Almost Done

Almost done!

Every boater has a list, long distance cruisers have a longer list. Every boater will get to the point where they say, “almost done” but never reach the end of the list as it grows daily. Today I am almost done with a long list of minor jobs so I thought a report was in order. There are many things on this list I could have done without, but I firmly believe I must keep Furthur in tip top condition, once things slide they slide fast. I have seen many a cruising boat that went for Bristol to junk in a matter of years, first one system goes then another. So even though I do not need hot water and have done without it for over a year, I replaced the tank.

I have found Boat Lagoon in Phuket to have the best services of anywhere on my journey and returned here list in hand. So far I have found talented people to do every job.

Starting at the bow; I had the 200 meters of chain regalvanized, it was getting real rusty. I went to the shop that does this and told them I had 200 meters (I am a metric boy now!) they arrived at the boat with a small cart and I queried how they would get my chain in it. The response was, “we thought you meant 200 ft, you are a Yank.” Nope 200 meters, 600 feet, The boys brought out the big cart and lugged it all away. My chain took a ride to Bangkok and back all shiny and new looking. We marked it and put it into the spanking clean chain locker, yes I even cleaned out the locker, not much chance to do that, is there?

Moving aft, I have American LPG tanks, which cannot be filled in Indonesia. I had hoped to rig some Asian tanks into the system; so far this has not been possible so I will get two more tanks to make sure I have enough gas for all those wonderful meals.

The pilot house doors have begun to stick and were hard to open and close, a touch of the grinder cured this problem. Great gobs of sealant fixed my two leaky hatches, not pretty but dry now. I also resealed all the antenna holes on the pilot house roof. The extreme heat, dry, then wet makes life tough on sealants.

Speaking of extreme heat, the big project this year was to add air conditioning. We are usually comfortable at anchor but time in the marinas is brutally hot. I found a great French guy who designs his own systems although I went with a simple Mitsubishi system. The external fan and internal one unit compressor provide excellent cooling, quiet and far cheaper than normal water cooled systems. The same chap installed the small square hot water heater, it takes little room and does the job. I showed these guys my dead ice maker and they fixed it easily, I was going to toss it. They fix things here not toss them, amazing!

In my slow conversion to a 220v boat I had the electrician add a breaker box and switches for 220v shore power which power the air con, battery charger, hot water heater, dive compressor and water maker. All will run on the generator also. I also added several 220v outlets so I can use Asian appliances and tools. We now have a working toaster!

The washing machine I replaced in Australia failed and the boys pulled it out and fixed it in one day allot of lifting and grunting to replace a belt and pump but we are back in clean clothes. Actually I do not use it much in Asia as laundry services are everywhere and dirt cheap.

The good ol’ Cummins now has 5000 hours, a hallmark in the Selene world. I had a pesky oil leak that it turns out was due to my error in not replacing the water pump correctly, that fixed we are doing a thorough service and inspection. Cummins is a continued supporter of the Furthur Adventure.

The Northern Lights Generator has gobbled up impellors at an alarming rate; I have had to replace them every 200 hours. This has put an unhealthy collection of rubber tidbits into the system. The sound shield mods made to accommodate the PTO had made it impossible to remove the front shield. We cut it in two and now it is a snap, should have done this long ago. The tech found two handfuls of demon rubber blades in the system, amazingly it runs much cooler now, haha.

The last of the original batteries, now 8 years old, dwelled in the bow thruster and engine starting boxes. I replaced them with smaller cranking batteries and they work great, saved a few bucks there.

The cockpit hatch leaks occasionally and as I just added a ton of electrical gadgets there; I had the boys install a second latch where the hatch did not seal correctly. I had the same lads repair the port side boarding gate which did not close.

On the cosmetic side, the louvered doors in the cockpit locker and the neighboring drawers were varnished and a pain to do, they were in a sad state. I had them painted this time a much better fix. While at it they gave me an offer I could not refuse to redo the rails. I usually do my own bright work but it is time to strip to wood and start again and the price was right so down to wood and 12 new coats in progress.

On the work in progress list: As I said in an earlier post, I proudly have worn a huge hole in the pilot house bench, I am looking to get it fixed. The mechanic who fixed the gen will service the pesky Honda; there is absolutely NO service for Honda outboards here even though there are many of them about. The sold the commercial operators the motors on credit but supplied no service. Honda is on my list of “never again”.

I hate to say it as it is asking for a curse, but I am ahead of schedule and hope to be out of the marina by Christmas with Furthur standing tall again. For a boat with this much time this is a very small and minor list, Furthur continues to be absolutely as trustworthy a vessel as sails the seas.