Tag: Problems

  • Teardown started

    Teardown started

    I have started to tear down the interior to clear the way for welding reinforcements to the ballast tanks. The forward starboard toilet is now done. So far I only had to saw one wall panel apart. There were some spots where the Estonian builders had actually followed instructions and not glued everything together. And…

  • Murphys law and Turtles

    Murphys law and Turtles

    After a crossing that took much too long we are now on Ascension Island. Remind me never to fail to take ocean currents into account again ;-) This place has less than 1000 inhabitants, and life centers around the big Air Force base which is jointly operated by the UK and the US. It used…

  • Rudder repair completed.

    Rudder repair completed.

    It took longer than I would have wanted. So it’s only borderline possible to reach Ascension Island before Christmas. We will see… But it’s done. I was surprised that the one single can of aluminum hull compatible anti-fouling that was available on the whole island was the same color as the old one! On the…

  • Rudder repair progress report: Monday.

    Rudder repair progress report: Monday.

    The weekend was a bit of a roller coaster ride emotinally. The first thing that happened saturday morning was we went over to the shipyard to continue work. Only the rudder was not there anymore. All that was left was some water damaged foam that we had removed the day before! Now when things like…

  • Rudder repair progress report, Friday

    Rudder repair progress report, Friday

    Ups and downs, I would say. This is not a fast paced place, so we decided to start working on the repairs fully ourselves. But just as we got the work going we were told by the police that we were generating too much dust and polluting the sea so we had to stop. (Actually…

  • Admitting defeat.

    Admitting defeat.

    I have previously written about my attempts to create a very energy efficient fridge and freezer. The idea was to integrate the hull as a heat exchanger in the compressor/evaporator circuit. I had some initial discussions with a cooling technician about this. However he was not very happy when he saw the actual installation. The…

  • All in one day…

    All in one day…

    We crossed over the short hop from Tenerife to La Gomera. It was quite an interesting day. To the south of Tenerife there was no wind at all, which would have been boring save from the fact that there was plenty to look at. Plenty of whales in particular. These are Pilot Whales. They seem…

  • First Blue Water Crossing: Lagos – Tenerife

    First Blue Water Crossing: Lagos – Tenerife

    The top of Tenerife is over 3 700 meter high. We saw it sticking up over the clouds from very far away, and it provided a very nice sunset as we did the final stretch into the port of Santa Cruz. You see the top just to the right of the setting sun in the…

  • Biscay tries to get the last word, almost succeeds.

    Biscay tries to get the last word, almost succeeds.

    Weather forecasts. Love them or hate them. We sat in A Coruña for 3 days waiting for a low to pass, and then all forecasts from the three different institutes that I use showed a nice 30 hour window for reaching down Portugal. We knew we would have upwind coming around Finisterre, but that should…

  • Todays fix: Stopping more noise.

    Todays fix: Stopping more noise.

    Now that we are sailing, work on the boat is not as turbo hectic as it was during the building stages. But I still want to fix at least one small issue every day as long as we are in harbour. Today it was the kicker (or vang as it is called in some places).…