Envoy has now moved to Gouvia Marina, Corfu.
We enjoyed the process of getting Envoy prepared for cruising having decided not to worry about meeting any time schedule and take each day as it comes – not becoming frustrated when as often happens contractors don't turn up on time or at all. In 2014 preparation took us four weeks and this year just a day over three so we thought we'd done pretty well.
Envoy went into the water nearly two weeks ago on a beautiful sunny day with great excitement on our part. The travel lift operators always give you plenty of time to check for sea water leaks and after half an hour we had none. But when we checked again after docking into our marina berth we had a couple of minor leaks, both of which have been resolved.
Envoy going back into the water
We've not had good results with various propeller antifouls over the years so took them back to gleaming bare metal and coated them with lanolin to see how that goes.
Envoy's propellers
The weather here has been great with light winds and temps in the low-mid 20s.
During the first days here we visited Vodafone to sort out both phone and internet connections and always find them incredibly helpful. Using our Mobile Broadband Device we can connect using our iPad and laptops simultaneously. Di's laptop wouldn't start up so she took it to a local repair shop who not only fixed it but upgraded it to Windows 7 – all for 30 Euros (about NZ$50). Now it's working great and much faster.
Although there are no obvious signs of economic issues here, locals tell us that unemployment is a real issue particularly in the big cities, and that many young people are leaving to get jobs overseas. While people are stoic about the situation they don't see it getting better any time soon.
Di's on-board herb garden
We had to spend about three hours with our agent – A1 Yachting visiting the Port Police, Customs and regular Police to get our documentation sorted out for cruising here. Although in Greece it's possible to do this without using an agent, we've found A1's assistance over the years to be invaluable, saving a lot of time, hassle, heartache and cost - especially this year as some new laws come into effect on 1 May and nobody is totally clear on how they will work.
The day of our sea trial in the Lefkas canal was stunning and not much of a test for our stabilisers
There's been some progress on items mentioned in our last Envoy blog:
1.The domestic fresh water heater's water leak is fixed and it's feeding hot water to all the right places. The mechanic who removed and reconditioned the unit hadn't connected it back correctly, but now all good.
2.Our large RHIB and Yamaha 25hp outboard has been finished and sea-trialed. The sounder is working well and a wiring fault which caused the auxiliary power supply (to sounder and vhf) to shut down has been fixed. Here in the EU there is a requirement that fuels must have 10% ethanol content for so-called environmental reasons. While the environmental grounds for doing this are very dubious the practical result is very negative for the boating community because ethanol is hygroscopic and the Yamaha mechanic told us many of the problems he resolves are directly related to this – particularly moisture and “sugar-like” deposits in fuel systems. It's not so bad in cars because the fuel is used more quickly and doesn't have time to attract moisture, but outboard motor fuel for example is often kept for many months or even carried from one season to the next. The advice now is not to keep petrol more than a few months, never from one season to the next and to add fuel conditioner – we are now using a “Wurth” product. It's also an issue in diesel and we are now using Stanadyne as recommended by Lugger and several industry gurus.
3.The boom winch which I reported as not operating is actually fine – I'd just forgotten how to operate it correctly.
4.Two new Deka bow thruster batteries have been installed along with a new circuit breaker as the previous one failed (after doing its job) when the short circuit occurred that caused the battery problem.
5.The Naiad stabiliser's hydraulic rams have had new seal kits installed and are working well. The 12 volt pump providing sea water for cooling the hydraulic oil didn't work so we've replaced that with our onboard spare. We also changed the hydraulic fluid filter and I had wanted to change the fluid as recommended by Naiad to do every two years, but the mechanics talked me out of this as the current fluid, has only been used for a few hundred hours, is filtered, looks perfect and – as they said “heavy hydraulic equipment is frequently operated nearly every day for many years without the need for fluid changes”.
Most equipment has now been tested and working OK but I still have to test the watermaker – I didn't want to do that while in the marina with dubious water quality.
Other issues which have arisen are:
The Yanmar wing engine wouldn't start and following analysis by Sailand's mechanic a new fuel lift pump was installed and all now OK. The Genset wasn't starting easily so the electrician tested the glow plug and found there was no current reaching it. A new relay fixed that.
The Lugger engine wasn't starting easily so Sailand's electrician measured the voltage at the starter finding it to be very low. He suggested making and installing a heavy duty earth cable between the engine and the battery bank's negative earth busbar. This has been done and starting is now excellent. At the same time he checked the battery bank's parallel switch for emergency starting and considered it to be too light for the amps involved, so sourced and fitted a new one for us.
The Lugger's throttle cable jammed just as we were manoeuvring out of the marina for a sea trial - which was disconcerting to say the least, so Sailand recommended fitting a new control unit and throttle and gear cables (none of which had been replaced in at least 10 years). This installation took most of a day as the lengthy cables travel between decks and it's very hard to access some of these spaces and then feed the cables through.
Laurie with old throttle and gear cables
The only job Sailand ran out of time to do was to machine polish the superstructure gelcoat so this is one that Diane and I will have to roll up our sleeves and do ourselves.
Rust never sleeps! Throughout Envoy are many dozens or possibly a few hundred hose clips. Any rusted ones need to be replaced. They should always be installed with the tightening bolt on the top side of the clamp so that any drips of water don't contribute to rust. This one was installed bolt down on a bilge pump hose.
Our “To Do List” always looks pretty daunting to begin with and I must say it's very satisfying to look at our list and see 79 items ticked off with only a few non-urgent ones remaining.
We enjoyed the process of getting Envoy prepared for cruising having decided not to worry about meeting any time schedule and take each day as it comes – not becoming frustrated when as often happens contractors don't turn up on time or at all. In 2014 preparation took us four weeks and this year just a day over three so we thought we'd done pretty well.
Envoy went into the water nearly two weeks ago on a beautiful sunny day with great excitement on our part. The travel lift operators always give you plenty of time to check for sea water leaks and after half an hour we had none. But when we checked again after docking into our marina berth we had a couple of minor leaks, both of which have been resolved.
Envoy going back into the water
We've not had good results with various propeller antifouls over the years so took them back to gleaming bare metal and coated them with lanolin to see how that goes.
Envoy's propellers
The weather here has been great with light winds and temps in the low-mid 20s.
During the first days here we visited Vodafone to sort out both phone and internet connections and always find them incredibly helpful. Using our Mobile Broadband Device we can connect using our iPad and laptops simultaneously. Di's laptop wouldn't start up so she took it to a local repair shop who not only fixed it but upgraded it to Windows 7 – all for 30 Euros (about NZ$50). Now it's working great and much faster.
Although there are no obvious signs of economic issues here, locals tell us that unemployment is a real issue particularly in the big cities, and that many young people are leaving to get jobs overseas. While people are stoic about the situation they don't see it getting better any time soon.
Di's on-board herb garden
We had to spend about three hours with our agent – A1 Yachting visiting the Port Police, Customs and regular Police to get our documentation sorted out for cruising here. Although in Greece it's possible to do this without using an agent, we've found A1's assistance over the years to be invaluable, saving a lot of time, hassle, heartache and cost - especially this year as some new laws come into effect on 1 May and nobody is totally clear on how they will work.
The day of our sea trial in the Lefkas canal was stunning and not much of a test for our stabilisers
There's been some progress on items mentioned in our last Envoy blog:
1.The domestic fresh water heater's water leak is fixed and it's feeding hot water to all the right places. The mechanic who removed and reconditioned the unit hadn't connected it back correctly, but now all good.
2.Our large RHIB and Yamaha 25hp outboard has been finished and sea-trialed. The sounder is working well and a wiring fault which caused the auxiliary power supply (to sounder and vhf) to shut down has been fixed. Here in the EU there is a requirement that fuels must have 10% ethanol content for so-called environmental reasons. While the environmental grounds for doing this are very dubious the practical result is very negative for the boating community because ethanol is hygroscopic and the Yamaha mechanic told us many of the problems he resolves are directly related to this – particularly moisture and “sugar-like” deposits in fuel systems. It's not so bad in cars because the fuel is used more quickly and doesn't have time to attract moisture, but outboard motor fuel for example is often kept for many months or even carried from one season to the next. The advice now is not to keep petrol more than a few months, never from one season to the next and to add fuel conditioner – we are now using a “Wurth” product. It's also an issue in diesel and we are now using Stanadyne as recommended by Lugger and several industry gurus.
3.The boom winch which I reported as not operating is actually fine – I'd just forgotten how to operate it correctly.
4.Two new Deka bow thruster batteries have been installed along with a new circuit breaker as the previous one failed (after doing its job) when the short circuit occurred that caused the battery problem.
5.The Naiad stabiliser's hydraulic rams have had new seal kits installed and are working well. The 12 volt pump providing sea water for cooling the hydraulic oil didn't work so we've replaced that with our onboard spare. We also changed the hydraulic fluid filter and I had wanted to change the fluid as recommended by Naiad to do every two years, but the mechanics talked me out of this as the current fluid, has only been used for a few hundred hours, is filtered, looks perfect and – as they said “heavy hydraulic equipment is frequently operated nearly every day for many years without the need for fluid changes”.
Most equipment has now been tested and working OK but I still have to test the watermaker – I didn't want to do that while in the marina with dubious water quality.
Other issues which have arisen are:
The Yanmar wing engine wouldn't start and following analysis by Sailand's mechanic a new fuel lift pump was installed and all now OK. The Genset wasn't starting easily so the electrician tested the glow plug and found there was no current reaching it. A new relay fixed that.
The Lugger engine wasn't starting easily so Sailand's electrician measured the voltage at the starter finding it to be very low. He suggested making and installing a heavy duty earth cable between the engine and the battery bank's negative earth busbar. This has been done and starting is now excellent. At the same time he checked the battery bank's parallel switch for emergency starting and considered it to be too light for the amps involved, so sourced and fitted a new one for us.
The Lugger's throttle cable jammed just as we were manoeuvring out of the marina for a sea trial - which was disconcerting to say the least, so Sailand recommended fitting a new control unit and throttle and gear cables (none of which had been replaced in at least 10 years). This installation took most of a day as the lengthy cables travel between decks and it's very hard to access some of these spaces and then feed the cables through.
Laurie with old throttle and gear cables
The only job Sailand ran out of time to do was to machine polish the superstructure gelcoat so this is one that Diane and I will have to roll up our sleeves and do ourselves.
Rust never sleeps! Throughout Envoy are many dozens or possibly a few hundred hose clips. Any rusted ones need to be replaced. They should always be installed with the tightening bolt on the top side of the clamp so that any drips of water don't contribute to rust. This one was installed bolt down on a bilge pump hose.
Our “To Do List” always looks pretty daunting to begin with and I must say it's very satisfying to look at our list and see 79 items ticked off with only a few non-urgent ones remaining.
1 comment:
Very interesting:did not know about the hose clamp advice, and nice to know the opinion about hydraulic fluid changes, and also that ethanol is hygroscopic. A good blog!
St Jean-Cap Ferrat, France
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