Samstag, 30. April 2011

On the dry for longer...

It feels a bit like two years ago when we had been stranded in this shipyard for several months. Hope it will not be that long again, but it seems clear today that we will most likely not get back in the water before we fly back home on Mai 10th. Maybe by end of May, when we really want to take off towards Madeira and the Canaries Taniwani will be ready again.

What happened?

Well, the known problem with the bow thruster turned out to be worn out bezel gears in the foot. Sopromar could even locate the spare part (the whole foot section), but the ordering process is not clear yet, as the maker company MaxPower was taken over by Plastimo some time ago and now Plastimo became part of the Navico group and logistics are all unclear. Still, there is hope the part will be here in a week or so.

The next part is the cutlass bearing that we really needed to replace after 3400 hours. The old one is out and the new one supposed to be here by Wednesday May 4.

The real problem, and a big surprise in addition is the rudder. The folks who were cleaning the boat, prparing it for fresh anti-fouling paint found a crack on the front edge of the rudder, usually well hidden behind the skeg. It must have been there for some time, as it has been painted over at the last anti fouling job. Strangely the fibre-glass still sits snug on the shaft, almost as if the fibre-glass cover has shrunk. The opposite however is more likely: The expert at Najad thinks that rudder shaft has grown due to some unexplainable corrosion.

We will soon know what it is when we open the rudder, it is already free, but we need the travel-lift to lift the boat a bit to get it out. Hopefully this will happen on Monday and then we need to see if we can repair it or if a new rudder is needed. All this will of course take time.

In the mean time we are enjoying the rain in Lagos....

Dienstag, 26. April 2011

On the dry

Well, we had asked if they (Sopromar) are open on the Easter Monday and the answer was, yes all these dates are fine just come to our dock and we'll arrange the haul-out. Turns out this Monday is Revolution Day here and off course the whole yard was at sleep when we arrived.

So we tied up to a Swedish boat and waited for the next day. And indeed, around 8 am, things got busy and it didn't take long and Taniwani was out of the water safely. After a bottom wash we were dropped at the exact same spot that we had spent several not so happy months two year ago.

This time we only need fresh anti-fouling and we need to fix the bow thruster. For the anti-fouling the boat has to dry off for two or three days and regarding the bow thruster Harald spent several hours trying to get the lower part out. Eventually received help from the yard mechanic who was able to get out one resilient bolt, but had to retire eventually at the end of the work day. Harald finally found that an oil filler nipple was blocking the whole thing and managed to get the whole thing out in the evening, before heading out for wine and food.

Tomorrow the lower part of the thruster will need to be disassembled and only then we will see what part(s) are broken and how long it may take to get them.

If we can fix it locally we would be back in the water by the end of the week, if not .......

We'll let you know.

Sonntag, 24. April 2011

Meeting in Portimao

After three rainy working days, getting Taniwani ready, we enjoyed a fairly sunny day at the anchorage of Portimao.

Here we met up with sister-ship Lahaina, a long time e-mail contact, but never met in person.

Lahaina will slowly move to the Med, and we need to go to the shipyard in Lagos tomorrow to haul out for a few days.

More from there...

Freitag, 22. April 2011

On board again....

We are back on Taniwani now for two days, getting the boat ready and stocking up supplies again.
Taniwani had safely wintered in the Marina of Albufeira, a good place to leave the boat alone, but not a good place to live on board. Without a car shopping is rather far away and with car they seem to make sure your car doesn't get stolen. Though that service is not cheap at €91.-
We plan to leave here tomorrow (Saturday) for two days at anchor and then on to Sopromar at Lagos for a quick haul out.
More from there...