for lift-in on 11th March. Preparations Complete. 

Parts and/or Items Used: Boat Wash, Wax, Wood Filler, Cutting Compound, Teflon polish, Anti-foul paint.

Boating Fun

Back In The Water!

Wheelhouse Roof Re-Vamp

Category: Woodwork, Deck Fittings

Maintenance/Repair Details: It's been sometime since we refreshed and repainted the wheelhouse roof, so August Bank Holiday was spent doing just that. The roof has always been painted white rather than the soft cream which is Kevayling's hull and saloon colour since we have owned her. So it was decided to repaint the roof to match the rest of the boat. First some of the fittings were removed to make the job easier, then the roof was sanded down with a rotary sander and then the odd hole here and there was filled and made good.

The following date the roof was then repaint in the hull cream colour.

Left to dry over night the fitting that were removed were replaced.

Job done.

Parts and/or Items Used: Cream paint. Gelcoat filler.

All The Better To Reach You!

Category: Electronics

Maintenance/Repair Details: Having installed a new VHF radio and antenna in July 2022 it became obvious during the following months that the whip spring antenna that I installed was not up to the job of maintaining adequate communications with other vessels or shore bases.

As such, as a birthday present, my wife supplied a more fitting replacement which has duly now been installed.   

Also installed a Nebo Link onboard which now fully automates our online logging system, enables us to monitor onboard battery levels plus a few other security features. Check out the link. 

Parts and/or Items Used: New 1.5m 3db Antenna.

Spring Refresh

Category: Woodwork

Maintenance/Repair Details: With Spring upon us it was time to refresh the woodwork on the boat. We started with a good polish & dust of the interior to remove the winter grime, overall the boat is in amazingly good condition after the cold wet winter we had.

Today we rubbed down and repainted the inside of the wheelhouse roof which was the only paintwork area that really needed attention and I think this was partly due to the bad condensation the wheelhouse suffered over the winter, which is a first we have had.

Parts and/or Items Used: White paint. Interior polish. Yacht varnish.

Mast Replacement

Category: Woodwork/Deck Fitting

Maintenance/Repair Details: Having had to restore our original mast each year at the end of the season, due to its age and ever degrading state, this year restoration work required is finally beyond my capabilities.

As such we have purchased a brand new one from Sheriden Marine and will be installing it on the boat in the spring. The new mast is solid mahogany and weighs considerably more than the old one. All the old fittings have been removed from the original and fitted, including the forward navigation light which was on the wheelhouse roof but now on the mast yardarm as intended.

The original mast, which stood proudly on the boat since 1968, has been given to a fellow Freeman owner who intends to completely replace rotten wood and restore. If this is successful we have told him to install on his Freeman and replace an out of place stainless steel one in situ.

Tuesday 21st February 2023 - Now the weather is improving the new mast has been presented to the mast base on the wheelhouse roof and checked for fitting. The mast is slightly wider than the old one and was a tight fit in the base. Removed, sanded down and re-varnished ready for final fitting. 

Monday 27th February 2023 - New mast installed on wheelhouse roof. Just a bit of wiring to tidy-up when the weather improves.

Parts and/or Items Used: New Freeman 30 Mast.

The New Mast

Test Fitting

New Mast Installed

Wheelhouse Refurbishment (Project)

Category: Woodwork

Maintenance/Repair Details: With the end of the 2022 boating season arriving soon we have turned our attention to refurbishing the woodwork in the wheelhouse, something we touched lightly earlier in the year with the repair of a window frame and darkening of the engine bay side panels. The plan is to now refurbish all the woodwork and roof as there has been a move around of various pieces of equipment leaving areas in need of repair, repaint and filling.

The first job has been to sand down the panels in the wheelhouse that have been re-stained earlier, with a satin base varnish, these have now had 2 coats of gloss yacht varnish to bring out the grain and shine of the wood.

Parts and/or Items Used: Wood Preserver, Wood Stain/Varnish, Yacht Varnish.

Overview of the wheelhouse after re-varnishing the side panels.

Close of side panel.

Engine bay side panel work in progress.

Re-covered Deck Hatches

Category: Deck Work

Maintenance/Repair Details: Having some faux teak decking left over from the renovation of the aft deck we decided to strip off the old paintwork on the forward saloon hatch and the aft gas storage hatch and match them in with the aft deck. Several hours were spent stripping off the old deck grip and paint layers so that we had a solid base to stick the decking too. The original hinges on both hatches were taken home, wire brushes, primed and sprayed with liquid chrome to give them a new lease of life. 

Hatch edges were then gloss painted. 

Parts and/or Items Used: Remnants of faux teak decking from previous aft deck project. Chrome in a Tin spray paint.

Work in progress - aft hatch.

Forward Hatch Completed

Aft Gas Hatch Completed

Marine VHF Radio Replacement

Category: Electronics

Maintenance/Repair Details: Due to the failure of the Navman 5500i chart plotter to find and hold GPS satellites it has been necessary to bring the whole electronic side of navigation up to date. As such both the chart plotter and Navman 7100 radio, both at least 20 years old, have been removed.

Being that we now use a Navionics tablet based navigation system the only new item required was a new VHF radio with built-in GPS positioning to give us the most up to date distress positioning system. 

Completely recovered the top of the helm dash to complement the new streamline look to the helm. 

21 July 2022 - Installed a new whip antenna on wheelhouse roof, removed old fibreglass antenna and made good the area.

Parts and/or Items Used: Cobra VHF FF77 GPS Marine Radio. Supergain Target 530mm Antenna.

Old electronics removed with the new radio in position. Replacement and repositioning of the
antenna cable still to do.

New whip antenna in place.

Dash top panel recovered before fitting.

Replacement Battery

Category: Electrical

Maintenance/Repair Details: Replaced Number 4 battery (stbd) due to it's age (11 years) and the poor performance of equipment connected to it. 

Parts and/or Items Used: 110ah 12v battery.

Aft Deck Covering

Category: Deck Work (Work in Progress)

Maintenance/Repair Details: It appears that the aft deck has suffered some degrading during the winter months and although the deck was covered with a rubber coating to prevent cracking it has still occurred. So, after deep consideration and thought we have decided to strip all the rubber deck coating and plastic based paint and cover the aft deck with a faux EV teak decking in middle grey.

22nd March: First step to start removing old paint and deck coating.

24th March: Continue with stripping the old deck coating and start sanding the edges. (It's a slow business!)

26th March: Completed the stripping of old deck coating, washed deck, filled irregularities with gelcoat filler and sanded down.

12th April: Following a few weeks of appalling weather we have finally been able to lay the new faux decking. Applied with additional heavy duty spray glue, as well as the self-adhesive backing, so hopefully will stay stuck for sometime yet.

Parts and/or Items Used: Paint Stripper, 3 x Rolls of Faux EV Decking, Gelcoat Filler, Paint & Sealant.

First day of stripping old deck coating.

Third day of deck preparation.

Decking Laid.

Winter Work - Rubbing Band

Category: Woodwork (ongoing work), Hull

Maintenance/Repair Details: The plan being to remove all old varnish and staining of rubbing strake to reveal state of wood work and repair and renovate as necessary. 

Commenced work on renovating by removing all varnish and staining from the stbd side wooden rubbing band. Starboard side revealed several areas needing work. First coat of 10 year weather proofing applied.

17th February - Stripped transom rubbing band noting missing wooden bolt plugs and a small damaged area. First coat of 10 year weather proofing applied then a second coat applied to stbd and transom complete.

22nd February - Stripped port side of all old varnish and stain, replaced missing wooden plugs. Applied 2 coats of 10 year weather proofing to all vessel rubbing band.

23rd February - Applied a coat of yacht varnish to rubbing band. Measured, designed and cut from aluminium sheet 4 protector covers to protect the woodwork in the areas that our fenders hang and excess deck water runs off. Removed old anodes and cleaned contact areas.

26th February - Applied anti-foul to hull.

Parts and/or Items Used: 10 Year Wood Preserver, anti-foul

Work in progress on rubbing band.

Old varnish removed & applying weather shield.

One of the 4 new protection plates installed at the fender points.

Anti-foul applied.

Winter Work - Wheelhouse Woodwork

Category: Woodwork

Maintenance/Repair Details: Following maintenance and repairs to the woodwork in the wheelhouse the side panels were rubbed down and re-varnished. This included the central engine bay panels which have always been of a light oak in colour, not mahogany as the rest of the woodwork. This has now been rectified and they match the rest of the wheelhouse panels.

Parts and/or Items Used: Wood Preserver, Wood Stain/Varnish

Winter Work - Raw Water Pumps (continued)

Category: Engines (updated as work progresses):

Having completed the installation of the fireproof/sound proofing on the port engine attention was turned to re-installing the reconditioned raw water pump on the stbd engine. The installation which I am glad to say was far simpler than the port installation and now complete. 

Will return and test the raw water pump tomorrow, winterising the engine if all checks out O.K.

14th December - Stbd raw water test O.K. All engine maintenance now completed and wheel house returned to a tidy state.

Parts and/or Items Used: Reconditioned raw water pump.

Winter Work - Raw Water Pumps (continued)

Category: Engines (updated as work progresses):

Commenced re-installation of both raw water pumps by installing the new pump on the port engine. What was thought to be a straightforward job turned into a 6 hour nightmare. Having struggled to install the new pump and reconnect the water pipes I realised that our engineer had fitted the pulley wheel the wrong way around. That meant dismantling all the work done to date, removing the pump, pulling the wheel off the shaft reversing it and refitting. Then the whole act of reinstalling was repeated. Having installed the pump the last thing to do was refit the alternator, easier said than done. With little room to get my hand underneath the the alternator fitting the retaining bolts was a drawn out process resulting in frequent stretching under the engine to retrieve dropped bolts, nuts or washers. 

Will return and test both raw water pump and alternator in a few days time, need a couple of days off! 

11th December - Raw water pump tested O.K so antifreeze pumped through the port engine cooling system, alternator function O.K. Stern gland greaser refilled. Work on the port engine now complete.

p.s have already insured the stbd pump pulley wheel is the right way around.

Parts and/or Items Used: Raw water pump.

New pump installed on port side engine.

Winter Work - Raw Water Pumps

Category: Engines (updated as work progresses)

Maintenance/Repair Details: Commenced work on port engine with the replacement of oil filter. Having become aware of the wear on the stbd raw water pump the port side pump has been removed and passed to the marina engineer for reconditioning as was the stbd pump in the previous entry.

In order to remove the raw water pump the alternator needed to be moved to make room and in doing so was found to have very bad connections to the rear wiring, with some wires exposed. All connections duly cleaned, made good and re-insulated.

18th November - Due to the condition of the raw water pumps it was decided to replace them but finding new pumps was difficult. Thanks to ASAP supplies a complete reconditioning kit was put together in order to rebuild the better of the Jabsco pumps. We also managed to purchase a rare complete new pump from Mack Engineering in Glasgow.

3rd December - Received from the marina engineer two raw water pumps, one new and one fully reconditioned. Next maintenence log will be the reinstallation of said pumps.