Evanston: metric bolts; awakened by carp;
the elusive nut; two corrections
Evanston: metric bolts; awakened by carp;
the elusive nut; two corrections
Why Harken, a good Midwest firm headquartered about 90 miles north of here, designs their winches to be installed with metric bolts, I do not know, although I speculate that they think that their customers in all but the United States, Liberia and Myanmar, would have more trouble finding what are still called English system bolts, although England is now metric, than Americans will finding metric bolts.
It was not that I did not read the owner’s manual for the 20.2 winches. I did and saw that it specifies M6 bolts, either hex head or slot head.
M6 bolts are available in the West Marine catalog, but not kept in stock at the Winthrop Harbor store, so I bought ¼” hex heads. When I went to install the winches Tuesday afternoon, I learned that while the shafts are nearly the same as M6, the hex heads aren’t. The ¼” won’t work. So GANNET is still not sailable, and my order of M6 bolts is on the way.
I did complete the lower shroud reinforcement, although in time I may splice the below deck line rather than leave it tied with knots.
I listen to more music on boats, both FM classical stations--at Winthrop Harbor I get one in Chicago and another in Wisconsin--and from my iTouch.
I have left the FoxL speaker on the boat and took my iTouch and an opened bottle of Laphroaig up with me.
Tuesday sunset found me on a Sportaseat on deck, sipping from a Dartington crystal glass while listening to Villa Lobos solo guitar music.
The overnight temperature only dropped to 48ºF and I slept well, except for being awakened at intervals by splashing fish. Big carp frequent the marina and are noisy neighbors. I saw several about two feet long basking near the surface the next day and intermittent turmoil continued around GANNET.
GANNET’s interior is a crawl space. As I have noted here before, except in my favored position in a Sportaseat on the cabin floor boards, I don’t have even full sitting headroom, only slouching. Going aft on the the quarter pipe berth is more slithering than crawling. Slither I did Wednesday morning in order to replace the Autohelm electrical deck connection with a waterproof one made by Perko.
The Autohelm fitting was held by two tiny bolts with two tinier nuts at the aft end of the cockpit, reachable only by contortions no old man should have to make. With a headlamp for light, I still couldn’t quite see the nuts, either with my eyeglasses or without them. Feeling blindly--something at which I am developing increasing skill--I finally got a pair of vise grip pliers around one and then slithered backwards on my belly to the companionway and went on deck where I unscrewed the bolt.
I never did catch the second nut and finally broke away enough of the plastic fitting from the cockpit side to expose it to a hack saw.
While I don’t believe in such laws, often it does seem that when you are trying to remove something, with no matter how many screws or nuts, one is difficult, if not impossible.
I have been known to become a bit testy at such times. But Wednesday I found myself thinking: it’s a lovely morning; you are on the water; and you don’t have anything better to be doing, old man, than working on this boat--except sailing her, and that will come with time.
I replaced the cord plug on the Autohelm with a Perko one and installed a Perko fitting on my Signet tiller pilot, so now both can be used interchangeably.
THE ELUSIVE NUT is a good book title, perhaps autobiographical.
The two corrections:
I wrote a while ago that GANNET’s deck is below my waist when I stand. While aboard on Tuesday and Wednesday I realized that I’m not that tall. The deck comes to my navel. The cutout facing aft for the small companionway insert is at my waist.
And in response to my estimate about the NETTIE’s length, a reader sent me a link to an online book which gives it as 21’. Thanks, Ken. You may have to click on that page to expand it.
The photo is a detail of the interior of the Milwaukee Museum of Art and has nothing to do with this post. I just like it.
Thursday, June 7, 2012