Brian's Chapter, Saturday, 1 February 2003Hi, this is Brian. Connie said that I could do a chapter in her journal to answer questions many of you have had about Take Two and her repairs.
First, let me give you few of the details about Take Two. Take Two was custom designed by the Dutch monohull and catamaran designer Dirk Kremer. The yacht was built by Waarschip BV in t'Waar, Netherlands, in 1991. She is 48' (14.5M) long and when we hauled her out of the water weighed in at 28,000 lbs (12,700 Kg). (Yes she could stand to go on a diet but mostly that has to do with just how much junk there is on here. Still, if I need a plumbing fitting, I probably already have it.)
Take Two is a wooden boat -- sort of. She is constructed using the European version of what is known here as the "West System". The West System combines wood, fiberglass, and epoxy to provide a stucture that combines the best characteristics of the two (wood and fiberglass). The hulls are made out of cold-molded cedar planking with each plank coated in epoxy to make each board waterproof. After the hull was constructed the entire hull was then covered with fiberglass and epoxy. This results in a hull that is light, strong, and virtually impervious to water so long as the hull remains unbreached.
The rest of Take Two is constructed of Bruynzeel "Gaboon" marine plywood. This plywood is very light and strong and carries a warrantee from Lloyds of London that it will last for twenty years exposed to salt water without delaminating even without any protective covering. Coat it with epoxy and some fiberglass and it should last forever. Please note that I added the word "should" in there. It becomes significant later.
When I selected Take Two I had her surveyed by a well-respected marine surveyor in St. Thomas, Will Howe. I flew the two of us up to Providenciales in the Turks & Caicos Islands where Take Two was docked. He found a substantial list of things that needed to be fixed but nothing indicating any real seaworthiness limitation. In fact he even helped me to sail her down to St. Thomas, not something you are likely to do if you think the boat is in imminent danger of sinking.
Still, on the trip to St. Thomas we did have our share of, uh, experiences. I found that the alternators on both engines had failed so we had only the generator to recharge the batteries, which themselves were in pretty poor shape with two of the four having totally failed and one having lost a cell. This dropped our supposedly 500 amp-hours of battery storage to about 100 a-h which required us to recharge the batteries about every 8 hours at night when we were using the lights and RADAR. Also the port engine appeared to be overheating (later to be discovered to be the gauge) so we couldn't use full power on that side.
But all-in-all these were relatively minor things that were fixed with moderate applications of the universal repair material ... money. New batteries and rebuilt alternators later the electrical system is relatively stable. I have removed most of the redundant wiring left over from the last time someone made a change to the electrical system so I am making progress. I do plan to rebuild and simplify it but that is one of those ongoing projects which may be addressed as I feel like it.
Still, there were things that needed fixing, primarily a bad cutlass bearing, which required the boat to be out of the water and she needed a new coat of anti-fouling bottom paint. My plan was to haul her out when it would have minimal impact on Seth's school schedule since, after all, Take Two was our home and it would not be at all convenient for Seth to go to school from her if she were sitting in the boatyard on Tortola. Unfortunately I couldn't haul her on St. Thomas because there is no yard with a travellift big enough to handle her 26' beam. My choices were either Nanny Cay on Tortola, British Virgin Islands, or San Juan, Puerto Rico. Since Nanny Cay is only 12 nm away from Red Hook, I opted for physical proximity (relatively speaking).
So we scheduled the haul out for the Christmas school break. Seth could stay with us until he went to visit his mother and then would only have to stay with our friends the Cooks for one week of school when he came back. You see, it was only going to take two weeks to paint the bottom, replace the cutlass bearing, and repaint the topsides (that part of the hull from the waterline to the deck). Good plan but as some general once said, "no plan of battle ever survives contact with the enemy."
We sailed over to Nanny Cay and tied up at the travellift. Normally we use the dock lines to hold the boat in the center of the slip but this time we just pulled her up tight to one of the sides protected by rubber fenders. As we pulled the dock lines tight I noticed the area under one of the fenders bulging inward. I immediately realized this was not good. I poked at the area with my finger which went right through the rotted wood. This was really, really not good.
The next day they hauled her out of the water but then, to our annoyance, the yard didn't start work on her for three days. After looking at the work on the cutlass bearing and the dry rot on the hull, Kieth, the yard manager, subcontracted the work out to Michael Andrews, a shipwright and manager of Yacht Restorations, Ltd. In this we lucked out as Michael and his crew are first-class shipwrights and wooden-boat specialists. He was also willing to slot us into his busy schedule which didn't have a hole in it until June.
Michael's crew, Tom and Leonardo, started pulling out the prop shafts. That was when I got my next nasty surprise. It took two days to do what should have taken about two hours because everything was rusted and corroded solid. Pulling both shafts to change the seals destroyed the seals and all four cutlass bearings, not to mention that when they finally unbolted the shaft flanges from the transmissions they discovered that the drive lines were grossly misaligned, the reason for the cutlass bearing failure. Seems the engines had not been installed correctly two years earlier. Now we have to construct new engine mounting brackets, install new engine mounts, remount the engines, turn the shafts with their flanges in a lathe, oh, and send the props off to be rebuilt.
Rebuild the props? Seems Take Two has two very-expensive, very high-end, reversing, feathering props that need to be greased by a diver every 3-6 months, a task that went wanting for the last two-and-a-half years. The result is that there wasn't a drop of grease left and the guide-pins for the blades were worn beyond safety limits. Since the guide pins must be matched to the blades the props had to go back to the factory for overhaul.
Because of the problems Michael strongly advised me to have the boat resurveyed while it was out of the water. (The original survey had to be done in the water since there was no place to haul it out.) The surveyor identifed a number of areas on the topsides adjoining the hull where water had gotten into the wood. Seems when the boat was built they didn't put fiberglass over the hull-topsides joint and the expoxy had cracked admitting water to the end-grain of the topsides plywood. We had to strip all the paint and epoxy off the spots to let them dry out (more time!). Once dry we could epoxy them back up and glass the hull-topside joint.
Are you getting the picture? Absolutely the last semblence of adhering to any planned schedule was out the window. Needless to say, we weren't going to get back into the water within the planned three weeks. Fortunately our friends the Cooks have said that Seth may remain with them as long as necessary so he can continue in school. I am certainly glad they like him because he has been living at their house for about a month now.
Regardless, we are making progress. The hull joints have been glassed in. Much of the sanding, drying, expoxying, and priming are done. The props are back from overhaul. The engine room mechanical work is almost done. The rotted wood is cut away and ready for new wood to go on once they make the jig to make the scarf joints. And we have only been here for six weeks! At this point I am really hoping that we can get back in the water on Monday ... February 17.
Here are some pictures:
Here are the "wet spots" being epoxied over by Steve:
Here are Tom and Leonardo finishing up removing the rotted wood from the topsides, coach roof, and deck:
