I started off by cutting two very large holes in the foredeck and getting ready to install two new Lewmar hatches in Theo's v-berth. His soon-to-be bedroom had no windows or portlights, and was terribly dark. Making him live in there would have been some kind of child abuse. Now there are two beautiful skylights, and a wonderful cross breeze.
Today was the first sunny day in weeks. Its been an ugly June, a rerun of April really. So I thought it would be a great idea to split open our water-logged rudder and let it dry out in the sun. We had read about how to do this in one of the Don Casey books, which went something like "Step one: slice open rudder around the edges. Two: separate halves (made this sound as hard as pulling apart a hard boiled egg.) This is the part that brings back memories of when Theo was a newborn and we read about how easy it is to Ferberize our baby. If I had met Dr. Richard Ferber then, I would have punched him. I'm better rested now, but I may still cause a scene. So three and a half hours later, Belinda and I finally great the rudder apart.
It definitely needed to come apart. At some point the previous owner had run aground, whacking the rudder and cracking it open and filling it with water, and bending the steel rudder post. And then it sat in the water for a couple of years. Considering this, it was in surprisingly good condition. And surprisingly well built.
The more that I take Honey-Trout apart, the more that I come to respect the O'Day's design and construction. Maybe this small ketch can take us farther than I first thought.
There are a few glaring exceptions to that, such as the deck/hull joint. But we have a plan. We'll come back to this later.
And then late this afternoon, as we were getting ready to pack up for the day (it is a school night), Richie came by asking if I was ready to pull the engine out. Now? Weeks ago had talked about making arrangements to pull out the old, deceased Atomic 4 engine using a crane. If he was ready to go now, then I wasn't going to say no. As he brought over the ancient crane truck, I had to get the engine ready to be lifted. The trick here is that the engine is bolted to the floor well inside of the engine room, underneath the cockpit. The Atomic 4 has to be unbolted and dragged out into the aft (bedroom) cabin, where the crane could reach it. Forty-five minutes of applying various theories of how 2x4 levers and fulcrums could persuade this 400 pound behemoth into the daylight, and the hardest part of this whole project was past us.
Richie, with Paul and I guiding, had the engine out and on the ground in a moment.
Not a bad day on Honey-Trout.
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