Wednesday Started the day by telling Kathrine that we are having to stay home for at least 14 days because Helen seems to have the Covid virus. She already has emails about how to request, accept and return work from the school so she followed those instructions and has spent the day catching up on existing work. The school is closed for all pupils from Friday anyway so everyone will be doing the same in two days time. They are predicting it will not re-open until September.
Kathrine is disappointed because she will be missing the chance to say goodbye to her friends who are going home and that apparently now even includes Laerge. She says she doesn’t understand the idea of going home because there will be no more school work at home and everyone will be missing out on the last weeks of this term. They do have plans to all meet up again in Denmark once the international virus chaos is over and Kathrine is determined that she and her parents will visit sometime in the near future (October?) instead of their planned trip next month.
Generally a damp day so, for me, today was mainly a day of wiring the Arduino into the boat as well as installing the development environment on the laptop so I can make changes to the software while in the boat rather than needing to disconnect the Arduino and bring it home to update.
By tea time I had the whole thing working without the majority of the 
debug printouts. I get different results for the water level and temperature sensors so I am confident that they are all working. I have not yet tested them with actual water while in the boat but don’t really have any reason to think they will behave any differently compared to when I was working on them in the study.
The only bits of the system that are not yet operating are the interrupt based start to level checking (Works immediately instead of checking whether the clock reports it has triggered the alarm, also triggered by any of the three bilge pumps running).
It might have been a perfect day to get the mast and rigging sorted out because there was almost no wind at all however Grace was busy sorting Helen out and tidying the lounge, kitchen and her bedroom. Maybe tomorrow will also be calm and we can have another attempt at getting the mast up and backstays finalised.
Thursday Today’s scheme is to either work on the mast or wash down the decks and the hull with the pressure washer then see if I can get another coat of white paint on the cabin sides (Definitely starboard side but possibly port as well) and deck at least as far forward as the front of the cabin. Once the cabin sides are painted I can install the navigation lights.
At breakfast I decided that the best way to deal with the mast is to use the block & tackle approach on the inner forestay as a safety system and actually pull the mast up using a winch mounted on the trailer. Means there wont he a single potential failure point as there is at the moment. Ordered a 272Kg capacity winch and steel wire from machine mart on home delivery. Might get it any time from tomorrow through to Wednesday next week. Hopefully it will be fairly soon so I can get the mast sorted out with reasonably little wind.
More disappointment for Kathrine today as EF have decided to get all their students home as soon as possible. She has a slight delay because of Helen possibly having the virus and us being on self isolation but she will be leaving almost as soon at the lock-down period is over. The college have agreed to continue sending her work as if she was still in this country so she will be still working and therefore hopefully still get whatever documentation she requires from this year. At the moment she and her parents are still planning to come back to the UK but it certainly wont be over Easter and may not even be as soon as the current revised plan of October. Seems that some of her 80 or so books will be staying with us until the visit as, assuming the approximate weight of a little over 500g applies to all of the books, shipping them to Denmark is likely to cost around £50.
As I wasn’t working on the mast I have fitted handles inside and outside of the sliding hatch and also sanded and painted the foredeck, side decks and partially re-painted the cabin walls. Finished that just as it was getting dark so the photo was taken on Friday morning.
The other job I was going to start was fitting the two navigation lights 
on the cabin sides (Starboard first as the window and painting are all finished that side. However there is an unexpected issue with that as I checked the number of items in the order when it arrived but failed to realise I had a second port navigation light instead of a starboard one. I have emailed the supplier but with the virus isolation it may be a while before I can send back the unwanted light. Does mean I will have definitely finished with painting the cabin before the lights get fitted.
Talked to Shirley today and there is another change to the process around the virus so I can apparently return to work if I don’t develop symptoms within 5 days of starting self isolation. That would be one of the days that I am on leave anyway. Shirley will email me some handbook entries to check so if I am still symptom free I am aiming to work from home on Monday then go back to work after the Tuesday & Wednesday that are booked as leave.
Friday Today really depends on whether the winch shows up and at what time. Obviously don’t want to start painting too early as then cannot do anything with the mast and rigging.
Todays progress included tidying and hoovering out all of the lockers 
(including the wet stuff in the fuel locker), removing the rest of the headlining and reinforcing the trailer jockey wheel so it no-longer wobbles as if it was not even attached to the trailer.
Saturday Woken at 4:30 by Charlie barking at something in the garden but I did manage to get back to sleep until 6:30. Long slow getup today but I was outside around 8:00 attaching the topping lift and spinnaker halliards & pulleys, tidying out the fore cabin and then painting the ceiling and hull sides. Brief interruption to sort out Helen’s breakfast and then finished the job.
Then started sorting out the stern light. I was contemplating welding a stainless steel bracket onto the port pushpit but made an aluminium pattern first to check the angles and lengths. Then decided that the aluminium version will be OK as I don’t think my stainless steel welding is up to the job with the large rods that are left and if I am pop riveting it anyway then I might as well use the template as the real thing. Drilled out the mounting holes to bolt on the light and then coated it with some of the remaining Everbrite. Finished and left that to dry around 1:30.
Somehow never really got started after lunch as it is windy and has gone cold. Slight excuse as I haven’t managed to find a 5.5mm drill bit that I will need for the pop rivets. Also cannot do any sanding while the cabin paint is wet. The starboard light is in the post having been replaced by Force4 and I don’t want to do the port one until after I have repaired and painted any damage to the cabin wall caused by sorting out the window. Cannot even pack the light that needs returning as they don’t seem to have attached the postal label that was supposed to be on the return approval email.
I do at least have the promise of the trailer winch and cable arriving on Monday so I may be able to put up the mast safely using the winch to hoist it and the block & tackle + sheet winch as a safety backup. I am just a bit wary of the forces involved and the potential failure points currently at the top of the sheerlegs device. So tasks for tomorrow include making a solid steel coupler instead of using the turnbuckle
Sunday 22nd Turned out to be a very productive day. Started off with waking up early so I had got part way through my breakfast before the alarm went off. Dealt with Helen’s breakfast because she was also awake early.
First boat task was fixing the stern navigation light. Then I sanded the top and sides of the fore cabin lockers and painted those.
Around lunch time the courier delivered the winch so the afternoon started with bolting that to the front of the 
trailer. Then replaced the bent turnbuckle at the top of the sheerlegs with a large shackle and used the winch to get the mast upright.
Slight snag in that I either made the inner forestay too short or else the 
dimension on the Snapdragon website was wrong. Made an extension for today and will have to get some more wire to make another the right length.
I didn’t manage to get the mast in exactly the right place to put through both bolts. Also had similar issues taking the mast back down as it ended up standing on it’s end rather than being supported by the bolts. I think I will need to make a hard steel crowbar with a tapered end so I can line up the holes to get the bolts through. Also may need to file off a few 
millimetres of aluminium and/or add an insert inside the through tubes to allow the mast to pivot properly.
Sorted out the backstays so they will be a suitable length for the new bottlescrews that I am getting.
Monday How’s this for a view to wake up to on a frosty March morning.
When I went off on leave, today was supposed to be my first day back at work and I would have been the only one of the clinical scientists at work. Of course all that changed when Helen had her “asthma attack”. Like almost all meetings around the NHS Katherine’s meeting was cancelled so she is authorising instead of me today while Amy & Shirley are using up leave. So I am working from home during the day and then authorising 6 till 9. Somehow you cannot argue when the other side of the deal is that I get back the 5 days of leave that I “lost “ to the quarantine period so suddenly becomes 10 days of boat work.
Basically I spent 8 until 2 working on the minutes of a meeting from the end of last month in one of the least conventional home offices you are likely to find. It has power (for 2 computers – our old laptop that I can just about edit on and the rugged Ipad to access my normal systems via VPN) and a decent work surface, just lacks heating (which was a bit of an issue) and has a rather precarious access route when the deck is covered in frost. I was fine working inside but started to shiver on the way back into the house for lunch and didn’t stop for about 15 minutes, shows I must have been concentrating fairly intensely.
Spent the afternoon working on spreadsheets in the study (Grace’s bedroom) as that was a job that needed 2 computers again but no access to trust IT systems because we emailed across the required files. Then on the authorisation task until 9.
So a day of working on the boat without doing anything to the boat.
Tuesday Another working from home day. Shirley seems to think I should be doing that always because of the risk to Helen if I get the virus at work and bring it home. Spent a bit of the day trying to progress with the spreadsheets and word document cross checking but progress is rather slow because the spreadsheets on the old laptop keep freezing. I am trying to upgrade to windows 10 tonight in the hope that a new install will run faster and be free of the problems caused by non-updatable software. Most of the day I was authorising on the iPad even though it was notionally Katherine’s day.
Tonight’s boat job will be to put together the detailed shopping lists to get ready for launch. There is a fair bit to get including hull paint, safety gear and the galley equipment but my guess is I wont actually get any of that delivered until a couple of months time because of the national lock-down.
Month 43 of the restoration project – Bigger time Coronavirus.
Wednesday 25th March My first NHS priority time shopping trip this morning 7:00 through to 7:25. Despite having been closed overnight there were a few empty shelves, particularly toilet roll and kitchen towel. Otherwise I managed to get most of the things on Helen’s list. Still got moaned at though for buying still water (there wasn’t any sparkling), not getting some items that weren’t available and also not getting enough crisps when there weren’t any of the big selection packs to buy. I never was all that impressed with the choice from Morrisons and that experience rather reinforced my bias but at least they are trying to give decent access to busy NHS staff and are doing a more effective job of it than some other supermarkets.
Spent 8:00 through to about 4 working on the boat – Now have the outlets installed for the two forward bilge pumps and the one in the big locker is fully plumbed and stuck to the hull with sealant. Had to leave the anchor on top of it as a weight to keep it in the right place while the silicone sets so hopefully the paint is attached to the fibreglass well enough to stand a little pressure from the reinforced hose trying to coil up or straighten. Still need to wire that one up to the switch panel and thread the wires through to the bow locker for the other one.
After that mammoth effort the drill batteries were all flat (2 holes sawed through the hull and two through the heads compartment bulkheads) so I moved on to painting the inside of the old water tank and then the whole cabin floor with their first coat of white.
Tomorrow I need to do the painting job on the rest of the deck and cockpit coaming so the topsides are all relatively clean and ready for the non-slip coating. I am still intending to try the masonry paint approach as it seemed to work before the cold weather lifted it all off. Maybe next winter I can change to another type of non-slip but I have a lot of the paint in stock so might as well give it a proper try.
Thursday Dogs were fussing at 4:00 ish and when I came to close the patio door the lock mechanism failed. Ordered a replacement so we will see how promptly that can arrive here.
Painted inside the bow locker and totally failed to locate the other piece of resin coated plywood which should be the mounting plate for the bilge pump.
Another brief trip out today to collect Charlie’s diuretics from the vet.
I also connected the water tank bladder to the galley pump. Still not really decided whether or not I will be fitting a deck level water inlet – Seems a bit pretentious for a small boat but here is no obvious other way to fill the tank without taking out a lot of bunk mattresses and plywood and no way to stop water escaping everywhere while pouring it in.
Another change of plan from work so I now wont be back tomorrow but will be waiting until Tuesday.
Friday Another day that started off with me working at the cabin table but today I didn’t stay at that for long because it was too cold to be comfortable. Somewhere we have a fan heater but I suspect it has gone out of the garage a long time ago in favour of Matthew’s house.
Came in around 9:30 and spent most of the rest of the morning working on the handbook for work. Part way through the morning the replacement door lock mechanism arrived so I took about 25 minutes to fit that before going back to the data checking.
Authorising tonight 6 till 9 but seems very quiet and it’s only 7:30. I suppose that is to be expected when the general trend has been to clear the wards of everyone that can be sent home and not do any outpatients or elective work.
Saturday Another early start because I was awake. Today I was outside and tidying the garage by the time the alarm went on my phone. At least the clocks go forward tonight so I will be more justified waking up as it gets light.
Another day that looks as if it is going to rain eventually so still not intending to do the remaining sanding and painting on the cabin wall and deck
Up until lunch time I was sorting out the heaps of stuff on the workbench and then working my way steadily towards the back of the garage. There is a fair amount of junk gone in the bin and even more items put away either in containers or else affected by putting the drawers full of bolts back into the cabinet. Still haven’t located the 25 mm hole saw which I need for the bilge pump install in the front locker so I think I will have to do it with the larger saw.
After lunch I did a sanding session on the space under the cabin table and then painted that area – Still need to do the aft bulkhead but other 
than that the cabin has all been painted with at least one coat of white paint. Some bits will get another coat as there are marks appearing on the first areas that I did. Mainly that is a consequence of having put the cover in the cabin some time ago and it left blue canvas coating on things.
I have also been measuring up the headlining boards so I can see how many sheets of plywood I will need to order. Doesn’t look as if anyone is up for delivering the full size sheets at the moment which is a shame as the roof pieces are wider than the half sheets that are potentially available on click & collect from B&Q.
Tonight we are trying to organise a flight home for Kathrine on Wednesday evening. There is a flight at 10:45 from Manchester direct to Copenhagen with SAS. That would avoid the potential for virus exposure in London as well as actually costing less than the train to London is likely to be. No big deal for me to take her by car and I am sure nobody would argue against it being necessary travel.
Sunday 29th
Aiming to progress the inlet filters for the other two drier pumps this morning. While waiting for the resin to warm up I sorted out a couple of online orders for stainless steel woodscrews & turnbuckles plus some more of the stainless welding electrodes so I can finish off the pushpit, guard wires and standing rigging. Seems both of the companies involved are happy to post out the products so we will see how quickly they arrive. Obviously not too much problem if they take some time as I still have 5 days leave to fit in somewhere next month (the leave I got back because of being on exclusion from work due to Helen’s ill session).
Also bought dock lines, anchor rope, the longer anti-wrap and burgee lines for the mast, a longer inner forestay and 6 pellican hooks for the guardrails. Again the suppliers still seem to be posting goods to customers.
Matt came over to collect a soldering iron so he can tin the ends of a couple of wires that he has included with other items for sale.
Monday Another day of “Working from home” as best I can. Some new incident reports added to the log but proper investigation will take about 5 minutes for each one when I am at work tomorrow instead of being a completely impractical juggle between multiple systems accessed via different devices. Maybe I can get organised tomorrow with a laptop in addition to the IPad so I can properly access the multiple systems I need from work. I will be able to be effective from 6:00 tonight though as authorising works fine from the IPad.
Matt came over again this morning to get me to tin the wires because he wasn’t achieving a neat job. Turned out he only brought one of the two wires so he will be back again later. At least he has added my returned navigation light to his own parcel collection that is on it’s way to the postoffice.
Not even able to be all that effective working on the boat as I haven’t found the right size of hole saws yet. Also asked him to bring the reel of 3 core mains wire that we have for the horseboxes. Matt is checking at home and will bring anything over when he comes back this evening.
My stainless steel welding electrodes appear to be on their way so that should enable me to be slightly more productive once they arrive and there is already an extra useful hour of daylight in the evenings but the normality of boat work is likely to be about to go back to weekends and evenings for a while.
Kathrine is all set to go home at 6pm on Thursday from Heathrow. As I will be at work, Matt is going to take her to the airport by car because of the potential issues with irregular trains, closed tube lines, possible infection risks etc associated with the EF travel plans. I don’t envy her another 14 days self-isolating again but at least she will be with her family. School is intending to still send her useful work to do during the isolation period so that may help maintain focus.
Hooray, Matt found a couple of 25mm hole saws – One is the correct size but the other has a handful of bent teeth that I modified to get a 26 to 27 mm saw. I used the latter to put the four holes in panels that I 
need to get the bilge pump tube out of the V berth locker, up inside the hanging locker, across above the headlining and then into the toilet compartment to get to the skin fitting. Still don’t have the cable or the mounting board but the big and complicated hose threading step is 
done. Once these hoses are screwed to the plywood bulkheads they shouldn’t be quite as obtrusive. The idea is that no matter how much heel there is on the boat it wont be possible for water to flow backwards into the lockers but the bilge pumps will be able to pump water overboard.
Should be plenty of plywood left after the headlining is done to use to box in the more unsightly bilge pump hose runs so watch this space.