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03/07/20 Fri. My diaphragm arrived yesterday afternoon, two and a half days behind schedule so not bad. Today, I stripped down the pneumatic governor, removed the old diaphragm (which had a split in it) and replaced it with the new one. The engine now revs at a more manageable speed. However, the overheating problem still remains, in fact it's worse now and we were up in the 90's just 15 mins after running the engine at 800rpm. Tomorrow will be a long day of checking everything possible.
04/07/20 Sat. On checking the water level this morning, it was down considerably. I topped it up again and fired up the engine. It ran fine for an hour at idle revs, not going above 65oC, then I put it in gear to load the engine and upped the revs to 1400, ran it for a half hour and it stayed at 74oC. I don't think the thermostat opens until 78/79oC so it looks like it is just difficult to fill from totally empty due to airlocks. I will do a bit more to it before being satisfied!
06/07/20 Mon. I had my haircut yesterday, it was driving me nuts touching my ears! We walked up to the garage this morning at 6.30am and got some more diesel, petrol and ATF oil for the gearbox. During the afternoon, I drained the engine cooling jacket again and also the gearbox oil - which I then replaced with the new ATF. I have put one or two photos on my 'workshop' page regarding the change of governor diaphragm which you can see here should you be interested!
07/07/20 Tues. Time for another moan! My elapsed time from Gillingham count-up timer is no longer working as you can see below. This is because Microsoft, in their infinite wisdom, have disabled javascript for their Edge browser. If you have the Windows 10 Pro version it is possible to enable scripts again, but for me with the Home version, it is impossible. Why do Microsoft have to be so bloody awkward!! I can't find any other way of making a timer, it isn't possible with HTML code, so unless someone lets me know of a way to write a new script, I will have to delete the one at the foot of the page.
09/07/20 Thurs. OK, a bit of a mishap yesterday morning,
we were walking to the garage again to get another 20 litres of diesel. My right foot slipped on a wet patch of slime across the pontoon and my following (left) foot automatically came down fast to stop the slide. It came down mid step and toes first - and crashed into the concrete, making me say a few choice words. I should have gone back to the boat immediately and put it in cold water, but we continued to the garage and back with the diesel. That afternoon and evening were absolute agony! I didn't get any sleep last night, and today I have a big toe 75% bigger than it's opposite number, the nail is cracked and the toe is rainbow coloured. The rest of my foot is also swollen. So, today I didn't do anything except sit and read!
11/07/20 Sat. My toe is much better now, not hurting nearly so much. I can't really walk or wear flip flops just yet, but I can get around the boat! We lifted the dinghy up on deck this morning - it's been in the water since pushing the boat over to A Dock two weeks back, was full of water from the daily rains and the bottom needed a good wash to remove marina dirt and barnacles.
16/07/20 Thurs. After two and a half days with no water, it was finally reconnected this morning - takes a long time to fix a simple plastic pipe leak here! B Dock still has no electricity, that's 3 weeks now. We are now looking at leaving and heading up to Kudat, the visa problem is a worry but I guess it will all work out in the end. We went into town this morning and started to stock up with canned food, fresh chicken and veg in preparation for leaving. As I type this, a terrific storm is raging, thunder, lightning, torrential rain and 30 knots of wind from the East - which of course is the way we initially have to go!
21/07/20 Tues. We did plan to check out today and sail in the morning but Ana was feeling a little off colour today (nothing serious) so we decided to postpone for a day. The weather is fairly stable at the moment but we still have nightly rainstorms.
22/07/20 Weds. Checked out today with all the relevant authorities and we will sail tomorrow morning about 0600.
23/07/20 Thurs. Slipped at 0700 and made our way northwards to Pulau Tiga. On approach, the wind picked up to 30 knots which would have made our anchorage on the south side of the island far too exposed, so we turned to starboard and anchored in about 10 metres in the lee of Kuala Penyu headland. Around 4pm, a terrific thunderstorm rolled in right over the top of us, sending multiple bolts of lightning down around the boat (maybe 200 feet away) - extremely scary and I was convinced we would be hit by one! All was well though and after an hour or so, it passed over us.
24/07/20 Fri. Weighed anchor at 0500 and continued northwards to Teluk Usukan (with an option of Pulau Dinawan if the weather got bad.) 6 miles short of Usukan, the heavens opened and we had a serious downpour. It was 3pm and we had navigation lights and steaming lights on, visibility was almost nil all the way into the bay and standing at the bow dropping the anchor in pouring rain is not much fun!
25/07/20 Sat. This morning, I am full of a cold!! Day of rest, the bay is calm, almost zero wind, clean water and the resident turtle swimming around - can't be bad.
26/07/20 Sun. We decided to stay another day relaxing.
27/07/20 Mon. Today's plan was to head 30 or so miles further north and anchor in Teluk Agal because winds were forecast to be favourable for that particular anchorage. I've anchored there several times before, and aborted once before because the waves roll in and break on nearing the beach if from the SW. 10 miles out, it was obvious that we were out of luck with the wind, so we altered course and headed for the tip of Borneo, rounding it at 1500. Then it was just a couple of hours down to Kudat. Something seemed not right with the steering, it was becoming vague and I could hear a 'clonking' noise sometimes. We were too tired to bother with inflating the dinghy and readying stern lines to moor in the pond, so we continued past Kudat Pond and anchored in the bay off the town.
28/07/20 Tues. Weighed anchor at 0630 and motored around to Kudat Pond. We had arranged to pick up Neil (Shelley) from Penuwasa to help us with the mooring and it was a good job we had! On entering the pond, we experienced a total steering failure! So my suspicion of a problem yesterday was correct. Things could have been worse of course, it could have failed anywhere on the journey, especially rounding the tip of Borneo. We used the boat engine to push us forward while Neil pushed my bow with the dinghy to steer and picked up Neil's vacant mooring lines. A quick look then at the steering, and the fault is obviously inside the steering pedestal which is going to be a real problem to a) take apart, and b) to get spares for.
The time onboard is..........
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