Alongside Fukuoka
Weather: sunny, mild

My big decision for the day was to commit to buying a new pushpit. The old one is made of galvanised pipe and has had quite a few modifications made to it in its long life, leaving all sorts of things poking out of it that are no longer use, many of which I have no idea what they were originally for and which now only cause rust problems. Seeing as this piece of ironmongery was badly bent out of shape in the collision, and as I had been wanting to replace it for years, now seemed the right time to do so, even though the new one is going to cost quite a bit more than I had hoped. So, decision made, today I cut the old pushpit off, leaving Sylph looking a little naked down the rear end. On the plus side it is making working on the stern area a lot easier, and it sure is easy to get on and off the boat.

Another job I have finished today is mounting a stainless steel plate onto the deck where the backstay bolts on. The point where the bolt for the backstay chainplate passes through the deck has always been a bit of a corrosion problem so hopefully the stainless steel plate will solve this. The other reason for mounting a stainless plate here is that the deck was distorted in the collision and the plate helps pull things back into line. And a third reason is that there are three holes in the deck next to the chainplate that had been filled with epoxy. Like the various bits hanging off the old pushpit, I have no idea what the holes were originally for, presumably for electrical wires to pass through but they are rather big for this purpose. Anyway the holes are covered by the plate as well, so I should not have to worry about those causing any problems in the future either.

While the stainless steel plate helped pull the deck back into shape, by itself it was not sufficient. I had discussed the problem with Masa a few days back and yesterday evening he brought a nice powerful hydraulic jack down to the boat. This has worked a treat, and while there is still some distortion in the deck it is nowhere near as bad as it was, and at least there is no longer a hollow in the deck for water to pool in and cause rust, which would have been the case if I had left it as it was. Once again, thank you Masa.

And of course the other important job has been to paint and fair the transom, which is coming along nicely.

All is well.

Sylph sans pushpit:

The stainless steel deck plate:

The hydraulic jack, courtesy of Masa:

And painting and fairing in progress: