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.