12/10/2012
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| Dumb design! |
Our topping lift exits the
mast below the winch, which means that a stupid amount of pressure is exerted
on the sheave, when raising the boom to hoist the mainsail. It really is a silly
design, using an under-spec sheave designed for dinghy loads. It has failed
twice before.
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| What's left of the sheave |
It collapsed again on our
sail down from Grenada
Fortunately, it jammed in a
way which did not prevent us using the topping lift…. We just wore a groove in
the plastic sheave!
So we had our projects lined
up for us in Bonaire , starting the day after we had caught up on the lack
of sleep from the trip!
1) Fix the hole in the mainsail…….stitch the seam in the
panels of the mainsail, where the reefing line had chafed away the 3 rows of
zig zag stitches.
2) Strip the seized winch, clean and re-grease it, and
then service the other winches again to avoid another seizure!
3) Remove the topping lift sheave box from the mast, and
try to find a replacement ashore.
Jobs 1 and 2 went without a
hitch, thanks to an amazing product called “Power Blaster”, which miraculously
un-seizes almost anything! This stuff, plus
“Corrosion X”, are essential bits of kit for a cruiser!
Job 3 turned out to be a pig!
No replacements in Bonaire . Nor were there any sheaves suitable for me to rebuild the old box with a new sheave. Clearly it was time for a bit of
creativity. I went through all my spare blocks, looking for one with the right
size sheave to pirate. All the right sized ones were too lightweight for the
job, and would certainly fail again.
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| Block piracy |
In the end I cut up a spare
running backstay block, which had a solid sheave which was a little bigger.
Once removed, I found that the centre hole was too big, and that the sheave was
too fat to fit the box. More creativity required. I found a Tuffnell sleeve
liner, which was even bigger than the centre hole in the sheave. So I drilled
out the sheave centre hole, and pressed in the tuffnel sleeve. I then had to
drill out the centre hole in the tuffnel sleeve, so that I could fit the
stainless steel sleeve into it, which acts as the bearing.
The new sheave then had to be
sanded down a few “mils” to fit inside the topping lift box.
I then had to make an axle
for the sheave out of a bolt, by grinding the head down to 1mm, and cutting the
nut on the other side to a similar size, so that the box could fit back into
the hole in the mast. Nearly done! I then just had to trim the sides of the
bolt head down a little more with the angle grinder…… Damn! Damn! Damn! I had
to censor what I really said!!
After nearly 3 hours work, the
completed box just jumped out of the vice and flew overboard!!!
Never mind, this is the
clearest water we have ever seen, so how difficult can it be to find a shiny
stainless steel box in 5 to 6mts of
water??
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| Our 3 ton mooring blocks.......5 metres deep |
Two hours later, with 4 of us
looking, we had to admit defeat as the sunset loomed! I sat down and sketched a
working drawing to have a new one made up by a machine shop….. it would only
cost $100 or so!!
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| Working drawing for replacement |
We were invited by fellow
cruisers to go ashore, and enjoy the Bonaire Festival, and sample their beer! After
a couple of beers, I nearly managed to convince myself that $100 wasn’t so
much, and that I would probably end up with a better box anyway etc etc….
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| Live entertainment at the annual Bonaire Festival |
By the next morning, I
decided, “NO!!”, I had spent 3 hours making a damn good box, and it should not
be allowed to pollute their beautiful
reefs anyway! I had put down my anchoring ball, weighted down with a
weight belt, in a position close to where I expected it to have fallen. The
boats swung around in 360 deg circles all day long, and by the time I started
my search the next morning, my anchor ball was alongside my neighbours boat.
The lady asked what I was looking for, and when I described the stainless steel
box, she said “that should be easy to find!!”
She then looked past me and said she could see a shiny reflection to my
left. I swam over, and “Bingo!” The box had
fallen and settled up against a pipe coral, and could only be seen from one
angle…. the angle she had, from her boat, with the morning sun behind her.
I moved my marker ball to the
spot, and contemplated whether I could persuade my aging body to do a 5 to 6mt
free dive. I decided to give it one shot. Now armed with a weight belt, a few
good deep breaths, and bit of adrenalin, I recovered the troublesome box
without suffering burst eardrums or from a deep dive blackout syndrome!
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| Hope it lasts! |
It is now safely back in
place in the mast, and hopefully it will prove to be stronger than the original!
EEEEEEEEEISH.....wot a story mate......well done
ReplyDeleteDennis