Sorry, I have not been blogging much lately but I doubt if anyone cares.  Hello...Hello....HELLO.
Anyway near the end of the season I did not not really go anywhere.  Got the engine rebuilt and running, No more water in oil and oil level is steady.  Getting cold out now.

I have been burning up pump  motors on my water pump and bilge pumps  (I have two).  The bilge pumps are jabsco 36800 series diaphragm pumps that were on breakers but not fused.  The pump was wired in parallel with the breaker.  So the float switch was essentially not fused or on a breaker.  Seemed ok to me until I purchased my third pump motor at $158 bucks a pop.  So now I have a 50 cent fused protecting the motor.  The water pump is Jabsco 36900 series but same motor as bilge.  I found the pressure switch was bad and even though it is also on a breaker, the breaker never tripped until motor burned up (and it was a brand new motor).  So, I also fused it in addition to the breaker.  So all is good.

Made good progress on Hard to Bimini.
I used system three standard color and it looks pretty close.  Windows in but I have a lot of work left to do.  But looking better.  Teak trim on windows helps.
Lesson learned....... Ask me.

My Aching Back

My plan was to go to the boat Friday evening and pull the head and injector pump and deliver to diesel repair shop on Saturday morning.  At 1:30 am Saturday morning I conceded defeat and went to bed.  I had got the head off but injector pump was still mounted.  Only three bolts holding it on to block.  Easy to get to uppper bolts  but third at the bottom not so much.  So new plan was to finish removing pump on Saturday and take parts to mechanic the following week.   Saturday woke up had my coffee and continued to remove pump.  Took two hours to finish but was not that bad.  Bolt at the bottom was hard to get off but after I got a routine down it came right off.  Thank God, no struggle to get the pump off.

Took picture of the pump so I do not have to remember where the pipes go.

Bilge pump problems:

Almost every spring launch I have bilge pump problems.  I have two bilge pumps that come on automatically. I installed the "water witch" (google it) switch type switches in bilge area one for each pump on separate circuits.  Anyway last week I noticed the one of the circuit breakers for pump A was fused.  That means that probably the motor got wet and froze up.  I have Jabsco bilge pumps model 36000 something.  Last year the other one (B) got wet and wrecked the motor.  To prevent moisture getting on it (pump B), I covered it with a plastic baggy.  Worked great, ran fine.  Actually pump A was working about a month ago.  So some how it got wet.  I figure it tried to run and fused the breaker.  When I tried to manually start it a few weeks ago when the breakers was still working, I saw the DC amp meter go to about tens amps but, the motor did not come on.  Anyhow, I noticed the battery switch was on both banks and only wanted one bank so I rotated it around.  When power is restored to the "water witch" ( did you google it yet) bilge switch it is designed to turn on the pump for a few seconds.  So when power came back to DC I heard a pop and saw a large billow of smoke coming from bilge area.  I rotated the battery switch to off to kill power.  Looked around saw no issue and rotated battery switch back to on.  More smoke and I saw the wires to the bilge pump glow to red and start melting.  Not Good.  Turned DC off again and went to the power panel and removed the melted wires from power source.  So bad news I need a new breaker, pump motor and bilge switch.   I do not know how or why moisture is getting to the bilge pump motors but I am going to cover both pumps from now on with a protective cover.  Good news, other bilge pump B working fine.

Spring cleanup and pending projects

My only task this weekend (since I only had one day)  was to power wash, fill tanks, check general condition of boat and run the engine.  The boat was very dirty but cleaned up nicely with my power washer.

 The boat was very dirty but looks good now.  The wood still had varnish but winter is very hard on it.  Multiple coats but, still still lifting in some places.  Oh well....  That can wait.

Checked engine oil and coolant.  Engine oil was over full from my known diesel leak.  Started engine and it started pretty good.  Ran to bring it up to temperature.  Oil pressure looked a little low but was OK.  Shut engine down and looked at oil again.  It had that milky look which means it had moisture in it.  OK, it now means I am going to have injection pump rebuilt as well as injectors.  Also, going to pull the head and have it checked and replace the head gasket.  Man these Delaware winters are hard on the boat and it was not even that cold this year.   Bye $$$$$$$

Note the differenrce in the polished side and oxidized.  You can see it in this photo.

I took a day off to try to finish up the polishing project on the hull.  Came out pretty good so far.  On close inspection of the hull I can see many stains and blemishes that probably only a paint job can fix.

The yard has put my boat on a part of the yard that has a slope.  Makes it really hard to put scaffolding down and keeping from killing myself.  I this blog stops it is because I am dead.  I told them I want to work on the hull and this is where they put the boat.  Oh well I launch next week.

Working all day on the hull doing the 3 step prep of sanding with 1000 grit, compound and then polish was a lot of work and I usually run out of steam at the end of the day.  Holding a buffer over your head is also tough on the shoulders and arms.  I was going to do this over a weekend but now glad that I spread it over a few days with  a break in between to give my body a chance to recover.  (Old age sucks)...

I also did some gel coat touch up on some bad places.  I sent a sample to a company to match the hull and it came back pretty good.  You can hardily see where I touched it up.

Getting boat ready for launch hull cleaning

Last weekend  (Saturday)  I drove down to the boat.  The specific purpose was to remove the Polyglo from the hull using the spray can of remover  I bought last year.  I worked pretty well.  First I used the power washer to get as much dirt off as I could.  Then spayed about 4 feet worth of remover swirled with sponge and then powerwash rinsed it off.  The can says do not let it dry and wash within 2 minutes.

Here are some before and after photos. This before note the  shine from the Polyglo.

 Before note the white part with soem polyglo removerd.

 After note oxidized hull.

After .

Next week I am going to polish the hull and try to bring back the shine.  Polyglo was pretty easy but after a few years it shows dirt and stains.

Spring is in the air

I have not posted much to my blog because not much boating activity in winter.  But with the warmer weather in the forecast I am making plans of things I am going to do before spring launch.
1.  Remove Polyglo from the hull.  I got the spray to remove it last years and test on small area on the hull and looks pretty easy.
2. After removal of Polyglo I am going to start the hull polishing task.  Here is a link to what I am going to do.
     http://forums.sbo.sailboatowners.com/showthread.php?t=117266&#post706131   I am going to take a few days off from work to get this job done.  Considered staying with Polyglo but after a few years it looks kinda ratty.  Also considered paining hull but to expensive and does not last.  People that have polished hull say it is the best way to go.  One very thorough cleaning and your good forever as long as you keep it up.  I will try to take photos of before during and after.  After having tested the various steps on a piece of clear Lexan I think I can say the most important step is the finish polishing step.  (fingers crossed)
Also, working that hard for a week I should be able to loose a few pounds.
3.  Wood rub rail needs to be sanded and multiple coats of varnish.

Healthy and Cruising.

OK, I admit it, I am getting old.  I do not at this time have any major health issues that would keep me from cruising.  I work out about an hour a day.  Blood sugar is a little high and doctor wants me to loose weight.  I think that describes 90% of Americans.   I wear contact lenses and it has occurred to me I may have a problem if in a emergency I cannot see.  Glasses are back up but I see better with contact lenses.  Blood pressure is good and Cholesterol is good (thanks to Crestor).
So setting off into the sunset has its risk anyway of all the possible things that can go wrong.  But, you would be in a world of hurt if you had a debilitating injury, head injury, or heart attack.
With that in mind.  There are plenty of sailors out there that sail into their eighties (I do not know about nineties)  I have heard of blind single handed sailors and deaf  single handed sailor .   I do not think I would try sailing blind but it does not stop some people.
So, even though I cannot survive for long without a pharmacy, there is nothing keeping me from heading out.  I figure if I have a coronary while sailing they may find my boat in Spain with one unusually smelly sailor on board.