Been on the hard since end August and as we have a lot of project during this off season, we started right away with boat job.

As we did not stay away as long as we had planned there were lots of food and wine to unload

Together with all other zillions of things aboard, we want the boat to be more or less empty as we have a lot of projects planned for the off season. After emptying the boat, we treated our self with a nice sushi

Eat as much as you want for 12 Euro a person, not bad.

But not rest for long, first major job  was to dismantle the gear boxes for the main furling system as I discovered that these super expensive gearboxes shafts were of a not so good stainless-steel quality already after a few months they started to corrode.

See the corrosion on the exposed parts of the shaft already after 3 months in action

For you who have reed my previous post know what a hard work it was before I got the new one in place. Also dismantle the head sail furling mechanism as time to service it.

Picture from when we took it of in Bermuda to service the top swivel. The whole lump weigh about 25 kg.

The electric motor has a poor cable hope I can fix it with a heavy-duty heat shrink tube, else I have to take it to a professional workshop. I have taken the head furling gear to a workshop as it is a very expensive peace of equipment and I do not want to risk damage the aluminium casing. I was recommended a workshop in Portimao who serviced the same type of furler on Lady Annila another Amel SM, which we know.

A bit more heavy duty workshop than many other marinas has , they will also make the shaft for the main furler gearboxes and some other things while they are at it, one problem they are loaded with job and they said “might be ready beginning of December”!!!. Keep my fingers crossed

You who follow, you know that I replaced one of the toilets but when we went out sailing it did not drain, well I found the reason for it.

The stud to the right is the cleaned one the other one is from the other forward lo

The hose between the bowl and the holding tank was totally blocked., I took apart the forward loo hose as well and it  was not long before that one also would have been blocked.

Further

From the copper stud that is glassed in to the holding tank there is a hose attached inside the tank, that was on its way to get a lot of deposits as well, If you want to know how I fixed a hose inside a holding tank? there is a YouTube film, me sorting the whole thing out

and by the way tell the female part of the crew to newer, I say newer put hair in the bowl, it will clog up your pump and destroy the seals.

We have bought new solar panels 2x400w to replace the 3×150 watt on the arc, so 800w on almost the same area as 450w, will be a great improvement. Waiting for two 150 w semiflexible tailor-made 36 v panels from China to put on the bimini, that with the current 2×180 watt on the rail will give total 1,46 Kw of Solar. I have 16×270 Ah LIFePO4 cells soon to arrive from China, but that will be a blog on its own

The Turbo and elbow needed service/replacement

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Cleaned out the Turbo

This is how it spins when attaching a vacuum cleaner to it.

Some say it should spin faster and longer after shutting down the vacuum cleaner others say it has no lubrication when not attached to the engine. I decided to just clean it and put it back again, Parts4Engine deliver very fast so if I need to replace it, I just order one for deliver wherever I am, and mount the new one. less than a half day job now when I have done it ones.

Elbow certainly needs to be replaced, I have now a new in Stainless steel to mount

Heat exchanger and oil cooler needed to be cleaned

Strange that the engine does not get over heated when running. The above are example of some of the job going on

Like to see how I cleaned to cooling system, and how a normal day are for us when in Lagos? Click on the link

While I work on the engine Kerstin is cleaning out our drawers, they are lined with some white fluffy fabric, smart solution? Not sure, the fabric stop noise from things rattling around in the drawers but as the fabric is glued fast, it is extremely hard to clean. Kerstin has a hard work cleaning the drawers and restore the waterproofness of our cockpit enclosure

I am not the only with work to do, do not want to swap with the fellow owning this boat

But not only work, we got a very sought-after visit from our daughter with family so for the first time we meet our grandson Alexander

They stayed for two weeks which we spend showing them the delight of the Algarve

We went babysitting so they could for the first time since the baby was born, go out and have a dinner and drink on their own, highly appreciated we believe. Now they are back in Stockholm and we proceed with our boat job.