Winter is here

Winter cold is coming in.....

QC is safe and secure at the dock for winter layup.

Another log joined our cruise last weekend

The water is up (31 feet) but the river is dropping but will go level then fall again so our cruise this weekend was watching out for drift, but still able to navigate just fine with only an occasional zig and zag. We where joined by Kris and Brandy and we enjoyed two great (and hot/humid) days. But it was easy to stay cool just turn on the AC, which we did when the day was over!

We had a great dinner that Kris the chef extraordinary put together with food from Fresh Market! 

Overnight we could hear more water than normal rippling in front of us as we slept, so I expected that drift was caught, by the bridal and chain leading to the anchor. Well....when I walked out at 6:10am, this is what I saw......

Looks like we have T-boned a 40ft log, devoid of limbs, but still a formidable obstacle to remove. To remove it should be easy.....well, not quite. 

The river is flowing at 247 thousand cubic feet per second, and that alot of flow. We are making 10.5 to 11 MPH down stream but only 5 to 6 MPH up. 

So after much sweat (finally cleared it after 2 hours), Kris, Vivian and I worked the log off weight center (which enables it to turn and slide by) and it simply floated by; off into the distance, only to land further down stream. 

Bon-voyage!!

Lastly this was another anchor test for the port side Danforth, and it passed with flying colors as we did not drag the anchor one bit, and the anchor came up clean and just fine.

   

  

Anchor Drop at Newburgh Lock and Dam

What happens when you pick a beautiful place to anchor but it later became bad place to anchor....something gets bent! Anchoring out comes with certain risk and droping your anchor in the wrong spot can result in a stuck anchor and a chain wrapped around a large heavy log. This particular adventure was directly across from the Newburgh Lock and Dam.

Sunday, after two great day enjoying that Ohio river we went to pull up the anchor and head home and we were stuck fast. It took over two hours to free ourselves with the help from son Josh and his Cobalt and an area River Rat that came by on a pontoon boat (an hour and a half in) and volunteered and jumped in and unwrapped the chain as we held up the log with the winch (and a mooring rope so we could let off on the chain). We had to leave a rope behind...but that was much better than cutting loose 200 foot of 3/8 G4 chain (and more)! In the end it all worked out and we have a great story to tell..... 

   

And now below you will see our new Danforth HT1500 to replace the bent one.

Projects and projects, more improvements...

Well we have lots of projects underway right now. Over the winter I have been making number of improvements. So far I have converted all the lights to LED to reduce the number of watts we burn to run our systems. Next I changed out the flat screen tv to Ultra High Definition LED Samsung Smart TVs. Next I have installed a wifi network complete with a Wifi booster. Im waiting for the next generation 4G LTE Wilson Cell Phone booster the Drive 4G. Cell phone boosters need an outdoor antenna so that means more electronics on the radar bridge. So, we have become experienced in fishing various wires inside the aluminim tubing frame. Last not but least we are adding another 4 foot high VHF antenna whiich will give us a second ICOM VHF radio (redundantany is good).

Wiring uncovered and pulled down to work with the wires.

 

Island Time Groove WiFi booster and antenna

You remove the under cover to expose the wireing.

You can see that all the radar bridge cables have to snake inside the radar bridge tubing. Wires include, radar, TV antenna, two VHF antennas, WiFi antenna, Cell Phone Booster antenna, Maratron weather station sensor, GPS antenna, Deck flood lights, and last but not least under cover LED lights.

  

Next project was to recharge the carbon in the black water vent filter.

Instead of simply buying a new one and throwing the old one away, I cut the old one in half...dumped out the old carbon and recharged it with $2 worth of carbon like is used in an aquarium filter system. I read an article on what to do and we will see if this recharge works (no smell outside means its working). I hope so because the filters are $40-50 each but the carbon to recharge them cost less the $6.

We have had trouble with the starboard chain. It is very rusted and need to be replaced. Since I purchased a new Rocna 40 Vulcan anchor it only made sense to replace the chain and Defender has their annual warehouse sale and so the chain was on sale saving more than 20%. The 300 foot 3/8 G4 galvanised chain weighs in around 450 pounds so we have to have a well thought out plan for the "change out" once the new chain is here.

New 6inch Bose speackers for the flybridge. Santa brought me 2 and I have ordered 2 and they will be here before the weekend.....Love Amazon Prime!

Two more antennas to go.

Old Deck light (plastic worn from the sun) will be replaced with LEDs

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Here you can see the replacement LED Spreader lights I have installed along with the new anchor light.

And now a new Danforth anchor to replace the one we bent anchored across from the old Newburgh Lock and Dam.

 

Spring has sprung and the water is UP!

Finally it looks like spring has sprung! We are de-winterizing QC and so far no winter related problems (frozen and/or busted). I continue to be impressed with the quality of the materials and core workmanship on QC. 

Yes the water is that deep on the road. Im standing on the level close to of the top of Evansville's levee. Waterworks road is...yes underwater.

The marina is quiet with not much activity. Onece the water goes down the last of the burned up boats will be removed.

We would normally walk down this ramp at a good angle to reach our slip. With the water up thirty feet, the walk is easy, no down then back up.

The water is out of the marina with water in the parking lot.

This is shot with my iPhone 6+ from our house in Spottsville Ky, overlooking the Green River (brown water right now). The camera seems to not handle lots of sunlight.

View north and west toward Eville..

Marina Fire Valentine's Day 2015

A tragedy occurred last night as a house boat had an electrical fire and burned, then it drifted into a beautiful 62 foot yacht and caught it on fire and it too burned to the waterline and sank. Here you can see the burnt roof on A Dock where Mark's 62 foot yacht was docked.

Summit enviromential placed a boom acrossed the exit to the river.

This picture we snagged online and is shot from the east looking west toward our boat. You can see a little of Quiet Company through the black smoke. We were lucky that not even an ash was left on our boat thanks to the wind blowing the smoke and ash away from us.

This is looking east behind our slip.This house boat was in a slip next to the hours boat that started the fire. It was I suspect pulled over into this slip but the fire boat from Evansville.

Working on to sole

I have been working on refreshing the sole (floor) in QC. I paid a floor guy $750 to lightly sand the finish on our floors. I say lightly sand the finish because you really don't want to "Sand the Floor" since the teak and holly flooring is not a solid board but a thin veneer you don't want to damage the wood by sanding, you just want to remove the finish (which in our case is the previous owners choice of using "Liquid Gold"). Well he did a CRAPPY JOB and did not take the time to do it right and applied a thick coat of tung oil and did not wipe it off within an hour. Instead he applied a thick coat and left the boat to return the next day which ended up two days later which meant too much tung oil dried on top of the wood and as a result became grimy looking after you walked on it. So I have spent many hours on my knees fixing his missteps. Moral is be there to supervise and tell them how you want it done...daaaa. 

Anyway it is looking good, I'm doing one area at a time using Scotchbrite pads and wet sanding the floor enough to find the wood but not sand it off then apply two light coats of teak oil applied...wait 5 minutes and then towel it off with a clean dry towel. The result is a clean floor with a satin finish that is beautiful and is not slick when wet, or dry, or in sock, or bare feet!

Wet sanding the teak and holly sole (floor) with a Shurhold Orbital Buffer and 3M Scotchbrite pads (red very fine). The object is to remove the topical finish until the holly wood once again emerges white. Then finish with teak oil but wipe dry 5-10 minutes after applying the oil.

Look at the difference the oil makes!

Wet sanded down to the wood on the left, and just after the teak oil was applied on the right.

Here I'm finished after applying 3 thin coats of Teak Oil. We will not varnish the flloors since the teak oil finish is less slippery when wet and can be cleaned and recoated as often as needed.