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Tuesday 31 May 2016

THREE CHEERS FOR DIVERSITY

CHEER 1

http://www.pictorialmeadowsonline.co.uk/

 
"A study shows that strawberries are bigger and better looking if they're pollinated by bees which have visited wild flowers on field margins, rather than those that have just visited crops."  
(BBC Radio 4 - Farming Today 29 09 15)


The study was undertaken by Professor Jane Memmot of Bristol University. 

The crops of large scale mono-cultures, depleting natural diversity as they do, incur costs of which we are only now beginning to learn. 
 



CHEER 2
Both David Cameron and Jeremy Corbyn are speaking of supporting small businesses. Hooray. I remember the days when many, if not most, who were self-employed or in small businesses were looked upon as crooks. Getting a post in big business or the public sector was the way to progress your career but ...

CHEER 3
Volkswagen, of all companies, has shown yet again how big monolithic businesses become corrupt despite there being thousands of good people working in them. Remember Enron and Arthur Andersen?
If businesses are small they are not 'to big to fail'. There are many of them, so, by the natural process of evolution, they will produce variety, diversity, in which lies great strength. If they go bad, for whatever reason, the social cost of their failure is also small. If enterprises are small, they are not too big to be challenged for their misdemeanors by regulators, local authorities, the media or the public. Best of all, small businesses are quicker to adapt to changing circumstances, unlike these mega-tanker corporations whose massive momentum takes them crashing on to the rocks.   

SMALL IS BEAUTIFUL. 

With modern communications, at once global and personal, the day of the large corporations is coming to an end, I like to think. But are we simply replacing Exxon, Shell, VW with Google, Facebook, Microsoft? Al least the latter can always be copied. Just think of Linux. We do need to encourage the development of a myriad of small enterprises.  

So here's to E F Schumacher, author inter alia of Small Is Beautiful of whom I will be saying a lot in due course on this blog.

Meanwhile, for those already interested try http://www.schumacher.org.uk/.

 





LUE - Life, the Universe and Everything - Anchor Light - Washing

After some lovely sunny days, today is grey and wet, so back to indoor work after all that sanding and varnishing.

Anchor light

 

At night, at anchor, one is obliged by Collision Regulations to show an all round white anchor light. Lady Cate has one on her main mast, which is ideal when anchored at sea and wanting to be seen from far off. But we will also be at anchor when the main mast is down, so I am fitting an anchor light on to the little forward mast. There is a steaming light on the little mast already, for night passage in close waters when the main mast is down. I'm supplying power through a three core cable, the two lights sharing a common return.

There is a plethora of electric cable around Lady Cate. Some is in good order and well labelled. A lot is not. So I'll get a Dymo labeller (if they still exist) to label each cable. (!)




Washing



Strange to wash on a grey day but my cunning wheelhouse drying system works very well. Open side window, fan heater below blowing upwards, hang stuff in the warm flowing air.





Au revoir.

Wednesday 25 May 2016

KITTY HAS ARRIVED

I have had a need long in the gestation. Before travelling seriously Lady Cate has to have a tender, for going ashore when at anchor and who knows what other situations. I decided I'd also have the joy of a little local sailing. Swallows and Amazons revisited - both Peter Duck and Nancy Blackett are moored in the Deben.

So, after months of looking, I've bought Kitty from Andy Seedhouse. our local, long established, small boat merchant. Made in Lowestoft, she is an 8ft pram dinghy with a single sail lug rig.





Here she is, lying snuggled up to Lady Cate's bow.

And here she is being rigged.
 

 And now waiting for the wind.



Susie, Mick's American wife, will paint her name on soon. I must get some rubbing strake on her.

Monday 23 May 2016

SCULPTURE - FOUND TECHNOLOGY

Tony has fixed my Bose radio/cd player by replacing the laser head. The broken head is such an intricate little thing (which seems worth so much more than the c£15 it cost) that I was loathe to throw it away. 

By chance I saw a shaft bearing thrown into the waste skip. It is a fine piece of precision engineering, using high grade steels and having ball bearings. The balls of ball bearings are precision items. Spinning and taking the load as they do, they have to be very accurately made. But their brilliance of manufacture is rarely acknowledged.

So here they are together, a little poem to high technology.

Happy days.

Sunday 22 May 2016

LEAK LICKED

As with any boat there is always ongoing maintenance. One that came with Lady Cate was the water heater - calorifier as many call it. It is a fresh water heater that is heated both from the engine cooling water and a standard 240V 750W immersion heater. The problem was that the immersion heater plate was leaking. 240V and water don't mix! The leak had been bunged up with both black and white goos of various kinds and the power disconnected. A sensible temporary measure that needed putting right.

Tony managed to extract the offending part from the water heater, which is handily tucked away in a very uncomfortable place. I cleaned off the goos. It was obvious the plate had been slightly buckled and a welding repair had left so much sputter around that the seals around the immersion heater mounts were not snugging tight. Mick cleaned up the sputter and reformed the welds; then put new O rings on and tightened up. I managed to put the heater and plate back in place and - hooray! - no leaks - cross fingers - touch wood.

Tony refitted the electrics and now, LO! Hot and cold running water. Luxury indeed.

AIR HEATER SAGA CONTINUES



I bought ten metres of insulated ducting to carry the warm from the heater to the cabins. The ducting is a central tube of heavy duty wire wound plasticised foil covered with insulating rock wool and a outer coating of plasticised foil. It came in a box one metre long from which it sprang out like a jack-in-a-box!






I had to lay it out throughout Lady Cate. This involved clearing out cupboards, uprooting panelling and cutting holes through bulkheads.








The silver snake got everywhere!











Then, disaster. I asked for a 12V heater but got a 24V one. Cock up in despatch over in China. As you can see the fuel pump is 12V.
I am waiting for a 12V heater to be sent.

VARNISHING - WHOOPEE


The wind is gusting 25 knots, making Lady Cate twist and turn at her moorings. It's lovely to be in this lively weather. (Well, when moored up!)

A boat is an endless project of maintenance and improvement. That's what's (!) been filling my time.

Varnishing

 Lady Cate's wheelhouse and topside fittings have been in need of a serious refurb
 for some time. So now I'm getting down to it, starting with the starboard side of the wheelhouse and the starboard bulwark strake. Preparation by endless sanding down is the key. Sanding is very tedious, making potato peeling for an army quite preferable.

[Perhaps George Herbert, (17thC poet, priest and hymn writer) got it right with his poem now known as The Elixir. (http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/herbert/elixir.htm)  Turn tedious actions into praise by taking a new perspective on the task.]



This is the area of activity. I have already sanded down and varnished the section forward of the door. Please note the shine.



I took off the sliding door retainers and the step up to the poop deck.These I could work on inside. The door itself is in fine condition, so I'll leave that 'til later.

Outside has to be timed with the weather. The BBC Met Office forecasts have been notably accurate this week.

  

 
But, as you can see, the strake is in parlous condition.

 


Now looking much better.





But there's much more to do!

More soon.