The three Other Days first. One very nicely done memorial service for our late member, Hadley, presented by his widow and three adult kids. There was no minister and no religious ritual of any faith. Rather the so-called Sailors Psalm was read and John Masefield's poem: "I Must Go Down To The Sea Again". And each of his family spoke about how much they loved, missed and had learned from him. Also, one of those slide shows that are de rigueur these days, over sailing music, again very well done. Then open discussion in which I shared my many warm memories of him as did many others.
The two other Other Days were Sunday walks in the woods. One along the ridge of the Palisades from the Stateline Lookout north to the state line
and the other in Westchester County at the Kensico Dam and nearby Cranberry Lake where the quarry from which the stone for the dam was cut (which reminded me of Maine). Both days were chilly and the later breezy as well but we all bundled up and the exercise kept us warm. The crew is becoming more regular, about seven to ten folks who gain masked outdoor exercise and sailing fellowship. Bravo to David for organizing these events week after week.
The two Work Days, totaling 5.5 hours of work, were mostly electrical. Before I get to that, I did attach a longer piece of wood to the cylinder of the new plastic hand operated bilge pump to permit easy uptake from the bottom of the bilge, but the damn thing then fell apart and needs to be fixed.
I got the water out using old fashioned methods.
The good news is that the ILENE's seven lead acid batteries are not ruined after all. The reading I had gotten was a false one. But they are ten years old and the big bill for replacing them will be coming up soon. In the meantime, by temporarily joining both battery banks I can get the diesel started after which its attached alternator charges the batteries. And I'm planning to get a portable jump start battery for when the batteries get weaker.
After cleaning the oxidation form the lugs, I tried to reattach the wire ends that had been joined at the junction box pictured in the prior post. But the thing sort of fell apart and Mr. butterfingers dropped a few of the screws which fell under the 300 feet of the anchor line for the ort anchor so I came up with a plan B. A nut and bolt will hold the loops an the ends of the wires to each other, and the juncture will be sealed in a shrink wrap tube, then wrapped in electrical tape for insurance and attached to the bulkhead in the form of an inverted "U" so that any water (there will be water) will, hopefully, flow down past the ends of the "splice" rather than into it. But I had only one heat shrink tube of large enough diameter, so the job is still not done.
Finally to the batteries again, after clearing out and moving all of the "stuff from the aft berth to the pullman berth, forward. Sandpaper scraped off all the corroded oxidized material that grows on the copper battery cable lugs. After greasing them and vacuming up the dust, they are reattached to the batteries. But only half of the lugs are done so far. The benefits of a long winter--time to get these pesky tasks done.
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