After the excitement of our Sunday lunch at Harmony Hall when Andrew and Caroline announced their engagement the congratulations have been flooding in.  Thank you for all those.

 

We had kept from our impending guests Harrison and Katy, who join us from North Carolina on Thursday, that our engine thrust plate which rather essentially joins the gear box to the engine was showing serious signs of breaking up.  We took Oriole into the marina and were berthed behind Gitana by 0900 on Sunday morning ready to start work on Monday morning with a nice cold engine.  Fortunately Oriole carries a spare thrust plate and we had done this before as it had to replaced six years ago. However I was concerned that it would be difficult to get out as it had been a very tight fit and had borrowed a wheel puller from Gitana's engineer.  I had not anticipated having to replace it again!  The first one lasted eleven years.  Why they are breaking up is a subject that Betamarine our engine manufacturer is investigating and taking very seriously, but we have our suspicions which I will not go into here.

 

 

 

The mechanic was entirely unaware of the activities of the photographer.

 

The process of replacement entails removing the gear box (sounds easy!), which is facilitated by demolishing the galley and then the thrust plate is exposed and having removed its 6 securing bolts I had a real wrestle to get it out, but it came off eventually.  A total of 24 bolts to get out and put back. The new plate was installed, the gear box re-fitted (also sounds easy), the galley re-assembled and we were all finished by 1700.  Nine hours of unremitting work was finished and so was JL, who had been patiently assisted by CAL all day.  The engine is now running quietly and smoothly and if my theories are correct it should not happen again!  However we will always carry a spare.  For those who ask what we do and whether we ever get bored this should give some insight into the cruising yachtsman's world.

 

So if Harrison and Katy have been breathing heavily on reading this, they can relax, and we look forward to their arrival.