Tuesday, 18 September 2018 - I finished the rope to chain splice today. Yesterday I spent about 5 hours on the first three tucks of six pairs of strands. Today three tucks of three pairs took two hours and forty five minutes for second row of tucks. This second row was of only every other pair, but still necessitated the same size fid to be pushed through the plaits. On the third set of tucks, I cut off one strand of each pair to further taper the splice, so the fid size dropped significantly as did the time involvement, an hour and a half for the third set of tucks. I think I'm glad my idea of cutting the line, splicing in two eyes and reattaching them with a shackle won't work. I'm not sure I'm up to another three days of splicing. That's a lot of strain and abrasion on a person's hands. I'd probably be a little better and faster on subsequent splices, but the hard part, forcing the large fids through, would still be the same. This is infinitely harder than splicing twisted rope. When you need to open the gap in strands on twisted line all you have to do is twist the rope and it opens up. With the plaited line, each adjacent strand and pair of strands is running the opposite direction, so when you twist the rope one direction to open up a gap, the one next to it tightens up, so you accomplish nothing. You literally have to force the fids through, and as you create more tucks, the strands get tighter and tighter. I never dreamed it would take me over 9 1/2 hours to do just one splice. I'm learning, though.

Wednesday, 19 September - I went to he library, then Home Depot to see if they'd gotten any group 27 marine starter batteries in. The last time I was there, they were out, They do have them now, but since I was on the way to Salsa and Carolina Shag dance lessons, I didn't get one. I'll have to return after taking mine out of the boat so I don't have to leave a core deposit.

Thursday, 20 September - I loaned my old dinghy to "Stitch" today. He's having engine problems with his and needed transportation to and from shore until he gets it running again. Second on the agenda was to defrost the refrigerator again. At least I'm getting the time involvement on that cut down.

Friday, 21 September - I saw Mike Barber at the marina today. He splices rope and sews sails for people in the harbor. I asked him about how he splices 12 strand mega-plait. He says it's been quite a while since he's done one, but gave me a brief run-through. As usual, I should have asked for advise first. He uses a totally different type of fid than I have for that work. He described it to me and and with that type of fid, he assured me I could have cut several hours off of the job. Oh well, that's what I do, learn the hard way. Now I know.

Saturday, 22 September - A run to the grocery store, then, later to the library today. On the way back from the library I was invited over to the boats of Eddy and Debbie Humphrey. They have a faro-cement boat named Rock Steady that suffered extensive damage in hurricane Irma and have bought a Morgan 38 to replace it named Blew By U (It's a fast boat). A very enjoyable evening of good music and rum.

Sunday, 23 September - I filled in for Don Shuler as the Boot Key Harbor Cruiser's Net net controller this morning, then around about 10:30 I about jumped out of my skin when I heard a huge crashing noise onboard Island Time. It didn't feel like anything hit the boat, but I dashed into the cockpit to see what it was. Nothing was really apparent, so I stepped out of the cockpit. As I looked across the bimini top, there lay the mainsail again. Last time it fell, it was in use, so it was just the sail material dropping, but this time it was furled, so the whole furling mechanism was wrapped in the sail and I thought for sure it must have broken one of my new $1000 solar panels, but, thank heavens, it didn't. When the sail is furled, or rolled around its vertical axis it is held under quite a bit of tension and when the wind blows, it bangs against the mast over and over. To keep that from happening, for awhile I was cinching it about halfway up the mast with a line, but I realized that the line was eventually going to abrade through the sun protection layer, so I quit binding it. Perhaps I need to find another technique to bind it. With it unbound, another result of the movement of the sail is that it flexes the threaded stud at the end of the cable that holds the tension on the cable running through the luff sleeve. Even though it barely moves, the repetitive flexion apparently caused the stainless steel bolt to break. When that occurred, the sail and luff sleeve came crashing down leaving the cable on the mast.
                    I need to go to the top of the mast to release the cable at that end so I can lower it, measure it, and replace it. I had never climbed whole the mast by myself, always having someone to hold a safety line in case I slipped, but today seemed like as good a time as any to try. I donned the bosun's chair and headed up. As I expected, getting beyond the spreaders was a little difficult because the steps on the mast are blocked by the shrouds at that point, but I made past the spreaders and headed on up. I got to within about four feet of the 45 foot mast and realized there were no more steps to clip my safety lines to. Since I had always had someone on the safety line, I guess I hadn't needed to clip in on every step, so I hadn't noticed the lack of steps at the very top. Anyway, now I know. I can't climb to the very top by myself safely. I'll try to find someone to tail the line for me tomorrow.

Monday, 24 September - I asked on the Cruiser's net for help getting up the mast this morning and Larry from the vessel Winter Dream came over within the hour and tailed the line as I went to the top of the mast and took the halyard down, then he also helped me lay the secondary rode and chain into the chain locker. I had been putting that off because by myself, it takes a couple of hours, but with assistance, it can be done in about 10 minutes. It's one of those "on-deck, below-deck" jobs.
                    After that, I tried to contact the maker of the roller furling system, CDI, but wasn't able to reach them by phone.

Tuesday, 25 September - I tried, again, to reach CDI, but the specific man I needed to talk to wasn't in, so I took the halyard cable over to Keys Rigging here in Marathon and asked them to give me an idea about how much it would cost and to see if they had any ideas about how to insure that it wouldn't break again. The design definitely has a flaw. At the top of the cable, at the top of the mast, the system has a double toggle so that the cable can move slightly in the horizontal plane, but at the bottom, the stud merely goes through a hole and holds tension on the cable with three nuts. There is absolutely no way for the system there at the bottom to absorb movement, so eventually, stress at that one spot causes the failure. When I described how the system was built, he couldn't believe they designed it that way, but said he'd try to come up with a solution.

Wednesday, 26 September - I finally got to talk with CDI this morning. They admit that the design is flawed, but don't have a solution. One reason for Island Time having the problem is that it has more sail area than the unit is designed for, so the stressed are higher. I'm sure cost was a factor in installing this model, and you get what you pay for. After talking to CDI, I called Keys Rigging again. He thought he had a solution, but it would involve significant modification to the bottom of the rig and to the sail itself, so I decided to merely replace the cable as designed. Maybe it will outlast me, maybe it won't.

Thursday, 27 September - Coast Guard documentation for the boat needed to be renewed soon, so I got that done online. As usual, that took longer than I expected. While filling out the online forms, one of the blanks was a choice between purchase a title or renew the documentation (registration). I chose documentation, but after I had finalized the transaction, the receipt I got showed "Title". It also showed "Mailing Address" as "Null, Null, Null". There hadn't even been blanks asking for mailing address. Maybe that is because I was doing on my phone instead of on a computer, but, regardless, I had to call someone to clear it up. It turns out, I reached one today, the bank it gets paid through, but the Coast Guard doesn't answer phone on Thursdays. Apparently they get so far behind in the first part of the week that they need a day to catch up, so they don't answer the phones in order to avoid getting new work.

Friday, 28 September - In the afternoon, I went to West Marine to try to get a small turning block for the roller furling system, but they didn't have it. On the way back from West Marine it was pretty warm at about 5pm, so I decided I had just enough time to get a beer at the Overseas during happy hour that ends at six. I ended up meeting some new friends, then some recent acquaintances asked me to join them. After four beers I realized I was hungry, so I had dinner there, too. A nice evening.

Saturday, 29 September - I spent a couple of hours trying one last time to charge the starter battery, this time using the generator directly to an automotive battery charger, then to the battery. It still wouldn't charge or start the engine, so I headed to the marina to borrow a bicycle to go to Home Depot, then after purchasing a new starter battery there, I returned to the boat and installed it. My old starter battery was made by Deka, who supplies batteries to West Marine, but they won't honor the warranty because mine doesn't have the West Marine Brand on it. This battery had only lasted about a year and a half, but I think about 95% of battery warranties aren't worth the paper they're printed on. I'm sure many people are like me in that they buy a battery when and where they need it, then they aren't near that supplier's outlets to use the warranty when they need the next one. Besides, they prorate them so heavily that it's hardly worthwhile using the warranty. Besides that, if the first one wasn't any good, why would you want another just like it?