Jamey will flesh out the details of his repair job on the snapped cable down below. What truly made Hampton an ideal place for fixing the boat was that it provided entertainment for the rest of us for the entire day.
We docked the boat on the public pier that is conveniently located right next to the Virginia Air and Space Center.
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| C.Spirit in front of the Hampton Carousel and the Virginia Air and Space Center |
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| 1. Fold airplane 2. Try to fly it into one of those holes 3. Try again and again and again... |
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| View from the VASC observation deck |
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| Phoenix |
Having had a great day at the museum, it was a bonus to see a parade turning the corner as we exited the museum. The girls had fun catching candy and balloons from the folks riding in the parade, and we later found out it was Kecoughtan High School's homecoming parade.
As if the parade was not a random enough treat for us, a few minutes later, a lovely woman called out to us and offered us rides on the carousel. She and her friends were gathered at the Hampton Carousel for a Class of 1956 high school reunion. They told us how they had ridden the carousel back in the 1940s, and they offered us MoonPies and Orange Crush (both also reminiscent of their childhood).
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| Skye joins the Class of 1956 |
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| The Hampton Carousel is a restored 1920 wooden carousel. It closed for the winter in September and opens only for special events. We feel special! |
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| Makes sense to eat MoonPies after visiting the Space Center |
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| We watched Jamey fixing the boat. He is the orange speck a bit to the left of the green carousel roof. |
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JAMEY'S POST: Creating Access through the Binnacle and Fixing the Steering Cable
When the steering gave out, I knew that we should press on further to Hampton rather than having a short day and stopping at Salt Pond. It was about ten miles more sailing, but would be through fairly sheltered and flat water, and Hampton was sure to be a much better place to do repair work. With regards to the historical claim that this place holds, I couldn't help but think about how we were sailing to this old port, first settled in 1610 and still so accessible and central to water and land resources as it has been for three centuries.
It was scary entering the harbor; the wind and current were pushing us out of the narrow channel and right into the massive stone jetty and concrete highway bridge pilings. Motoring in this confused cross sea was much less stable with the emergency tiller than was sailing upwind in flat water. After the tricky entry channel, the Hampton river itself was an idyllic though crowded anchorage.
I started working on the steering system as soon as the anchor was down. First step was to remove the quadrant cover which was simple. Six screws later I could see that we had a broken steering cable, which is a real problem, but very solvable (see pictures on yesterday's post). The only way to replace the cables is to remove the entire chain and cable assembly, and this means opening up the top of the binnacle and pulling everything up and out.
The problem with C. Spirit is that access to the top of the binnacle is blocked by a 1/4 inch thick stainless steel plate which serves as a cup holder and mounting point for the fold-out cockpit table. The four screws securing this plate to the binnacle top had tiny Allen heads and were screwed through stainless steel and tapped into the aluminum binnacle. Any good chemistry student will tell you this is a sure recipe for corrosion and stuck fasteners, and I brought out all of my tricks to try to avoid stripping out the Allen head screws. I sprayed them with CRC lubricant, heated them with a blow torch, banged them with a hammer, but nothing budged those screws. After three hours of painstaking work, the score was two stripped Allen head screws, and zero budging of anything.
With a final spray of CRC, I left them to soak overnight and slept on the problem. In the morning, after an educational session watching online how-to videos, I felt re-energized to get those four screws out. After an early morning row into the maritime center dinghy dock and a one mile walk to Patrick's Hardware store, I used our newly purchased dremel tool with a heavy duty cutting disk to cut a slot in the most stubbornly stuck and stripped screw. After about thirty minutes of grinding and turning, I got 1/2 a turn on that screw, but was fairly sure by the feel that I was just twisting the screw head itself and not turning it loose. Time to re-evaluate... I needed a new plan or those screws would be broken off in place, and I would really have a problem.
After some thinking, I decided to try cutting an access hole right through the plate, then I could just reach in and pull everything up and out through the hole. This idea came from our old sailboat which had that kind of easy access to the steering mechanism. On that boat you just pulled up the compass, and everything was right there with the removal of two screws.
The dremel tool was not making much progress cutting through the plate, so I took a second, and then third trip back to the hardware store to get progressively more aggressive cutting tools. The 4-inch disk grinder with a metal cutting wheel finally cut through the plate with relative ease, though it wasn't pretty. I purposely made very shallow cuts so I wouldn't damage any of the steering mechanism below since I couldn't tell how much clearance there might be.
I knew this was a destructive solution, but I knew the hole would be covered by the compass, and it would offer easy access to the steering system for future check-ups and lubrication.
Once the hole was finished, it was a simple task to pull out the cable and chain which I carried over to the North Sails loft just down the street from the public dock.
North Sails didn't have the right kind of cable, but sent me to Tidewater Marine Services, where Gaston, an ex-Israeli marine and a real character, did have some, and he practically gave it to me ($20 for 20 feet of 1/4 inch 7x19 stainless steel cable). I also got a great tour of his shop, a short version of his interesting life story, and a ride back to North Sails.
Glenn at the North Sails loft let me borrow his tools to disassemble the chain and cables. He then crimped new cables and let me put it back together, also for next to nothing.
Reassembly was straightforward. The one tricky part is remembering to have the cables cross inside the binnacle, which requires snaking a string up through the bottom of the binnacle. I pushed the old cable up through the bottom and hooked it with a metal clothes hanger bent to the right shape.
I tensioned the steering cable until it had about one inch of deflection over a three foot run from the quadrant to the sheave when I pushed on it with two fingers. I tested the feel of the system by reattaching the steering wheel and working the rudder back and forth aggressively for a few seconds. When the system felt responsive enough but with no play, I set the lock nuts on the tensioners and closed everything up. I will check the tension in a week or so and then add some Loctite to finish the job.
I was so relieved to have completed this much in one day. It could not have happened without the help of Maxwell, the dockmaster at the Hampton Maritime Center, Gaston at Tidewater Marine Services, and Glenn at North Sails.
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SIGNIFICANT HAMPTON HISTORY: Settled in 1610 by the early colonists, Hampton is known as the oldest continuous English-speaking settlement in North America. It's true that Jamestown was established earlier in 1607; however, due to hardships and the eventual growth of Williamsburg, Jamestown was not continually inhabited. Hampton was settled on the site of a Kecoughtan Indian village. It was interesting to match the name of the high school whose homecoming parade we saw today with this bit of history.
VIRGINIA AIR AND SPACE CENTER: Our admission was free as the VASC is part of the ASTC Passport Program. By joining the Bishop Museum back in Hawaii as Patron level members, we have reciprocal admission through this program to 300+ museums in over a dozen countries. Tickets are otherwise adults $11.50, children (3-18)/students $9.50, seniors/military/NASA $10.50. The museum is open Tues-Sat 10-5 and Sun 12-5. During spring and summer months it also opens on Mondays.
DOCKAGE: We are at the Downtown Hampton Public Piers which offers short-term dockage for four hours. For the sake of today's repair, we are docked for the night for $1.25 per foot. Included are free Wi-fi, use of the fitness room and pool at the nearby Crowne Plaza, and complimentary bicycles (used by Jamey this morning for trips to the hardware store). Electricity is $3/night. There is an Enterprise Rent-A-Car that offers discounts to boaters.
FOR THE KIDS: There is a great little playground at the church across the street from the Crowne Plaza, but it looks like it might not be for public use. A block further takes you to Mill Point Park which has a small amphitheater and grassy fields that the girls used to do some gymnastics.
I started working on the steering system as soon as the anchor was down. First step was to remove the quadrant cover which was simple. Six screws later I could see that we had a broken steering cable, which is a real problem, but very solvable (see pictures on yesterday's post). The only way to replace the cables is to remove the entire chain and cable assembly, and this means opening up the top of the binnacle and pulling everything up and out.
The problem with C. Spirit is that access to the top of the binnacle is blocked by a 1/4 inch thick stainless steel plate which serves as a cup holder and mounting point for the fold-out cockpit table. The four screws securing this plate to the binnacle top had tiny Allen heads and were screwed through stainless steel and tapped into the aluminum binnacle. Any good chemistry student will tell you this is a sure recipe for corrosion and stuck fasteners, and I brought out all of my tricks to try to avoid stripping out the Allen head screws. I sprayed them with CRC lubricant, heated them with a blow torch, banged them with a hammer, but nothing budged those screws. After three hours of painstaking work, the score was two stripped Allen head screws, and zero budging of anything.
With a final spray of CRC, I left them to soak overnight and slept on the problem. In the morning, after an educational session watching online how-to videos, I felt re-energized to get those four screws out. After an early morning row into the maritime center dinghy dock and a one mile walk to Patrick's Hardware store, I used our newly purchased dremel tool with a heavy duty cutting disk to cut a slot in the most stubbornly stuck and stripped screw. After about thirty minutes of grinding and turning, I got 1/2 a turn on that screw, but was fairly sure by the feel that I was just twisting the screw head itself and not turning it loose. Time to re-evaluate... I needed a new plan or those screws would be broken off in place, and I would really have a problem.
 |
| Creating a flat-head screw from a stripped Allen screw |
The dremel tool was not making much progress cutting through the plate, so I took a second, and then third trip back to the hardware store to get progressively more aggressive cutting tools. The 4-inch disk grinder with a metal cutting wheel finally cut through the plate with relative ease, though it wasn't pretty. I purposely made very shallow cuts so I wouldn't damage any of the steering mechanism below since I couldn't tell how much clearance there might be.
 |
| The hole in the binnacle |
Once the hole was finished, it was a simple task to pull out the cable and chain which I carried over to the North Sails loft just down the street from the public dock.
 |
| Access! |
North Sails didn't have the right kind of cable, but sent me to Tidewater Marine Services, where Gaston, an ex-Israeli marine and a real character, did have some, and he practically gave it to me ($20 for 20 feet of 1/4 inch 7x19 stainless steel cable). I also got a great tour of his shop, a short version of his interesting life story, and a ride back to North Sails.
 |
| Gaston |
Glenn at the North Sails loft let me borrow his tools to disassemble the chain and cables. He then crimped new cables and let me put it back together, also for next to nothing.
Reassembly was straightforward. The one tricky part is remembering to have the cables cross inside the binnacle, which requires snaking a string up through the bottom of the binnacle. I pushed the old cable up through the bottom and hooked it with a metal clothes hanger bent to the right shape.
I tensioned the steering cable until it had about one inch of deflection over a three foot run from the quadrant to the sheave when I pushed on it with two fingers. I tested the feel of the system by reattaching the steering wheel and working the rudder back and forth aggressively for a few seconds. When the system felt responsive enough but with no play, I set the lock nuts on the tensioners and closed everything up. I will check the tension in a week or so and then add some Loctite to finish the job.
I was so relieved to have completed this much in one day. It could not have happened without the help of Maxwell, the dockmaster at the Hampton Maritime Center, Gaston at Tidewater Marine Services, and Glenn at North Sails.
_____________
VIRGINIA AIR AND SPACE CENTER: Our admission was free as the VASC is part of the ASTC Passport Program. By joining the Bishop Museum back in Hawaii as Patron level members, we have reciprocal admission through this program to 300+ museums in over a dozen countries. Tickets are otherwise adults $11.50, children (3-18)/students $9.50, seniors/military/NASA $10.50. The museum is open Tues-Sat 10-5 and Sun 12-5. During spring and summer months it also opens on Mondays.
DOCKAGE: We are at the Downtown Hampton Public Piers which offers short-term dockage for four hours. For the sake of today's repair, we are docked for the night for $1.25 per foot. Included are free Wi-fi, use of the fitness room and pool at the nearby Crowne Plaza, and complimentary bicycles (used by Jamey this morning for trips to the hardware store). Electricity is $3/night. There is an Enterprise Rent-A-Car that offers discounts to boaters.
FOR THE KIDS: There is a great little playground at the church across the street from the Crowne Plaza, but it looks like it might not be for public use. A block further takes you to Mill Point Park which has a small amphitheater and grassy fields that the girls used to do some gymnastics.
Wow - - - Phoenix !
ReplyDeleteHave fun you guys:)
Thanks!!
ReplyDelete