Keoma - 5 December

Dearloves
Mon 5 Dec 2005 20:12
This morning we tried to address the various problems we had caused/encountered last night.  The solution to the autopilot failure came from an unexpected quarter - Juliet, who is a complete ignoramus when it comes to anything mechanical, noticed that the display screen indicating rudder angle was showing an angle of 30 degrees even when the rudder was in the central position.
 
The radius arm on the rudder post had dropped down and needed to be lifted up and re-keyed in position.  This involved Charlie climbing into the aft locker (Nick was amazed that he could fit in there) and then Nick passing him tools like a surgeon performing an operation.
 
This seems to have improved the rudder bearing situation, and there is no longer the vibration we experienced yesterday.  We repaired the torn genoa with tape:
 
 
Then furled it away and set the spinnaker.  This has now been up all day and we have had some superb sailing.  Juliet was on the helm when we recorded a boatspeed of 13.1 knots!
 
 
We have been doing 9-10 knots for most of the afternoon, with a rolling, following sea.