Fair Maid, 30’ Eric Cox sloop, 1951

[John B]

Maybe too much anchor chain in the bow?

Thats always a concern , getting trim right, but in this case it's simply running into a set of tide waves at the end of a narrow pass into an atoll.
For this pass there is a window of an hour or two around slack tide. We pushed that window a little bit , our friend pushed it a bit much.
more photos of that pass in this thread ,if its of interest.from post 1942 on.
http://forum.woodenboat.com/showthre...-season/page49

[Priscilla]

I think some color will help.

Teal?
That was the name and trim colour of our airline many moons ago Tasman Empire Airlines Limited

[CPF]

When they have her in the slings, is there a line between the two slings that we can't see??? I would be very concerned about that forward sling slipping up her stem and dropping her on her nose. --- It does happen.

John, I am with NedL here. Those slings should be tied to each other or to the hull so they can't slip. The yard should automatically do this as a matter of course. If they don't, I would not only insist on it, I would then watch everything else they do, like a hawk.

Best,
Chris

[Aquinian]

Thanks Chris. I see the point. On the one hand, this is Royal Perth Yacht Club, an ancient and venerable institution which won the America's Cup after 127 years of nobody else being able to win it, and which is home to a multitude of wonderful timber vessels in superb condition, and the operator of the Travelift does around four lifts and launches every day, so he has huge experience. On the other hand, most of their work is plastic boats with modern hull shapes, so I wonder if the traditional knowledge has been lost and will only be rediscovered when a long-keel yacht is lying in splinters on the concrete...

When lifting from the water, how do you get the strap on the slings? It's simple when lifting to launch, of course.

Anyway, Fair Maid is floating gently at her mooring now, so all's well that ends well I guess!

Regards,
John.

[Hugh MacD]

The yards I've dealt with over here have the tie straps on before they drop the slings around the boat. On long keel boats it's often a single line tied down low...might not be visible?

[Aquinian]

Of course, it would be simple. Don't know what I was thinking!

More photos, because as Jim says, everybody likes them!

Rowing away after tying the old girl up, checking the bilge pump (again!), and praying that she's afloat in the morn.

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Looking glorious in the afternoon winter sun on a calm Swan River.
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Looking back, yep, still afloat...

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Tomorrow we can template the cabin sides and front for our ply veneer, and the cabin top for the laid teak.

I'll document the laid teak deck process for the interest of forumites, as it won't be something most have seen before. We're laying the teak off the boat, epoxy gluing the teak planking to a sheet of acrylic, caulking it with the usual 3M gunk, finishing it off, then epoxy gluing the acrylic to the existing ply cabin top roof as a unit. Zero holes through anything, and most of the work will be done in the workshop.

I wouldn't mind some input on how to deal with rot in the original timber front and sides of the house. I'd say these are 1951 vintage, never replaced. They are solid planks, jarrah, a local Western Australian hardwood, as good as any in the world, but not particularly rot-resistant, so they've done well. I'm thinking that we'll dig out the rotted wood, and chisel some edges squarish on the holes, then epoxy in some dutchmen, then roughly fair it to make a sound surface for the epoxy for the teak ply. If there's no moisture ingress in future, the rot cannot continue. I've seen people here talking about removing huge amounts of timber to get rid of all possible spores, but that's not what the experienced hands on here actually do when they're dealing with rot, it seems to me. I guess the question is, what's reasonable?

Regards,
John.

[Aquinian]

Rot at the base of the front of the house, behind the mast step. Tricky spot to get to, to say the least.

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Rot in a window rebate.

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Rot in the window rebate and extending to the left of it. This is the worst spot. On the inside of the house sides is a ply with a teak veneer. It's solid, only the jarrah has rotted.

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Regards,
John.

[Aquinian]

And a gratuitous shot of the Swan River from Nedlands, near our yacht club, looking across the playing fields. This was taken a few weeks ago, Fair Maid is visible on her mooring between two yellow boats. The late afternoon sun is lighting up the buildings on the far side of Melville Water (part of the Swan River estuary) in liquid gold. The clouds acted their part perfectly.

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[Aquinian]

Re-launch.



Heading out from RPYC slipway at around half throttle. She flies!

[Aquinian]

A gift from a friend.

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Rot removal.

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Making templates for the new teak veneer.

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[cstevens]

Congrats on getting the motor sorted John. She's looking great! Well, not so much that cabin side. But it will in time, I have no doubt.

[Aquinian]

Congrats on getting the motor sorted John.

The irony! Motor ran up fine in the workshop, three times, revved it, ran it for ages, revved it again, etc. Thoroughly worked it over, all good. Installed it on the hard, ran it up, all good. Got into the water, and it ran fine first time. Starts instantly, loads of power, excellent. Next day she runs rough, vibrating badly. Still starts instantly, and has plenty of power, just shakes, at all revs.

So now I'm looking at getting a diesel mechanic on board to diagnose the issue. I'm guessing a dodgy injector, but they're all new, so if one has started to fail, it's pretty disappointing (although it's also the best outcome, the cheapest to fix!).

On the house sides rot, I'm trying to work out where the water was getting into the front panel. The rot's at the bottom, in the centre, behind the mast tabernacle. My concern is that was migrating under the foot of the tabernacle, and if we glue new wood in and seal it up, the problem will recur. I have no basis for this concern, except that it's possible, and the results will be very bad if it's a fact. I have no idea how to check it, or if I really just need to bite the bullet and pull the tabernacle off and re-bed it to make sure.

Rot removal pics. The second one shows the front of the cabin, and the mast tabernacle base.

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Regards,
John.

[John B]

Sounds like its sucked some air or is continuing to suck some through a banjo or connection/ filter etc. Re bleed might be in order.

I've been through a few years of Sea sprays John, and have discovered my collection starts at october 1951, dammit.
Quite a few Cox's but nothing resembling yours I'm afraid. I may have a few earlier ones but not an entire set from 1947? on, so I will see whats there when I get a chance.

[Aquinian]

Thanks John, much appreciated. The mystery remains.

John Lesslie, the original owner's son, told me again that his father saw the plans advertised in Sea Spray, and when I suggested that he might have seen similar plans and had Eric Cox develop new plans for Fair Maid, he said no, that wasn't how it happened, and he recalls first a model being made here in Perth from the plans, then the boat was built. He is 86 and remembering things from when he was 20, so he easily be mistaken, of course!

Regards,
John.

[Geftb]

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hi John. May I ask, how does your tabernacle go? Easy to use?
cheers steve

[Geftb]

I just found this page in your blog.
http://fairmaid.blogspot.com/2017/08/interesting-local-feature.html?m=1
any more to add would be great as I'm thinking I may add a tabernacle to my boat

[Geftb]

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Are the chain plates extended to the height of the pivot pin? Cheers Steve.

[Aquinian]

hi John. May I ask, how does your tabernacle go? Easy to use?
cheers steve

Yes, Steve, not too bad. Hard graft lifting the mast back up, as you would imagine, there’s a lot of weight in it, and you’re starting from a low angle. Yes, the chainplates have to be extended to the height of the tabernacle hinge.

I had nothing to do with this set-up, the boat came with it. But I did look into it a couple of years ago when considering another boat which didn’t have one. It’s not rocket science.

Regards,
John.

[MADOC1]

darn, another engine problem. what did you do to cure the exhaust problem? did you check the exhaust exit elbow where the water is injected? what kind of engine do you have? good luck

jim

ok, i went back and looked and it appears that your elbow is new.

[Aquinian]

Hi Jim,

Exhaust system now runs down from the wet elbow, to the pong box (similar to a Vetus water lock unit), then up in a loop under the starboard cockpit seat and then down to the through-hull in the transom.

This is the type of pong box.

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In any case, we now have a procedure which I think is fail-safe - we only open the raw water cock after the motor is started, and after we are finished with the engine we shut the raw water cock while the engine is still running, check to see when water stops coming out the exhaust outlet, then stop the motor. It's coolant-cooled so she can run for minutes without raw water flow, without overheating. I reckon this procedure might have sufficed even with the poorly designed exhaust system already fitted before, but you don't know what you don't know!

Ironically, one of the previous owners contacted me after the re-launch and commented, "The location of a below water line motor is always a problem in these deep keel yachts because there is never enough room to loop the pipe above water level. The only sure way is to turn the water inlet off at the motor before shut down and run for a minute to clear the exhaust otherwise the stuff just syphons back into the engine. I gather there is a pon box in line with the exhaust as that usually helps."

Yep! Wish I had bought the boat from him, instead of the guy who knew even less than me!

Regards,
John.

[John B]

Sounds dangerous, I couldn't put up with that.
You can have a syphon break on the raw water circuit to solve that problem.

[Boatsbgood]

Agree with John B, siphon break. I'm allergic to starving impeller pumps of intake, cooking the impeller only takes a very short while, of course the pump's not dry, but heat builds up pretty quickly. I should qualify my response by saying I don't really have my head around the particulars of your install, but in my (long-ish) experience I've come to dislike closed intakes on running impeller pumps. Love the boat, and really appreciate your work to bring her back!

[Aquinian]

Thanks guys, had the same thought about the impeller, so we don't run it long. Also have a siphon break, but I'm not taking chances with the pong box remaining full when she's shut down, then sloshing back up in a swell or underway. The best solution is a dry stack riser, with a gooseneck and then the water injection on the down side, I think. Plus the anti-siphon valve. But I reckon we'll be OK now. (The dry stack riser would need to go through the engine room wall and up under the cockpit seat to be a decent height above the waterline, so it would be a major fabrication/installation exercise.)

Regards,
John.

[Aquinian]

These should do the job, after a bit of a clean up and a re-seal.

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[Aquinian]

Starting to lay out the cabin top teak planking. We're epoxying this to a layer of PVC, then caulking it with TDS SIS-440 Teak Deck Caulking, sanding it to clean it up, then epoxying the whole assembly to the cabin top when ready.

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[Aquinian]

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[Aquinian]

Hi all,

What do you think is going on here? Specifically, why the construction on this foredeck hatch to mount the vent? It’s not a dorade box, it’s all solid. I am thinking of getting rid of it and mounting the vent directly on the hatch top.

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Regards,
John.

[Hugh MacD]

Did that maybe replace a broken Dorade box? I can see that as being pretty exposed to like wrapping and tearing off a less robust mounting.

[Aquinian]

Maybe, Hugh. It's in a bad place, of course, just begging the jib sheets to foul (and they often comply...) However without it there's no ventilation in the forepeak at all.

The vent mount does need some support, either above or below, because the top is made of tongue and groove, so it needs to be plated to be strong enough. But why such huge blocks of timber? I'm thinking of re-plating it with a 3/4" thick block, lowering the whole thing and improving the looks. Anyway, if there's no obvious reason for that specific construction, I'll go ahead.

[Aquinian]

Working on the cabin top decking.

All the 12mm x 35mm strips of Burmese teak are cut, laid out dry, pulled up, edges sanded lightly, then epoxy spread on the plastic base sheet and the strips re-laid. Scrap bits are used to clamp it all down.
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Caulking.

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[Aquinian]

And then starboard side sanded, leaving the caulking only between the strips.

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We’ll cut the substrate down the centre to facilitate fitting to the boat, then fit the final strip.

[Aquinian]

We’re using TDS caulking compound. Reputedly the best, and priced accordingly. That’s about $800 worth right there.

[Aquinian]

And finished sanding. Ready to glue to the cabin-top.

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I'll get some better photos when it's out from under those fluorescent lights!

[Aquinian]

Hoping to get it fitted this weekend, rain permitting.

[Geftb]

I look forward to seeing it go down