On Schedule !

Week 138

Sunday

The fitter woke once during the night when the heat was quite noticeable, despite not having the fire on. He then work again once it got light, resisted the temptation to look at the clock and tossed and turned for what seemed like hours. He eventually gave in, looked at the clock and decided he'd get up. It was just after 6.30am.

He had breakfast and then decided to tackle the toilet. It took a while to loosen and remove those items that needed to be cleared out of the way so that the seal below the bowl could be accessed. It is amazing where what you think has gone into the bowl actually goes and the fitter used quite a few antiseptic wipes to clean everything up before finally lifting the bowl clear.

The existing seal had some lime scale on it but it didn't appear excessive. The fitter removed as much as he could, applied some Vaseline and then refitted the seal. There is nothing to positively locate the pan over the seal so the fitter tried to centralise the pan before refitting everything that had been removed. The cold water was turned back on, the toilet flushed and left to see if the water leaked out.

The fitter decided to leave the toilet for a while and went back to rubbing paintwork down. The cream could possibly do with yet another coat but the fitter has decided that not even that would necessarily completely obliterate the last vestiges of the dark grey undercoat, so he only had the blue to do.

It didn't take long to rub down and wash and took no longer to paint - all the painting was confined to the rear deck, rear doors and rear wall.

A quick check of the toilet revealed that it still wasn't holding water. Out came the tools, off came all the fittings and everything was checked. Everything was re-assembled but the water still kept disappearing. The securing ring was loosened, the pan adjusted slightly and everything tightened again. The fitter turned the boiler on so that he'd have hot water for his shower and for washing up after lunch and went off for a cup of tea with the boss.

The fitter came back after tea and the water was still there. He flushed the loo again and departed once more for the trip boat which still needed cleaning up after Saturday evening journey and then needed to be prepared for the day's trip.

The fitter had about an hour afterwards to return to his boat, shower and make and eat his lunch. But first he checked the toilet and found that the water had drained again! Everything was checked again and the toilet flushed once more.

The fitter turned the boiler off, put the kettle on low and went and had his shower. The kettle then proceeded to boil whilst the fitter was in the shower!

Lunch preparation was a slightly hurried affair, as was the eating of lunch. Then it was back to the trip boat for the afternoon's outing.

The trip was delayed several times at locks waiting for other boats and what should have been a three hour journey took forty five minutes longer than that. As a result the fitter didn't get back to his boat again until just after 5.15pm. He quickly gathered everything that he planned to take home, loaded everything into the car and then set off on the way home.

He'd gone about three miles when he realised that he'd left the computer on the boat. He did a three point turn and headed back to the boatyard, returned to the boat, collected the computer, locked the boat and headed for home again.

He ate when he got home, called the family and then headed for the laptop to write up the weekend's notes and catch up on mail and forum before shutting down, having his bedtime drink and heading for bed.

Monday

The fitter, who hadn't slept too well on Sunday night was back from London at his normal time but instead of heading straight to the laptop, he changed into his woodworking clothes and headed for the garage. He'd volunteered to make some small wooden shields for a fellow boater who teaches part time at a school for children with special needs.

The fitter had been given a design to indicate the wanted size and another, much smaller, drawing to show the design that was wanted. He roughed out the design on some MDF, cut it on the bandsaw and then used the power sander to clean up the edges. He also used a bearing guided cutter the put an ovolo shape on the edge.

He searched high and low for some stain that he thought he had but couldn't find it so he'd have to go shopping to get some later in the week.

It was meal time when he finished so he closed the garage and headed indoors. He'd spoken to the toilet maker during the day and they said that new filters and half ball were probably required. As the toilet needs to come apart to change the filter, it seemed proper to change the ball at the same time and then look after them. It was suggested that lemon or vinegar should be used in the bowl from time to time to minimise the risk of lime scale forming.

The evening was spent on the laptop, checking mail and forum and updating these notes.

Tuesday

The fitter diverted on his way home and bought a tin of wood stain for the shields. As he'd already been delayed in London by a meeting, he was over an hour later home than usual afterwards. He once again headed for the garage as he wanted to try and get the first coat of stain on the shield before he ate, allowing four hours for the stain to cure so that another coat could be applied before bed time.

Meal and television followed, as did work on the laptop, before returning to the garage for that second coat of stain application and a not too late bedtime drink and bed.

Wednesday

We were awake around 6am after a reasonable night's sleep. We laid in bed for another hour before we got up, washed and had breakfast. The fitter headed for the garage, applied the third coat of stain to the shield and then adjourned to the laptop to check up on mail whilst the stain dried. He then showered, changed and loaded food, jacket, tools and shield into the car and set off for the boatyard.

He was at the boatyard just after 10.30am, took a few clean clothes and shield to the boat, from where it will be collected, and picked up his trip boat bag. He'd arrived just as the mid morning cuppa was being prepared and had also, as he was to find out later, beaten the delivery of the toilet parts.

He heard some horror stories about Monday evening's trip boat journey where several things had managed to get themselves wrapped around the propeller, including the remnants of a mattress, which had managed to severely delay the trip. It was not surprising, therefore, that the fitter found the boat had not been cleaned properly so the fitter had to spend time playing catch-up on the cleaning as part of the trip boat preparation duties. This scuppered any plans for doing anything else.

The boat was finally ready about 1pm at which time the fitter headed for the office and was told that his parcel had just arrived. He took the parcel to the boat, opened the rear hatch and simply dropped the parcel onto the engine room floor as there was no time to doing anything with the content.

The passengers for the trip had all arrived early and we were able to depart ten minutes before time. We were just about to untie when two boats appeared, travelling in our direction, and there was no way that we could leave our mooring until they had passed because we would have collided with them had we done so.

It took us twenty minutes to get to the first lock and we'd seen these two boats way ahead of us, across the fields, approaching the lock and had expected that they'd be in the lock when we arrived. Instead we found only one boat in the lock and the second just moving away from the bank. The two steerers were on the backs of their respective boats and their crew on the lock side. Only one of the crew was at the first lock and the other at the second lock. Consequently they were taking an age to work the lock and managed to delay the trip boat by about fifteen minutes, despite the fact that we ended up helping them through the lock.

We were just about to leave the second lock when we noticed a third boat pull away from the bank in front of us. We had hoped that the first two boats would pull over to allow us to pass, but we never saw them again. Instead, by the time we got to our third lock, the third boat that we'd seen was just setting the lock. This boat had four crew, two on and two off the boat. We asked the two on the boat if we could precede them and were directed to ask their other two crew members who were, by this time, about to open the lock gate(s).

The on shore crew were happy for us to go first but the on board team had, by this time released their mooring rope and were being sucked into the lock by a mix of current and wind. By the time the lock gates had opened they were almost in the lock and there was little to be gained by getting them to back out as that would probably have taken quite a while.

Bang went another ten minutes.

The fitter secured the trip boat and went forward to the lock to help hasten the other boat through - his two crew members already being off the trip boat to work the lock. The fitter took position at the back of the lock, ready to lift the paddles to empty the lock as soon as the lock had been vacated and the gates closed.

The trip boat was around thirty minutes late by this time and the now frustrated fitter wasn't in the best of moods nor was he very pleasant to the crew of the other boat who he considered were delaying him even further by the tardy way that they were working the lock and he told the crew so!

We turned the lock to our favour as soon as we could and were through the lock as quick as we normally are. The crew walked to the next lock as they usually do whilst the fitter steered the boat. He was just approaching the next lock, which involves negotiating a bend in the canal that must be more than 180°, when he encountered an approaching boat that had just vacated the lock. The crew from the boat that had most recently delayed us were stopped below the lock and waved us past and into the lock. Humble Pie and an apology were in order!

We cleared the lock as quickly as we could but, in doing so, didn't work as efficiently as we normally do, causing a further delay to the trip boat and, subsequently, to the boat that was now behind us. There were further apologies to the crew of that boat as we passed, now travelling in the opposite direction to them, the trip boat having turned, and the fitter thinks that we parted on good terms (even if we were still about thirty minutes late!).

The rest of the trip was largely uneventful and we returned to the boatyard almost exactly thirty minutes later than we should have, despite only really seeing three other boats that had any impact on us.

The boat was cleaned and secured quite quickly - after twenty plus years you have a routine, and the fitter was able to wander over to his boat, drop his bag and then head for the car, leaving the boatyard just before 5.30pm.

He ate almost as soon as he got in and then watched his usual early evening television programmes before heading for the laptop to check mail, forum and blogs before writing up the days events on this page.

Thursday

The Thursday morning bug struck again, with the fitter waking around 3am and not convinced that he got back to sleep between then and when the alarm went off at 5am.

The fitter was in London on Thursday and Mrs. Fitter went to Southend on Sea with our daughter and around sixty children on an educational visit - were we live is almost the furthest point in England from any coast. The fitter got home to time but the others didn't, having been stuck in a track delay on the motorway and then in a traffic census much nearer home. The end result was that they eventually arrived home an hour later than planned and nearer to two hours later than they had hoped they might if the traffic was clear.

We ate a meal that had been in the slow cooker all day, spent a brief time on the laptop and watching television and then headed for the pub and quiz - the fourth time that the new car has been in the direction of the boatyard, so it must be getting to know the way!

Friday

The fitter was at home on Friday. He spent the morning and parts of the afternoon making the shields. He used the sample as a template and drew round the outside of it, onto the piece of MDF that he'd used originally - there was just enough left to cut five copies. The board was then cut into five and each piece taken to the bandsaw and roughly cut out.

Next the fitter swapped the saw bench top for the router table attachment on the Triton, fitted the Triton router and installed a trimming bit with guide. The original template was attached to each of the five new blanks in turn, using double sided tape and the router used to clean up the edges of the new blanks.

The cutter was swapped for an ovolo cutter with guide and the five blanks were passed over the new cutter. The bigger (Triton) router making mince meat of the cut where the smaller (Trend) router would have struggled and needed at least two passes.

The woodwork over, it was out with the abrasive and, with just the right amount of time before lunch, out with the water based wood stain for the first coat. Three more followed, two on one side and one on the other, during the rest of the day.

In between time it was back to the laptop to work on some spreadsheet macros, check mail, eat an evening meal and watch a bit of television. The fitter also did some amateur radio related work.

Saturday

We'd not stayed over on the boat on Thursday night because the fitter had no trip boat duties until Sunday and Mrs. Fitter was volunteering at church on Saturday. This left the fitter a free agent for much of the day.

His only planned task for the day was to add a third and final coat of stain to both sides of the shields and to do some more work on the spreadsheet. Luckily the weather wasn't up to much so there wasn't any disappointment at not being on the boat.

The original plan had been to fit some form of metal hanging device at the top of the back of the shields but the shaped edged limited the thickness and meant that there was a risk that the screws would protrude through the wood. Having spoken with his friend for whom the shields were being made a different plan of attack was adopted.

The fitter had a thin offcut of Sapele which was cut into several 30mm lengths, 25mm wide. A 10mm hole was drilled in the centre of each piece, the edges rounded over either on the disc sander or with abrasive, and the hole countersunk. The pieces were then cut in half length ways, bisecting the hole. The approximate centre of the shield was then marked about 25mm from the top and one of the (half) pieces of Sapele were glued and pinned to the back of the shield with the half hole towards the bottom of the shield, with the countersunk face inwards..

The first attempt partially split the Sapele but not bad enough to make it unusable. As a result, 1mm diameter holes were drilled in the remaining pieces. Even so, one of the remaining pieces split badly and had to be replaced.

The completed shields were then packed up ready to go to the boat and the garage was tidied and then locked up. The fitter returned to the laptop, did some more amateur radio work and further work on the spreadsheet before writing up these notes and watching some television. Ironically, the programme we watched, at Mrs. Fitter's suggestion, was a repeat which the fitter could remember, but Mrs. Fitter couldn't. She'd probably slept through a large part of the first showing!

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