July 12 | Maintenance Day

I spent the afternoon of July 12 taking care of some projects that had been hanging over my head. There was little to no wind, but it was a lovely day, so it was perfect for taking care of projects aboard.

First I turned my attention to dealing with a leak in our new Lavac's diaghram pump. I was irritated to find that after getting the whole arrangement installed the stupid pump was leaking. Consulting the owner's manual, I found that it is apparantly a common enough issue to be listed in the troubleshooting section! The solution was to disassemble the entire pump and seal the threaded rod that attached the actuator arm to the diaphram with the dreaded silicone. After the silicone cured, the pump exhibited no leaks.

I then tackled the always unpleasant job of changing the filters and lube oil on the diesel. There's little to report other than the usual swearing and general oily mess. Yuch.

June 30 | Maintenance Day

I've got two diverter valves on order from Defender. Even though I placed a Second Day Air order on Thursday, UPS claims they are going to be delivered on Tuesday. That's 4 days by my count...

Meantime I got a bit more work done, adding cleats for the holding tank, and starting on some of the plumbing that isn't dependant on the diverters: the intake loop, and the branch run to the deck pumpout fitting.

June 28 | Maintenance Day

Got a start on the head and holding tank project. Cut open the settee and figured out the fit for the tank. Also did some planning work and made some shopping lists for plumbing parts.

Of course, it was one of the hottest and steamiest days of the year so far. Temps in the mid 90s. I know some of you probably think that's just a nice summer day, but here in Maine it's about as hot as it ever gets.

June 26 | Maintenance Day

With a new Lavac Popular marine head in hand, and a lead on a quality custom-built-for-a-Triton holding tank, I headed out to the boat to take some general measurements for planning purposes. I also knew that I would need to deal with my frozen head discharge seacock before I would be able to pull the old head and install the new.

June 15 | Maintenance Day

I spent the morning loading gear, cushions, and miscellany on board in preparation for our shakedown cruise planned for Father's Day Weekend. I left the boat around noon, and returned at 1800 for dinner aboard with the family. After dinner, Heather and Gavin headed home, while I stayed aboard for the night. Quiet and bug free. Lovely.

June 10 | Maintenance Day

On Sunday I headed down to the boat around 1045. I brought the boat in to the dock for a substantial washdown, while Heather and Gavin played on the dock. Around noon, Heather headed off to gather some lunch and pick up her friend Irackley who was passing through town. While she was running errands, Gavin and I took the boat back to the mooring and repaired the cracked fuel fill neck with JB Weld.

With the repair work finished, Gavin and I joined Heather and Irackley on the club deck for lunch. We got a call from our friend Phoebe, who was also passing through town on her way back to Boston so she diverted to the club and we all spent a nice—if a bit hot and still—afternoon relaxing aboard before our friends had to depart.

June 8 | Maintenance Day

I headed down to the boat on Friday, June 8th around 0830, primarily to affix my 2007 mooring permit to the boat. But since it was dead still, I decided to hoist the main so that I could run my reefing lines. I also took care of setting up my control lines, and a few other minor rigging tasks before pausing to answer my phone: Tim Lackey was in town and calling about getting together for lunch. Since he was free all morning, I invited him out to the boat to relax and chat, and we did just that until leaving at 1115 to pick up Gavin at school, and head to lunch.

Well it's been a pretty horrid spring here in Maine, with two large April snowstorms, followed by a tremendous rain-and-wind northeaster that slammed us on Patriot's Day. But as it always does, the weather finally began to improve by mid-month and on April 24 I finally got the cover off the boat. Unfortunately, there was a nasty little surprise waiting for me.

Like the Whales of August. Only different.

Some people have been asking "Why no updates? Why no progress? Isn't the boat going in soon?" Well, the answer is, "Yes, the boat is going in soon. May 11, to be exact. However, the weather isn't really cooperating with getting any work done."

I had planned to take the cover off the boat this weekend. I guess not! Soon, though. Soon.

Not much to report: little work got done on the boat this fall and she is now put to bed for the winter. This year I removed the forward gate stanchion which had caused a few problems with last winter's cover, used more and better stakes, and added two more pvc-conduit ribs for added support. Time will tell how well the cover holds up.

With no large projects on tap for the winter, site updates might be slim, but I'll try to post something occasionally. And next spring we'll be back in the swing catching up on our varnish work and getting the boat ready for another season.

'Til then!