Hurricane Earl - Fri Sept 4th 2010

Hurricane Earl, was forecast to most likely stay offshore, but provide a glancing blow to the area. The paranoia began around Monday when forecasters could not tell how close it would come, but we could get winds up to 75mph sustained. It was all that anyone talked about, and all over the news and weather programs. Hysteria was building, and it was hard not to get caught up in it.

Boat US is our insurance carrier for the boat, and their policy is to pay for half the haul, wash, and blocking, so I decided to play it safe, and as a bonus get to do some needed work to the bottom of the boat.

The biggest project planned was to stop the dripping stern gland/stuffing box. We had a drop about every 6 seconds - while the engine was OFF. It has been like that for probably a year, but had to be stopped.

The next project was to paint the prop and shaft with Cold Galvanising as it was too popular with the barnacles. We had nothing on there up to now.

And the final project was to touch up the bottom paint around the waterline and on the rudder.

The boat came out on Thurs the 2nd Sept, and went back in on the Tuesday after the Labor Day weekend holiday.

Opening the seized stuffing box was a bugger, and when I tried it on the water last year, I think I loosened the seal to the stern tube. That is why I wanted the boat out of the water this time.

The stuffing that came out was a one piece multi-strand string. It was done, and may have been original as most of the things on the boat are.

Anyway, replaced with 3 pieces of square shaped PTFE flax stuffing ($5 a ft). 5/16ths is the size, and the 3 pieces fit in perfectly. Each piece was over 4" long to go around the 7/8ths shaft (so get more than a foot of the stuff).

The stuffing box and locking nut were frozen together. Used PB Blaster overnight and 2 big pipe wrenches to force them apart.

We had the boat on the hard for the project, as it was my first time doing something like this.

Did have a drip every 6 seconds (with engine off) before, but a nice dry bilge now (1 drip every 20 seconds when under power).

Can get the packing nut tight enough by hand - no wrench needed there. Make sure to use wrenches to tighten the locking nut though, as it will work loose otherwise.

Next Brigite & I touched up the bottom paint. We couldn't get a quart of the Trinidad Pro, so used Trinidad SR instead, and got a great deal at only $42 for a quart at West marine, plus we used a $10 off coupon.

Got the rudder and a foot of the waterline twice with a quart of paint (400 sq ft coverage), plus we touched up around the top of the keel. Let the bottom coat dry overnight before applying the second coat. Used the roll and tip method, and got a very smooth finish. Much smoother than what was there before.

The engine RW intake was oozing a day or so after the boat was hauled so I took it off to look in there and found a disgusting slimy habitat! Cleaned it and painted it with some borrowed blue antifouling (Micron).

The cold galvanizing was easy enough, and we also hit all the metal thru hulls with the stuff. Used a full aerosol can on the project, and the can cost around $8 at Do It Center.

What about the Hurricane? Well it stayed about 150 miles offshore and only gave us 30 kn winds for a couple of hours. But we got some great projects done on the boat, much needed projects and the boat now has a dry bilge, which is very satisifying, and I am sure better for the boat. The only down side is that now that it is dry it stinks, I think there is mold growing there now!!! Pweeeuueeee!!!

Boat US provided us the hauling refund check in a matter of days for half the full cost.