Keel Thoughts

Tomorrow I will pickup a proper 17/32" drill bit to make the tapping easier.
Will also have to get the 1/2" rod and nuts.

I am confident the last stud with the broken off stud extractor will just take a little time to drill out.  The fact that three of the six keel bolts broke off when turned slightly makes me glad I am doing all of this.

Overall I am pleased with the progress.

Thanks John and Colin for all your help.

Keel Bolts

We cut off one of the middle keel bolts and ground it smooth.
We center punched it and drilled a 1/4" pilot hole using the drill press.
It took about 10 minutes to drill down a little over an inch, when the it got easier to drill, and the filings were darker and finer.  We were definately drilling into the cast iron.

Catalina had said that the studs were J cast in to the keel casting.  We somehow doubted this, and decided to try a pipe wrench on the others.  Low and behold, the next two bolts unscrewed from the keel, having approxiately 1" of good thread into the keel:

The rearmost bolt broke off.  We drilled a 1/4" hole about 1" into the center of the broken bolt, and tried a stud extractor.  With a little bit of leverage with the pipe wrench, the stud extractor broke off in the hole!

SHIT!!!

I called Colin Cunningham from Newcastle, and he came by with some more tools.
We tried to get the extractor piece out with various drill bits, CNC bits, dremel bits, but the steel is VERY hard, and we could not get anywhere with it quickly.  We decided to move onto the other studs.

That left the frontmost bolt, and it also sheared off.  We ground the two front ones smooth, center punched, and drilled 1/4" pilot holes:

We then drilled out the middle stud to 1/2", and started to tap with a 5/8" tap.  It was slow and difficult; we used a small square to make sure the tape was true.

A 5/8" tap requires a 17/32" pilot hole.  This is 1/32" larger the the 1/2" pilot hole we had.  We decided to head to Princess Auto to get a proper pilot bit to make the tapping easier.  Princess Auto, Home Depot, and RONA don't have this size.

I did pickup some rings with 1/2" thread on them at Princess Auto.
I was able to thread them into the two good original holes and hook up the keel to the overhead crane.

Keel Cradle

John Schultz from the club took a photo of my keel on the ground with a tape measure beside it and designed a steel cradle to support the 800 lb keel in the shop:

We fabricated it from 2" angle iron yesterday, and welded it up this morning:

Lifting if off the skid outside the shop was accomplished with some rings connected to the keel bolts, and then lifted with the overhead crane in the shop:

Here it is in the cradle:

Cracked Rudder

Took the pintles off, and there are some major structural cracks

Uhhh Ohhh

Stripping Rudder

Spend a couple of hours scaping and sanding the bottom paint off the rudder.

Spinlock Triple Rope Clutch

Picked up an unused Spinlock Triple Rope Clutch off Kijiji

$75 didn't even barter; lucky because the guy had many offers, and I was the first to respond to his add.

My buddy Neil picked it up in Baltimore (near Cobourg).

Will go on Still Time 1.0

Boat Stuff from Kijiji for Still Time 1.0

Picked up the following:

These will be added to the coach roof to bring all lines back

Older foot blocks, don't know where I will use them

LED Anchor light

Got all three items for $80

Charging Batteries

My surveyor noticed that the voltage of the house batteries were below 9 volts, not even enought juice the power the interior lights.

Got down to Mimico, and met the previous owner David.

The boat came with a 70A Balmar alternator with an external regulator and battery isolator.  These and the house batteries came with the boat when he bought it in 2007.

I added about 1L of distilled water in each of the house batteries, hooked up the boat to yard power, and charged the batteries for about an hour.  After turning the charger off, the voltage was up to 12.5 volts.

Time will tell, but I think the purchase of new house batteries may be in order for a piece of mind on an extended cruise.

Still Time 2.0

We are officially the owners of a 1990 CS34:

Designer: Tony Castro

LOA 33 ft 6 in
LWL 27 ft 8 in
Beam 11 ft 3 in
Draft 4 ft 6 in (shoal)
Disp 10,500 lb
Ballast: 4,200 lb

I 43 ft 0 in
J 13 ft 6 in
P 37 ft 0 in
E 13 ft 0 in

B/D 40%
D/L 221.4
SA 529 Sq Ft
SA/D 17.65

We decided to make the jump to a cruising boat:

• 20HP Yanmar 2GM
• Dripless shaft seal
• Hood main with two reefs
• Hood 140% genoa
• Harken Mk 3 furler
• Double spreader mast
• Whisker Pole
• Dodger/Bimini
• Sugar scoop swim platform
• Enclosed aft cabin
• Enclosed aft head
• Separate shower
• Hot water
• Propane stove/oven
• Silva depth/speed/wind instruments
• Autohelm 4000
• Garmin 130 GPS
• Standard Horizon VHF with cockpit remote mike
• 12v Refrigeration
• Electric windlass with 20kg Bruce anchor
• Electric deck wash system
• Teak cockpit table
• Marine stereo with cockpit and salon speakers
• Amplified TV antenna on mast
• Cockpit cushions
• Winter cover

The new boat is in Mimico and will launched and commissioned April 28th weekend.

She will be called Still Time, and will be a cruising only boat.

Still Time 1.0 will have her keel re-attached, renamed, and put in the water.

I will be racing her this season.

She has been a great boat for us to learn on.

I plan on teaching my daughter to sail, so who knows!