senator

Some may rember me posting a month or so ago asking the question whether my props were the right ones due to White Lady pulling 38 knots on Breydon compared to Sea Trials in Poole where she averaged 30 in a bit of a choppy sea. Last weekend she would only pull an average of 31 despite being lighter loaded than the 38 knot run. The only thing I can think of and it is probably total rubish but when White lady came out for maintenance there was a uniform coating of what looked like baked on mud on the props, this was cleaned back to shiny stainless, Was the mud giving better grip on the water?

the lure was barbless jonny but you still have 3 hooks to get out and as fast as I got 1 out another point stuck in, the blood was a result of some very sharp teeth, the fish didn't try and bite but trying to get the hooks out meant I kept catching my fingers on them.

Word of warning, pike have sharp teeth and the lures used with treble hooks are not the easiest thing for the inexpierienced to get out. Caught our first jack pike last year, there was blood involved in the unhooking process and it wasn't the pikes, it also took about 5 mins to get the lure out which is far to long for the fish to be out of water, at least it seemed non the worse for wear when it swam away. Will now take some specialist advice from one of the abundant pike fishermen around the broads on unhooking before fishing for that particular spieces again, even a couple of pounds of pike was a thrill to have on the hook so god knows what the big ones are like. Ours was from the Ant on a spinner close to the bank but I believe you can catch Jack pike just about anywhere on the broads it is the specimen fish that you need to know where they are. Ian

Is there any news on Go Boating, will they still be there? and if they are is this not just a get out from the hoseasons clause they were locked into?

They have with IPS and the new Mercruiser job for stern drives, means you can drive the boat in joystick mode without being anywhere near the helm. Don't know what the range is but wouldn't like to see the results if you sent it a bit to far

Obviously when you have an estimate then the bill comes in nearly double the money hurts but the fact that you feel ripped off hurts even more. I suppose in the grand scheme of a years costs, elevated this year by a couple of GRP repairs then £250 is not a lot but when the boat maintenance account has a vaccume attached the good feeling inside that you get from something like this is worth thousands. Goodchilds were not only less than estimated on this repair but kept to there Quotation on the other repair to sort out the stress cracking, have done a very good job, have been more than helpfull with making sure that the boat is available for working on at the weekend, leaving it on a heavy duty trolley that has been pulled in and out of the work shop, despite there being a week between them finishing the 1 repair and me giving them the go ahead for the second repair they have not charged for hard standing other than that originally factored into the initial quote and they have allowed White Lady to stay on the trolley to save having to have another crane lift onto blocks. All in all I have been very, very impressed with Goodchilds and would have absolutley no reservations about recommending them to anybody. Ian

Am bound to have put this in the wrong place but was so supprised that I just had to post it as quickly as possible. Had an estimate of £500 plus VAT from Goodchilds for one of the repairs they did on White Lady. Just had the bill £260 plus VAT. First time ever that something for the boat has not only come to the same as estimated but considerably less so THANK YOU GOODCHILDS keep up the good work.

Have exactly the same set up with White Lady Simon, couldn't do it otherwise, never tend to have a spare couple of grand lying around. If the summer turns out to be a summer then every penny is money well spent, the feeling of cruising gentaly around the Broads or a good thrash on Breydon in your own boat is totally priceless, sitting under a steamed up cannopy pluged into shore power with the fan heater on listening to the rain drumming on the top somehow doesn't seem such good value. Let the Sun shine :-D

Well White Lady is finally off crutches thanks to her leg being refited and antifouled ready for a return to the water this week, CC marine managed to estimate £200 plus VAT and felt they were close to that when the final bill came in at £360 but I suppose that is just boats, we all tend to accept if not expect it but you wouldn't be too happy if it was your car and the other thing, when was the last time your local garage charged you for parking while they were doing a repair. Goodchilds have finished the internal repair to the side deck brilliantly but have, or at least I hope have still to finish the deck itself and the stress cracks from the crane lift last year are now confined to memory appart from a slightly different shade on the GRP to the repaired area. Still have the engines to service but all the under water bits are complete so should have no problem with attending the meet over may bank holiday. Lets hope for a decent summer otherwise the money that bites so hard in the winter is going to seem less worth spending next winter. Total spend for this maintenance session was over £2500 and that is with me and father doing all the mechanical stuff on the boat ourselves.

That does look a very smart housing Perry, looks as if someone who knows what they are doing has made it. Do you have their number

Jonny the very fact that you are a boat owner means everyone knows you have and never will have any cash

lucky with White Lady as the fuel cap is in the perfect place and angle to fill with a jerry can and spout so you dont get any spillage but have invested in one of thos syphon tubes with the one way valve in just in case there was ever a need to add fuel on the move.

Did mine at a local school in Birmingham course was about £70 and the licence is £26 on completion of the course, the ships licence is free on line but I am not sure if you need an operators licence to apply. Course was over 5 evenings if I remember rightly but you can do it in a day on the coast. There are some serious fines for operating a VHF marine radio without a licence would think it worth the risk if you were going to sea as it could save your life, on the broads though what is the point and remember everyone can here you. out of the 80 odd chanels you are only allowed to use 5 for ship to ship, another for calling marinas and a couple for listening to the coast gaurd so worth knowing what you are doing.

Sounds a very strange machine jonny would be interested to find out about it as the 305's were as far as I can establish all outdrives with twins either Volvo AD31s at 130 hp and later 150 hp or AD41s at 200 horse power or V6 / V8 Volvo petrols and sell at between 40 and 50k for the diesels and 30 to 40k for petrols. sounds like someone spent a lot of cash doing a major coversion that no one wanted if it had a single petrol on a shaft, unless it was a one off from the factory. Could have been a Sealine 30, these preceded the 305 and were the first of the line so maybe a few variants were offered but cant see much point in putting a single petrol that big in as it is not enough to get it planing.

Jonny would be interested to know about a 305 for 15k don't think a single 220hp petrol would be much use in one though, the only 305 I know to around st olaves is a brown and cream one that is up for £42500 with twin 200hp diesels.

the flybridge is the big seller for me Jonny, I know it wont fit under potter or Ludham, Wroxham and Beccles old but just think of the views from what is left of the rivers, being able to see over the reeds without looking through a windscreen and with the sun on my back is a major attraction to me.

Perry, Well still subject to sea trial and survey but a Sealine 305 Statesman, Your right about the work on White Lady, she has had just about everything replacable replaced, Water tank, Fuel Tank, Holding Tank, engines, legs the lot, even installed heating and her BSS is valid till 2011, will make a very nice boat for someone it is just that with a minimum of four and often six on the boat she is a bit of a squeeze, so we have decided to go bigger, will miss the speed on Breydon but at least we are staying Sealine, they are just so good at using what space is available.

the roller coaster continues, after acccepting that the repair to the leg could have been worse instructed Goodchilds to do another £500 worth of repair sound in the knowledge that while it was on their cradle being worked on that I would be able to get the leg back on and so avoiding craneage and hard standing costs which provided a level of mitigation. Now CC Marine inform me at 4pm on a Thursday night that the seal they need is not in the country and the leg won't be ready till next week, long after Goodchilds will have finished. To add to it we may have found White Lady's replacement so if anyone wants a very nicely polished 1990 Sealine 255 with twin 2005 mercruiser 3 litre petrols (only use 1 on the rivers uses about a gallon an hour) top speed around 35 knots and having just had £2500 lavished on her making sure she is ready for the season, give me a shout. in the current market she will be available at a very competitve price. Ian

Father is available for hire complete with ebay polisher, Mojo, as to the double post, would have been a lot more if both legs had needed doing. Just got to hope that we can get her back together now next Saturday.

Well the news is in, it is the middle drive shaft seal, CC Marine being main Mercruiser dealer for the area say they have only changed a couple in the last 12 years so we were just unlucky , £250 cost, could have been worse I suppose but in future when I buy anything I am going to ask which bits don't go wrong and just budget for replacing them all. Good news is that the water was spotted in time so no other damage and we will be there for the spring thrash on Breydon.

Well the news is in it is the middle drive shaft seal, CC Marine being main Mercruiser dealer for the area say they have only changed a couple in the last 12 years so we were just unlucky so £250 could have been worse I suppose but in future when I buy anything I am going to ask which bits don't go wrong and just budget for replacing them all. Good news is that the water was spotted in time so no other damage and will be there for the spring thrash on Breydon.

Suspense is killing me, CC can't test the leg till the end of the week so am a nervous wreck at the moment, why is it you just know that if the bit being tested is £4000 then if it has to be repaired it is not going to be £50, I am just waiting for that mechanic moment when you get that sharp intake of breath followed by "have never seen this before, you are just unlucky"

Hi, David, and thanks for your assistance the weekend. Would be nice if it was just condensation but as you know there are 2 of them in the same bay and the other one has nothing at all showing, also when split, the lower leg showed nothing untoward but on removal of the upper leg there was some milky oil around the top sections. I remember towards the end of last season noticing that the oil was a bit high in the aformentioned reservoir but I had lifted the leg earlier in the day to remove some boat twine that I picked up in the North, so I put it down to the oil moving round the system a bit, it went back to normal the next day.

Results are in on the Seajet Emperor 034 Antifoul after she was lifted last week. Despite being at Burgh Castle there was no marine criters, no barnicals and virtually no weed or slime. It is not cheap but as a multi purpose antifoul it has definately done the job plus the big benifit for those with outdrives is that you can paint aluminium with it as well as it contains no copper. Edit to change No. of antifould from 38 to 034.

The weekend just gone was a real roller coaster for boat maintenace emotions, had decided to change the bellows on White Lady's legs as she was out for some GRP work at Goodchilds. Arrived at the Mercruiser agents to pick up bits at 9 am Saturday morning after a 6.30 start from Birmingham, left at 10.30 with half the bits so a bit of a downer. trailored the legs to find the existing bellows and clips in very good condition and began contemplating whether it was actually a good idea to touch them at all, my motto is normally "if it aint broke break it" but this tends to be expensive on boats. Fortunately a vey knowledgeable fellow forumite has a home at Goodchilds and was kind enough to offer his opinion, even if it was with the disclaimer that "no responsibility either proffesionaly or personally could be accepted and the views were expressed purely as observations" In my book though knowing how fanatical this person is as to boat safety and maintenance, if it is good enough for him then it is good enough for me so this was a serious up time. Set father to work with the polisher and went off to CC marine to do some swapping of parts, unfortunately no anode sets in stock found this strange given the time of year but still these were ordered for next week along with other bits for the rest of the engine servicing, so back to downers Another tip offered by our own technical expert was to clamp off the reservoirs to the legs given that the oil in them would not have been in the legs at all and it would save a good litre or so of leg oil, which at £12.50 a litre is a great tip, only problem being on close inspection of one of the headers the slight white at the bottom, which I had taken to be just a bit of clouding in the plastic, move when I tipped the tank. The oil that came out from the leg was clear but there was definately water in the tank so a call to CC was made. The reply "bring the leg in for pressure testing" was not the one that I wanted to hear. Still White Lady is now nice and shiney again after father worked his socks off, the repair by Goodchilds, although not totally finished yet looks absolutley perfect and is a total credit to them, they arn't cheap but they are exceptionally good, and hopefully the water was spotted in time to ensure that no damage has been done to the leg, really does show the importance of routine maintenance. Am now hoping that she will be back in the water for the Spring meet which providing this week brings good news she should be.