Crystal Sea Trawling Blog

Sorry for not blogging for so long, but the boat is still up in macduff. We found further problems with the stern gear when we went to leave last week and it turned out that the stern tube had dropped ever so slightly, so once again the yard pulled out all the stops to put this problem right.

They hadto take the shaft and prop off again so that they were able to draw the tube, with this done it then took two days with a fifty tonne jack to push the tube back out of the dead wood. They then put the tube on a laithe to check the alinement. The tube then went back into the boat and the next day it was chock fasted in place, so that their could be no movement in the future.

We went back down the slip on thursday evening, where the boat was left to settle overnight and on friday the team of engineers started to line the engine back up to the tube once again. Macduff have done everything humanly possible to put everything right and in as quick as time possible, but sometimes you just get jobs like this that perplex everyone, as it has been highly unusual to come across this sort of problem.

The good news is that when we were out on trials the nozzel and prop were doing what we wanted it to do and save fuel, we were seeing a 10-15% saving in fuel so that is looking very promising. The crew and I are hoping to leave macduff on monday to go on trials once again, lets hope all goes well(touch wood).

Asten of the Tranquility.