Yesterday was a difficult day with grey skies and much wind from the side which is the worst. Many times I had to go on the wobbly foredeck to work the centerboard and sails. This is not how it should have been done. It should have been done from the safe position of the fore hatch. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. At first everything looked fine, then in the last days when the timetable was set, came a rush. The forepeak got filled up and its intended use as a safe place to handel the sails and centerboard was temporarily sacrificed. I eat myself to more space was the idea.
Surprisingly even after eating for now more than a month it seams as if I have as much provisions as when I left Ireland. I still have to work from the outside from the foredeck. Unfortunately because I do not feel completely safe there in the dark when the boat is healing rocking and yawing. Then the night was difficult to but in a different way. I am now in the really shipping lines for traffic to and from the Gibraltar straight. Some was coming very close. It is difficult to know if the crew is seeing me or not and I hate to bother them by calling them on the VHF. Everything went well and I awoke to a wonderful day. The wind had calmed down and the sun shone brightly from a clear blue sky. It was wonderful and very nice and warm. Then the horror of it, the port rudder did not work. It had jammed and was blocked in a position. I tried everything but to no avail. What to do? I did some thinking. I was sailing south. The hot morning sun did strike the port side. I have inside steering and no wind-vane or autopilot. The pipe steering lines goes to my bunk. I do not want any water there, specially not seawater. The trough hull connection consist of a piston mobbing in carbon fiber. To each end of the piston the steering rope is attached. Thus breaking the wicking effect and making it waterproof.
My boat is very narrow only 104 centimeter. She floats to deep and is very tender and rocky. I therefore use a lot of antislip tejp. They come in two varieties, black and white. To my yellow boat I thought black looked best. Black do get very hot in the sun, in fact it is uncomfortable to touch it. The heat produced by the black antislip tejp had so heated the piston that it had expanded and jammed in the pipe. I have now pealed it of. Now the piston is cooled and it seams as if the steering once again is a working construction. I have wanted to mention this as an example of how two things at first not connected to each other can interfere and cause big problems. One can not new things without testing them. Problem is here at the latitude of Gibraltar the sun is much stronger than in Sweden
I have a nice time out here. I spend my time working on Next Design which is coming out most satisfying.
Regards Yrvind
Update to sailing report 6
I still have a problem.To day again the sun is shining brightly. Again the port rudder is blocked. I was happy yesterday. I thought I Had solved the problem by removing the black anti slip tejp. I hope I can come upp with a solution.
Regards Yrvind
Update 2 to sailing report 6
The rudder problem gets worse and worse. Now in the afternoon when the sun comes in from the other side also the starbord rudder is blocked. I cannot steer my boat. Its a bad thing. If a ship is heading for me I cannot move out of their path. I try to find a solution.
Regards Yrvind