Independence - Updates | Maintenance & Care

[Bedslad]

Robin

great blogs, great crew and an epic tale, I myself enjoyed every minute of the trip, thank you for sharing.

good job you didn't have me on board, I'dve been groundbaiting the whole journey, really looking forward to see how you're adventure pans out mate but with your enthusiasm I'm sure it's going to be plane sailing from now on.

best of luck on that beautiful boat

Pete

[LondonRascal]

33 minutes ago, Lulu said:

What was the music when Indy’s coming into Yarmouth Robin? 

"Oblivion" and it is a single by French band M83 featuring lead vocals from Norwegian singer Susanne Sundfør.

[FairTmiddlin]

2 minutes ago, LondonRascal said:

"Oblivion" and it is a single by French band M83 featuring lead vocals from Norwegian singer Susanne Sundfør.

Available on You tube heard it first on the film of the same name about 5 years ago she certainly has a good voice

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=822P87a773c

[Aboattime]

Robin and all the crew ,many thanks for sharing your journey with us,One word sums it up,BRILLIANT. Regards Kevin

[Lulu]

Added the song to my spotify playlist :)

[Jovril]

Hi Robin

Can only repeat all that has been said. Great adventure captured expertly in your blog - Well done and now enjoy your boat in her new home.

Would be good to get Griff's view on the final leg from Dover to Gt Yarmouth to complete to story if he has the time.

All the best

John

 

[LondonRascal]

If anyone has Spotifyand wants to enjoy the entire Captain's Blog  'Back Catalogue' then you can follow the playlist here:
https://open.spotify.com/user/londonrascal/playlist/29uikLoey82WXlJoQfYz6v

 

 

[Lulu]

Ooooh I see Robins next venture..... Now Thats what I Call The Captains Blog - Volume 1  :)

I do have Yotto - Wondering already on my playlist 

 

 

 

[Guest]

1 hour ago, LondonRascal said:

If anyone has Spotifyand wants to enjoy the entire Captain's Blog  'Back Catalogue' then you can follow the playlist here:
https://open.spotify.com/user/londonrascal/playlist/29uikLoey82WXlJoQfYz6v

 

 

Missed one    ie "Smoke on the water" ( Deep Purple) re the barnes brinkcraft incident  

[BroadAmbition]

Would be good to get Griff's view on the final leg from Dover to Gt Yarmouth to complete to story if he has the time.

I'll do a write up when I get a moment

Griff

[Guest]

10 minutes ago, BroadAmbition said:

Would be good to get Griff's view on the final leg from Dover to Gt Yarmouth to complete to story if he has the time.

I'll do a write up when I get a moment

Griff

So , sea ,sky , sea ,sky, sea ,sky  yarmouth etc ect etc 

[Jovril]

Thanks Griff

Look forward to read it when posted 

John

[BroadAmbition]

The Weymouth to Brighton trip although far from flat calm was easily manageable and we made our eta on time.

The morning of Sunday 4^th is where we encountered our first issue totally out of our control.  The admiralty chart and the Reeds almanac both agreed with each other stating ‘Maintained depth 2m’  We knew we would be departing at Low tide and 2m would be sufficient.  The fuelling pontoon / station was further round inside the huge breakwater up by the lock to the inner marina.  We had got ourselves up and ready early as we also knew that topping Indy’s tanks up would be more than a five minute job.  I thought it prudent to call the HM on the vhf enquiring as to the depth as we could plainly see the mud shoaling very close to the marked channel.  The HM informed us that we would have to wait till about 1000 if we wanted to move round for fuel or alternatively 0900 if we wished to proceed to sea.  Brighton Marina it turns out do not maintain a dredged channel depth to 2m at all as stated.

Nowt for it then, after an early ‘Call the Hands’ we all trooped off to Wetherspoons for a full English as one does for the princely sum of £3:50 plus as much coffee as one desired.  Then bimbled round to the local supermarket for supplies with all of us forgetting it was Sunday morning and nowt was open, apart from a petrol station so we made do with what they had to offer.

We slipped Indy’s mooring lines at around 1000 and made our way round to the fuelling station only to find a large rag-n-stick alongside waiting for water depth to increase.  This was another delay. I had to hop off onto the pontoon and kindly inform them that we needed fuel and could they wait elsewhere? Non to happily they moved off and sat in mid channel.  Fuelling Indy took an age.  By the time we had completed, slipped, secured the upper deck for sea obtained permission to proceed etc it was approaching 1200.  We were well behind schedule now.

Once clear of Brighton it was throttles down, I was doing my calculations with regards to eta at Ramsgate, we would now be arriving in the dark with low water approaching, not good.  It wouldn’t have been so bad if I was familiar with the pilotage into Ramsgate harbour but to my knowledge I had only been there once before and that was 26 years ago.  Still we would just have to deal with it in due course.

It was after passing Beachy head that the sea state really picked up.  The wave height steadily increased to around 8ft i would guess, not so much of an issue but it was a short swell with sharp peaks that was making itsen felt, it was getting uncomfortable and more violent by the minute.  No option but to reduce speed to deal with it.  The film footage / photo’s you saw taken by Nigel and Grendel, we were only making around 9/10kts SOG at best, though probably more through the water.  I knew that this was putting our eta at Ramsgate even further behind with the real possibility that we would now arrive at smack on Low water but there was no way we could make any better progress in the sea state we were dealing with.  As we pushed on and altered course as one does, the direction of the sea changed from being directly on the bow to more on the Stbd bow.  So as well as the bow / anchor forging into the peaks and dumping green water on the foc’sle it increased the roll as a result, Joy and glee, we were as badly burnt as scolded.  In the snow/rain storms visibility kept reducing significantly too.

My crew fazed? – not a bit of it.  I knew they would be fine with this otherwise I wouldn’t have picked them for this kind of trip in the first place.  I always knew that this sort of situation was likely to happen at this time of year.  It was getting hard work keeping on ones feet and my regular engine room rounds were somewhat challenging.  The fwd bilge pump indicator kept sticking on with the threat of burning out the motor.  The blasted float switch kept getting thrown vertical and stopped there even though the bilge was only slightly wet.  It was probably never designed to be vertical!  Added to that some clown of a boat builder had mounted the float switch lower down than the pump. So if there was enough water to lift the switch, the pump was still sitting dry.  I put a weight on the float switch – that cured that issue of saving the pump running dry but meant if we did have a water ingress the pump could not now operate. This meant of course regular checking of the fwd bilge, just another issue to deal with then.  Going fwd with the amount of pitching we were experiencing and lifting deck plates was an adventure. 

I was keeping a crafty eye on our resident crabfat too as this sort of passage in this sea state was an unknown to him and would he deal with it ok? Mentally he would lap it up and would not stop or give in, but would his stomach rise to the challenge? No worries about our submariner or the Wizard.  Robin however was a different entity and went into shut down mode.  It was understandable as he would never have been in this situation before or experienced anything like this.  The best place for him was aft in the master cabin.  I kept popping in reassuring him that his boat was fine, the crew were looking after Indy and she would in turn look after us. The crew were dealing with the situation in hand.

Indy was fine too.  She was handling the sea state and shrugging off even the now more regular rogue waves that she pounded through.  Nothing was coming loose (Well it did actually, the fwd berthing rope that was tied onto the cleats – Howard dealt with that one) or was breaking, the water tight integrity was to the good.  The engineering department was purring along just as it should do.  The crew however were now under no illusions that they were not on a Sunday afternoon cruise down the Yare, far from it.  Our crabfat was doing just fine so we had four of us operating normally.  Upper deck rounds – Well that is to say venturing onto the sun deck (Sun deck? – should have been named monsoon deck) and fly bridge was not for the faint hearted but it had to be done.

Robin came up for a word, could we alter our destination to Dover and get out of this sea state?

 

 

 

Griff

 

 

[grendel]

Just one thought - re the bilge pump, it sounds like you need a stop / bumper to prevent the float reaching the vertical, as if it doesnt get vertical it cant get stuck. - not of course that Independence will likely ever be going out in such extreme conditions again. 

[stumpy]

11 hours ago, Ricardo said:

So , sea ,sky , sea ,sky, sea ,sky  yarmouth etc ect etc 

Ricardo - I somehow think that should should read .........Yarmouth beer beer beer lol (I know they well deserved a few)

[MrB]

1 hour ago, BroadAmbition said:

The Weymouth to Brighton trip although far from flat calm was easily manageable and we made our eta on time.

The morning of Sunday 4^th is where we encountered our first issue totally out of our control.  The admiralty chart and the Reeds almanac both agreed with each other stating ‘Maintained depth 2m’  We knew we would be departing at Low tide and 2m would be sufficient.  The fuelling pontoon / station was further round inside the huge breakwater up by the lock to the inner marina.  We had got ourselves up and ready early as we also knew that topping Indy’s tanks up would be more than a five minute job.  I thought it prudent to call the HM on the vhf enquiring as to the depth as we could plainly see the mud shoaling very close to the marked channel.  The HM informed us that we would have to wait till about 1000 if we wanted to move round for fuel or alternatively 0900 if we wished to proceed to sea.  Brighton Marina it turns out do not maintain a dredged channel depth to 2m at all as stated.

Nowt for it then, after an early ‘Call the Hands’ we all trooped off to Wetherspoons for a full English as one does for the princely sum of £3:50 plus as much coffee as one desired.  Then bimbled round to the local supermarket for supplies with all of us forgetting it was Sunday morning and nowt was open, apart from a petrol station so we made do with what they had to offer.

We slipped Indy’s mooring lines at around 1000 and made our way round to the fuelling station only to find a large rag-n-stick alongside waiting for water depth to increase.  This was another delay. I had to hop off onto the pontoon and kindly inform them that we needed fuel and could they wait elsewhere? Non to happily they moved off and sat in mid channel.  Fuelling Indy took an age.  By the time we had completed, slipped, secured the upper deck for sea obtained permission to proceed etc it was approaching 1200.  We were well behind schedule now.

Once clear of Brighton it was throttles down, I was doing my calculations with regards to eta at Ramsgate, we would now be arriving in the dark with low water approaching, not good.  It wouldn’t have been so bad if I was familiar with the pilotage into Ramsgate harbour but to my knowledge I had only been there once before and that was 26 years ago.  Still we would just have to deal with it in due course.

It was after passing Beachy head that the sea state really picked up.  The wave height steadily increased to around 8ft i would guess, not so much of an issue but it was a short swell with sharp peaks that was making itsen felt, it was getting uncomfortable and more violent by the minute.  No option but to reduce speed to deal with it.  The film footage / photo’s you saw taken by Nigel and Grendel, we were only making around 9/10kts SOG at best, though probably more through the water.  I knew that this was putting our eta at Ramsgate even further behind with the real possibility that we would now arrive at smack on Low water but there was no way we could make any better progress in the sea state we were dealing with.  As we pushed on and altered course as one does, the direction of the sea changed from being directly on the bow to more on the Stbd bow.  So as well as the bow / anchor forging into the peaks and dumping green water on the foc’sle it increased the roll as a result, Joy and glee, we were as badly burnt as scolded.  In the snow/rain storms visibility kept reducing significantly too.

My crew fazed? – not a bit of it.  I knew they would be fine with this otherwise I wouldn’t have picked them for this kind of trip in the first place.  I always knew that this sort of situation was likely to happen at this time of year.  It was getting hard work keeping on ones feet and my regular engine room rounds were somewhat challenging.  The fwd bilge pump indicator kept sticking on with the threat of burning out the motor.  The blasted float switch kept getting thrown vertical and stopped there even though the bilge was only slightly wet.  It was probably never designed to be vertical!  Added to that some clown of a boat builder had mounted the float switch lower down than the pump. So if there was enough water to lift the switch, the pump was still sitting dry.  I put a weight on the float switch – that cured that issue of saving the pump running dry but meant if we did have a water ingress the pump could not now operate. This meant of course regular checking of the fwd bilge, just another issue to deal with then.  Going fwd with the amount of pitching we were experiencing and lifting deck plates was an adventure. 

I was keeping a crafty eye on our resident crabfat too as this sort of passage in this sea state was an unknown to him and would he deal with it ok? Mentally he would lap it up and would not stop or give in, but would his stomach rise to the challenge? No worries about our submariner or the Wizard.  Robin however was a different entity and went into shut down mode.  It was understandable as he would never have been in this situation before or experienced anything like this.  The best place for him was aft in the master cabin.  I kept popping in reassuring him that his boat was fine, the crew were looking after Indy and she would in turn look after us. The crew were dealing with the situation in hand.

Indy was fine too.  She was handling the sea state and shrugging off even the now more regular rogue waves that she pounded through.  Nothing was coming loose (Well it did actually, the fwd berthing rope that was tied onto the cleats – Howard dealt with that one) or was breaking, the water tight integrity was to the good.  The engineering department was purring along just as it should do.  The crew however were now under no illusions that they were not on a Sunday afternoon cruise down the Yare, far from it.  Our crabfat was doing just fine so we had four of us operating normally.  Upper deck rounds – Well that is to say venturing onto the sun deck (Sun deck? – should have been named monsoon deck) and fly bridge was not for the faint hearted but it had to be done.

Robin came up for a word, could we alter our destination to Dover and get out of this sea state?

 

 

 

Griff

 

 

Good write-up, looking forward to the next installment. 

[grendel]

1 hour ago, stumpy said:

Ricardo - I somehow think that should should read .........Yarmouth beer beer beer lol (I know they well deserved a few)

not just beer - weatherspoons, I am not sure if they missed out on a weatherspoons at any of their chosen harbours

[scaniaman]

I wondered why the price of my wetherspoon shares had shot up

[Jovril]

Great write up Griff

Looking forward to the next installment

Scaniaman - I think you will find that your shares have dropped now Indy crew are all home 

 

Thanks again Griff

John

[NorfolkNog]

Great write up

Scuse my ignorance but what's crabfat??

[SueH]

9 minutes ago, NorfolkNog said:

Great write up

Scuse my ignorance but what's crabfat??

HWMBO used to call me that when I was serving in the WRAF.  Mind u I used to call him a Pongo.

Military sense of humour!!!

[diesel falcon]

3 hours ago, NorfolkNog said:

Great write up

Scuse my ignorance but what's crabfat??

Dec 2002 - Accounts vary, but apparently the grease was called 'crabfat' because it resembled in color the ointment used to treat sailors for 'crabs' (pediculosis pubis, genital lice), and of which fat was a major constituent.

i pasted this, lazy typist!

or, a submarriner?....no RAF!

[BroomSedan]

Enjoyed the last installment of the delivery. It was unfortunate that you did not have calmer conditions but no one can control the weather. You seem to be getting a better handle on things now the events are a bit further behind you.

Just a suggestion, as you said that the running total was £14k when you left Plymouth and as you've mentioned you were using this as a record of your updates etc. for yourself, how about a running total of the costs. This would give everyone an idea of the cost implications of big boat ownership without having to look back through all the posts. Hope this doesn't appear too nosy but I am sure we are not the only ones who are fascinated by the amounts involved. Obviously keep your privacy paramount.

Hope all is going well with the current work being done by NYA. Looking forward to your next blog.

[LondonRascal]

Quote

how about a running total of the costs. This would give everyone an idea of the cost implications of big boat ownership without having to look back through all the posts. Hope this doesn't appear too nosy but I am sure we are not the only ones who are fascinated by the amounts involved. Obviously keep your privacy paramount.

I don't think that is being too nosy but the truth is, I stopped taking any record of spending some time ago - which may not have been the best move. However I have gone over invoices for works done to give some idea of those costs.

To service the Generator and for spares for it and the Yanmars: £1,188.57

New water pump: £203.30

To inspect possible fuel balance issues: £623.00

To polish fuel and clean fuel tanks: £505.00

To buy and have installed 5Kw warm air heater: £4,861.97

New life raft and associated items: £2,678.42

Fuel costs to bring to Norfolk: £2,825.97       

Broads Tolls to date: £385.50

Mooring in Norfolk: £4,001.40

BSS: £110.00

Goodness knows how much on Amazon for various items that I have been buying since purchase - bedding, kitchenware all the usual items you need. And this is before the big projects have begun.

[scaniaman]

Like you said in one of your blogs Robin"they know how to charge"

have the yanmars been serviced for that price as well?

paul