66 Rivets

Friday saw several more jobs ticked off the list.  It had stopped raining overnight so the first job was to drill and rivet the top section of the track for the trysail.  I was pleased to get the last of the 66 rivets into position so that I could move onto other less repetitive work.

My days as a potential cockpit dictator were secured with the attachment of the loudspeaker to the mast.  To stop it from filling up with rainwater whilst the mast was horizontal, I taped some plastic sheeting to it.  I was then able to cut the cable at the foot of the mast to the right length and drill the waterproof deck-glands for all of the new wires to go through.

The mast was washed and Stalok rigging screws were fitted to the bottom of the new shrouds so that they were ready to hold the mast up again.  I also sanded and filled the bottom of the keel so that it would be ready for antifouling to be applied at the weekend.

The last job I tackled was shaping and fitting bronze sleeves to the kicking strap (vang) and boom bearing surfaces.  These have stainless steel pins that bear on aluminium castings which have worn slightly.  This wear, and that the pins were never an exact fit, means that there is irritating slop in the system as the boat rolls at sea.  The bronze sleeves will provide a better bearing surface as well as taking out much of the unwanted movement.  The sleeves for the kicking strap rod kicker ends were easy to cut to size.  The one for the gooseneck fitting at the end of the boom is ongoing work as, whilst the length is correct, the outside diameter needs to be reduced.  Easy if you have access to a lathe - I don't.