Our two main issues from last weekend look likely to be solved by tomorrow. The aft locker floor, which holds our spare 18hp Tohatsu outboard motor (41kg) and its 25 litre fuel tank (25kg), is being replaced in the moulding shop by Scorpion as we speak. The strain that the floor takes when we land from a wave is enormous. It is unusual to store an engine of this size here.
The fault that triggered our alarms and 4% power restriction last weekend has been identified by Dave Crawford - a loose cap on the oil tank. Not sure how it would cause this problem, nor even how it happened. Scorpion's Graham Jelley suggests that we ask the engine people for some instruction just in case something like it happens again. Graham had a similar experience near the top of Scotland once.
Meanwhile at home, MarineTrack has just delivered the satellite tracking transponder which we need to install and which ultimately should feed our position to this site during the race. And we now have the PC Planner software and card reader so that we can navigate with our laptops at night. We know how to have a good time!
The weekend's forecast looks much better than previous weekends. I'm looking forward to our first long passage.
Gavin April 25th, 2008
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