This spring has seen an intense period of work go into Arctic Loon. Being on parental leave from work has allowed me the extra time required to attack the long list of projects and upgrades. In April the projects were big and important and our daughter Maddie’s time in daycare was increased to give me more time to work. With an end of May deadline approaching to leave for the summer cruise I knew I had my work cutout for me but was still confident that I could get most of it done.
The haulout should have been 14 days but windy weather forced a two day delay. We finally hauled out the boat on 12 April for 12 days on the hard to do bottom maintenance. One other challenge was the fact that I had to lighten the boat to be under the 20,000 Lbs limit of the crane being used. The Westsail 32 spec dry weight is 19,500 lbs but I knew that I was well over that with all the gear onboard. This took months of planning and coordination and included the following tasks: emptied the water and fuel tanks, took the mast down (thank you Ben, Ryan, Andreas, Gerry and Ian), removed the bowsprit, landed all the anchors and chain as well as removed the majority of the miscellaneous items inside the boat. There were many car trips bringing items home and putting them in an ever growing pile of boating stuff in our garage. It was a daunting task but also refreshing to dig down to the bottom of all the lockers and give the boat a good clean inside and out.
You might be thinking at this point why I didn’t just take the boat elsewhere to be hauled out on a marine travelift that can haul boats many times larger. The answer is partly financial thriftiness ($ vs $$$) and partly travel time efficiency from home to the boat (10 min vs. 40min).
On lift day the boat weighed in at 19,000 Lbs, it was worth it but my challenges were just beginning.
Major work performed included:
- All new standing rigging done by Blackline Marine
- Sand and paint two coats of ablative antifouling bottom paint
- Replaced two thru-hulls
- Removed, repair and reattach the rudder gudgeons. Welding performed by Altech Machining
- Reseal hull deck join with 3M 5200
- Replace zincs
I was busy working until 4pm the day before relaunching to get the rudder bolted back on.
Relaunching went smoothly and then I had only to ferry the mountain of gear from my garage back to the boat and put it all back together! That should be easy right?…..
Ellery
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