As might be expected when sailing a 30 year old boat, maintenance and repairs are an important part of the year. While our Albin trawler remains in good condition, sometimes things just break. We seem to be pretty good at breaking things. While I am not accomplished in boat repair I am attempting to learn the routine maintenance. This does require repeated attempts to bend this old body like a your midget to rear certain bolts, valves etc. There have been occasion where I had the thought that my heirs might find my body in the bilge wedged between a manifold and batteries. Maybe a safety harness would help extract the body?
One of your major repairs this year is the windlass. That's right the wince that launches and retrieves the anchor. Having destroyed the original windlass, we searched world wide for a replacement. This came from a tip on Trawlers for Trawlering email string and has lead us to the solution. We have been retrieving the anchor by hand, legs, back and will. This can bring you to a challenge.
I left this post some time ago. Now I am preparing for the great exploration South to the Florida panhandle. So I will end this post in hopes of continuing to greater waters and more quality posts.
Captain Barry
