April 9-26 -- A Lot of Work Days And Some More Work Days For The Club

We did spend one day visiting our friend, Fran, in Kent CT. Before lunch, we took a hike on a short piece of the Appalachian Trail, just below Bulls Bridge, on the Housatonic, which runs into Long Island Sound at Stratford CT. The river was running high.

After lunch I checked out Fran's canoe, at the side of her lake, Clifford Pond, which had been rebuilt and made water tight again.

The rest of the activity was work, of three types. The first was two days (ten hours) for a work party led by Dan, the Marine Chairman of the Harlem Yacht Club. I was the sixth member of the team and the least skilled. The tasks related to the marine railway by which the boats stored at the Club are launched in the spring and hauled out in the fall. It was preventative maintenance and

very heavy work. One project Involved lifting the platform on which the boats sit to let the railroad wheels and axles set in boxes beneath the platform fall out so we could detach the axles and wheels, clean them and re-grease them before reinserting them. Heavy truck jacks were used to lift the platform. This task was accomplished on the first day. The second task was to replace the "sleeves" that hold up the columns at the sides of the platform. Slings are strung between pairs of these columns which hold the boats it place, in the air, during hauling. The sleeves fit into pits at the base of the platform and are inserted and held in place by "pins" so the columns can be rocked back or forth to accommodate boats of different widths. The sleeves were rusty, very rusty, and to get each of them out we used the fork lift. First, one of its tines would push them to one side and then a heavy chain connecting the column and the fork lift pulled them back the other way.

After several repeats of this manoeuver, the rust's hold had broken free and the fork lift was used, with a long heavy crowbar through the top of the column and across the tynes of the lift to lift them out. Tony was the driver and it was a game of inches to line things up and keep the tires of the lift on boards on the platform so that its weight did not break through its grate. Very careful driving and all of the men contributed imaginative  ideas. I was quite impressed by the skills as well as the dedication of this well oiled team. But the replacement sleeves, were perhaps 1/16 of an inch too wide to fit into the columns! And the holes for the pins did not match up precisely. What to do?  Someone pointed out that 1/16th inch of steel will be 1/2 inch

thick or more when it rusts up. So the team ended up grinding off the rust, observing that there was plenty of good solid steel left and taking the sleeves to Newark to be re-galvanized. The second work party was to reinstall the system so the  Club will be able to launch boats this spring. I was the outsider but they accepted me and I tried to be useful, getting tools and blocks of wood and making a small contribution. Without members with skills and willingness to volunteer their time, we could never afford to pay contractors to do such jobs. Because we will be away on the date of the Club's annual spring work party, I was pleased to have this opportunity to serve the Club.
All new-shiny and  back together again, with two new pins:

I also did several non-manual tasks. I contacted Jamie, who we connected with in Maine last summer. Jamie and Laurie have been to Newfoundland many times and he spent almost a full hour filling my head with information, about how to get to Newfoundland with another hour needed after i absorb this, to find where to go in Newfoundland. There are three routes from Nova Scotia to Newfoundland, West, Mid or East of Cape Breton Island. Because visiting Newfoundland will require both going there and coming back, we will have the opportunity to use two of these routes. And several alternative first stops north of Nova Scotia were also outlined including Prince Edward Island and two small islands that are part of France. Lots of time ahead to think about how we want to spend our three months on cruise this summer. The Central route is through the Bras D'or Lakes that we visited in 2017.
I also spent some time getting the tiny microchip that contains the charts of the waters we sail out of the MFD and back to my home laptop where the free updating was installed. Next year it will be $100 for another updating or a replacement chip.
I had to return the barrell zinc to be placed on the propeller shaft -- wrong size and material.
Jeff Lazar, the rigger, came by and noted, that in addition to the general examination of the rigging that I asked him to do (so the mast won't fall down) the VHF antenna atop the mast is rusty and needs replacement. I also had the pleasure of reading the first of my two part article in Points East Magazine (pointseast.com) "Our Favorite Maine Anchorages". The editor did a good job of  dividing up and reorganizing my text and adding charts to illustrate the first part of the route, but the on-line version omits most of the photos.

But eleven days during this period, 54 hours (plus 3.5 by Ed Spallina and eight by our nephew, Mendy) were devoted to getting ILENE ready to splash. A total of 65 hours of labor and a few more are needed, by Mendy, to wax the port freeboard.

The bulk of this work was on the hull, scrubbing it, taping and painting below the waterline, removing yellow stains with FSR and applying six different paints: 1) a green primer on the propeller and its shaft, 2) four coats of white paint on this underwater metal, 3) blue bottom paint, several coats in some places with moving of the jack stands and chains to get the spots they cover, 4) some varnish in the interior of the cabin, 5) white rustoleum primer on the steering compass stand and at fifteen foot intervals to mark the anchor chain and 6) white enamel Brightsides paint over the Rustoleum.
Then came washing the freeboard with soap and water and a brush (and Scotchbrite on the dirty spots) compounding it and finally the paste wax. Mendy also helped me lift the three heavy sails from ground level to ILENE's deck so they are now staged to be bent onto their roller furlers and spars. I always like to have at least one sail available for the short first voyage from ILENE's winter home  back to the Harlem in case of engine trouble.

Lene and I, with Bennett and Harriet of s/v "Ohana," will be enjoying a bareboat charter of a 39 foot catamaran from April 27 to May 7 in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. My first sail of  2019. The next post to this blog will report on that cruise.