So, if anyone is interested in further and still further adventures, please feel free to visit the links below. Bit of a spoiler alert here since there are 2 links the More Plan B is not the end.... :)




http://moreplanb.blogspot.ca/
https://oursundancer370.blogspot.ca/

The continuing story

OK, so as the story continues I decided to start a new blog to cover our further adventures. So, if you are interested, here it is - life after our 400 Sundancer:

http://moreplanb.blogspot.ca/

Hope to see you there.

........S O L D ........

Yes – believe it or not, Plan B has been sold. We listed her at the end of last year when the activity is totally dead. But the first person who came and viewed her in March (the real start of the boat selling season) bought her. We had anticipated the sale to take at least a year and that we would have her for the 2013 season. Hmmm, same thing happened when we sold Alias 5 years ago.

 

Why sell? Well………we decided that we really wanted more of a cruiser than an express. And this was for the accommodations and primarily a bright salon with lots of windows to see out of. The express design (regardless of the make) is not exactly blessed with lots of window – just a couple of port holes. That is the primary reason to sell. It will be nice to sit inside and still feel like we can see what is going on around us. We have been torn between the sedan bridge and aft cabin – pros and cons to each style – unless budget and size have no limit…….Oh and on my wish list are diesels if at all possible. Now, on the down-side, I really love the styling on the big Sea Ray Sundancers – just so cool looking. And she really is like a sports car on the water. I think it will be a bit like going from a sports sedan (BMW M3) to an SUV. But since we spend more time at the dock than underway (around 30 hrs last year) we think this will be better for spending more time on board.

 

The boat was sold to a couple from the Bay City area of Michigan. They are moving up from a small bow-rider so a huge change in boating style for them. The survey went fine – passed with flying colours. They asked for a sea trial which obviously requires the boat be in the water rather than sitting in a shed. We launched April 19^th – a very windy day where the temperature started at 18ºC and then dropped to below freezing. The launch went fine and all the systems came to life after 7 months with no issues. We stayed on board Friday night as it snowed and ice pelleted through the night. Thank goodness for the great on board central heat. Saturday the decks were covered with ½” of ice and the canvas zippers were frozen, as were the mooring lines etc. Regardless the new owners showed up at 10:00 and we walked through all the systems. With the flood waters still flowing real fast and lots of debris and a 50 – 60 kph wind it was agreed to sea trial out to St Clair Harbor only and back. We stopped at the fuel dock and the new owners filled up to the tune of $1000. Then back to Rivers Bend where they signed off on the trial and we bid them good luck and happy travels.

 

So……what’s next? Well, you will just have to wait for the next post to get an update

 

 

 

Season Wrap-up

The season wrapped up uneventfully – some excellent weather and the opportunity to anchor off Canatera Park and some trips to Port Huron and Saint Clair. Haul out occurred Oct 12^th and went smoothly. Plan B is stored indoors again in St Clair.

I did manage to get a few minites of video and will try to put it together. I confess to not being good at it or having great equipment.

At the resteruant dock in St Clair - we tied here on one of our day trips.

Late summer dawn - view from the cockpit at Bridgeview

 

 Early morning at our dock

Plan B as viewed from George's flying bridge

Sea Ray Girl casting us off

 Cycling superstar Will helming down the St Clair River

Entering the Pine River and St Clair Harbor

Early morning in St Clair

L to R George, Jen, Sea Ray Girl and yours truly - in our cockpit at anchor

Liddy chillin'

Mary and Austin

Will and Carley and unknown person scooping chip dip!

"The Kids" preparing to jump

one,  two,   three, jump!!

Jen helming the mighty Plan B towards the Blue Water Bridge

Rescue? No Thanks…..

Williams’s girlfriend – Arianne came for a visit one weekend (she lives in Gataneau) and we took her to the boat for the week-end. We decided to head across to Port Huron for dinner - something a bit different. So, like when Austin came with us, Arianne does not have Nexus. The process is not difficult but it is time consuming. You have to tie up on the river at Desmonds Marina and then call in and explain you have a visitor with a passport but no Nexus. You are told very clearly not to leave the boat and wait for CBA officers to arrive. It takes about half an hour and then they check the paperwork over and ask questions. This time they did not board the boat and we got the OK to move 200 yards up the river and tie up by the restaurant. Time consuming but at least we were sitting in the sun, no shots were fired and no one was arrested.



I put the bilge blowers on and as we waited to start up a call came over the VHF. A 23 ft cruiser had lost power and was drifting down the St Clair River just south of the Black River. They were speaking with the US Coastguard and having difficulty getting an anchor down. I looked at Sea Ray Girl. “We should go help – if it was us drifting I would want some help” Nodding agreement we cast off and headed back out to the St Clair. I agreed that if we could see the boat we would offer assistance but I was not trolling up and down the river looking for the boat. We spotted a small boat over near the Canadian shore that might fit the description and headed across to see. As we closed up Sea Ray Girl went up on the bow to talk with the crew who unzipped the back cover and climbed out. We asked if they were the boat radioing for assistance. Affirmative. Did they want a tow back to Port Huron (they were a US boat) because we were heading there? The answer was a surprise. “No thanks. We are going to wait for the Coast Guard.” Hmm…….a choice between getting a tow now or waiting who knows how long for the Coast Guard boat to show up and all that time end expense. Strange. Anyway, assured they wanted to wait we headed back and enjoyed a nice dinner!



The Wiper Finally Wipes Again



It was just about a year ago that the starboard windscreen wiper broke. Of course this is the helmsman’s wiper just to be extra inconvenient. Now, we have not had need for it so far this season but it really bugs me when something doesn’t work right on the boat. Well, finally, when temperatures cooled down a bit I set to work to try to fix this once and for all. To recap, I had figured out that the access was through the electrical panel and the wiper system was visible and even touchable but the attachment method was a mystery. So, armed with a nice bright trouble light and George’s new inspection camera with the flexible camera wand and light we had a better look Our first look with this did show a hidden screw from the bracket into the wooden block. It was very difficult to get at. After much musing and a beer or 2, occurred to us that there may be better access through the day head, going in above the head-liner.

So, like most panels on this boat, the fasteners for the headliner are hidden. A few tugs showed me that there seemed to be on the aft edge. Assuming they were the plastic “Christmas tree” plastic fasteners, I set to work trying to pry the headliner down without damaging the vinyl. Finally, with a good pull it was down and low and behold, it was held with hidden screws. Really?? Is that how every headliner panel is held in place? They have a small ‘flap’ of the vinyl that you can pull back to access the screw. Then you have to tuck the flap into the edge gap and presto – hidden. Anyway, with the panel down and the AC ducting disconnected I set to work to cut away the forward fiberglass panel above the headliner (so the hole would be hidden). Once that was removed it was pretty clear that I was not going to gain access the wiper this way. So, I put it all back together and considered it a learning exercise. Back into the electrical panel with the camera we figured the screw had to come out, regardless of how hard it was to get at. So, taking turns we finally had the screw removed. Then up on deck we removed the nuts holding the shaft housing in place. Back into the electrical panel again and getting tired and scraped up contorting to use screwdrivers, we finally removed the 2 screws through the angle bracket at the end of the wood block. Low and behold, the wiper motor came out. The wiper shaft had separated from the arm linkage. A quick trip to a local machine shop we use at work that following week had the shaft welded back in place. The following weekend, knowing how it was actually held in place, we had it re-installed in about 40 minutes. Hmm, a year to remove and 40 mins to reinstall. But in summary, it is fixed and working great and the total cost was $0.00. That has to be a first for boat repair!

By the way, I did finally locate the supplier of these wiper systems and while I was able to repair ours, the small linkages and parts are not too bad a price.

http://store.amequipment.com/

This sort of shows the extent of the access challenge. The silver blob is the wiper motor and bracket. The screws are in behind it and not visible from this side.

The wiper motor and bracket when finally removed for repair.

The A/C ducting and wiring disconnected in the ill-fated attempt to access the wiper from the day head.

With the motor removed. The 'white' hole is daylight where the shaft housing passes through the deck

One of the surprise screws holding the headliner in place. Good to know if I ever have to remove more head-liners but identifying the location is a challenge.

The flap of vinyl that pulls away to magically reveal the screw head.

Screwed back in place with the flap of vinyl showing

With the flap tucked back in place the fastening method is invisible.

Fuel Pumps and Blinds

The fuel pump was dying – This must be distinctly understood, or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to relate. (apologies to Charles Dickens).

OK – that is a bit dramatic but…….. When we got back from Mac Ray I noticed a small pool of oil below the pump in the bilge of the starboard engine. Since the bilge is clean and dry it was quite easy to trace down. A quick dab with the finger and the smell test and I deduced it was gear oil – not crank case oil or ATF. I put a call in to Sean at Rivers Bend Marina. He suggested the fuel pump would need replacing but I should at least top up the gear oil and if I undid the top screw on the side of the housing the pump sits on (he thought there should be a fill and drain screw) then I could add oil. So, armed with newly purchased gear oil and pump I descended into the engine room to do battle. After all, how difficult can it be to add some oil??? Of course it was not that straight forward – what was I thinking – it’s a boat. First off, there was one screw, not two. So back to my trusty on line service manuals and indeed there was a version with the 2 screws and one with a single screw in the side. Back into the engine room I decided to remove the screw and see what happened. As the screw loosened a little bit of the blue/green gear oil ran out followed by a flood of gasoline. Oh, crap, now I have gas everywhere. I put the screw back pronto and set about cleaning up. I was pretty confident that gas should not flow out of there. This can’t be good. I got in touch with JD, our Bridgeview mechanic and he confirmed the pump was gone – likely the seal between the oil chamber and the fuel chamber. So, a new pump was ordered. He also strongly suggested not to run the boat until this was fixed. He located one in Toronto at the Mercruiser parts distributor and we had it installed. Done. Then I thought it best to check the port engine although there was no sign of oil dripping. So once more into the bilge armed with a rag and screwdriver. Once more removing the screw in the reservoir housing and……..once more an oil / gasoline mix. Oh crap – both pumps had gone. Off I went to track down JD and I learn he is on vacation. Hmmmm – that means he will likely have no time get a part and install it before our vacation. Luckily there are 2 mechanical service shops on site. So I tracked down Ron Lake as Bridgeview services. After explaining the situation and convincing him that yes, we needed to order a new pump and no, I don’t think we need to wait for him to get a mechanic onto the boat to verify that, we went through the manual and sorted the pump based on the engine serial numbers and my description of the set-up. Ron thought it an odd arrangement how the pump worked on these engines and vowed to research this with his Mercruiser technician. This was on Saturday July 28th. By Thursday Aug 2nd it was installed. Interesting point – Ron charged $50 less for the pump than JD did……

Interesting little geeky fact here (well, I thought it was interesting anyway but maybe that is the engineer in me). Apparently the 454 blocks (from Chevy) used to be cast with a feature to mount a cam driven fuel pump – all very normal for an overhead valve configuration. Then around 1997 they started supplying the blocks without this feature. Mercruiser had to find a way to mount / actuate the fuel pump. They hit upon the idea of running it off the raw water pump shaft and thus the configuration we have. Then they realized it was prone to having gas leak into the oil reservoir and cause both a fuel pump and water pump bearing failure. The single fill hole design was impossible to drain for maintenance. So they revised the reservoir to have a fill and drain screw (the configuration Sean though we would have). They eventually went to electric fuel pumps which did away with this configuration all together.

OK – there will be a quiz later in the blog so I hope you didn’t doze off.

Anyway, moving on.

I finally got back to work with the blinds in the master cabin. I had gotten started the end of last year but with the move etc the project had languished. So I finally got on with the install. Starting with the port side which is the shorter area, I built a frame to mount the blind to and also the valance to. Once I had this I could get the exact length of the blind and purchase that. These are the same as the ones in the main salon that I went on about several blogs ago last year. Having made the frame I could use the standard blind mounting gear supplied which for once made my life easier. For the valance I purchased some oak which is the same as the rest of the trim wood Sea Ray used (well, it may be ash but they are basically interchangeable with the grain type). I stained it with my much loved gel stain and varnished it and presto – it perfectly matched the rest of the cabin trim. If I say so myself I think the effect works nice and really updates the cabin.

Before picture of our cabin

Withe the new blinds and valance in place

Blinds closed - it helps with light coming in at night from the big street lights visible right through the port side.

2012 so far - a quick update

Wow, we are past the Canada Day long weekend already and I have not posted anything….


So, I guess a bit of catch-up is in order. We have been using the boat quite a lot although the schedule tends to be fluid with William’s cycle racing / training schedule. Someone is up virtually every week-end although both Sea Ray girl and I are not necessarily there together the entire week-end.

William has competed at the Pan-American Championships in Guatemala and then the Canadian Road nationals in Quebec and next up are the World Championships for the U19 track – held in New Zealand in August. So between all those events and the training and his work schedule it is hectic in the Simonds household.

We took the whole family – including Mary’s boyfriend Austin across to Port Huron for lunch back in June. We all have Nexus which allows us to call ahead and clear customs. Austin only has a passport. So when we called in we were told that we had to land in Port Huron and then call in and a CBP officer would come down to the boat. So we went across, tied up at the fuel dock being careful not to step off the boat and called in and waited, and waited. Luckily it was a nice day so we chatted in the cockpit and half hour later 2 CBP officers arrived. One came on board and searched the boat; the other reviewed all the paperwork – passport and Nexus cards. We got the all clear to move the 200 yards up the river and on the other side to tie up by the Quay Street Pub where we were planning to have lunch. So, no issue but hardly the most convenient way to get cleared into the States. We are all anxious for Austin to get a Nexus card. Mary said no way she is doing that again so we will see if she pressures him to apply. For now he got a summer job in Ottawa so is living back at home.


For the July long weekend we planned a few days away with George and Jen on Iron Jenny – adults only. Then the week before Mary announced she had the long weekend off and was looking forward to being on the boat. OK – adults only + one offspring. The girls wanted to go back to Mac Ray so I called  to make reservations and sent in the required paperwork. Both George and I had gotten the Friday off as well as the Monday so we were up at the boat Thursday afternoon. Really the only bit of prep other than engine checks was to get the dingy ready. Last time Sea Ray girl and I went down to Mac Ray we did not take the dingy. This time we planned to explore. So Liddy and I hauled the dingy out of the water and scrubbed the bottom so it would be clean on the davits.






Friday morning Iron Jenny cast off at 9:00 AM. We took our time to get the dingy loaded and were leaving the dock at 10AM. The trip down was sunny, calm and quiet with little boat traffic on the river. We took the same route as last time, taking the North Channel route past Algonac and Harsens Island and then the snaking buoyed channel out into Anchor Bay. We caught up with Iron Jenny by the no-wake zone just before entering Anchor Bay. George preferred to follow us so once past the no wake area we passed Iron Jenny and then throttled back to 15 knots. With a bit of trim tab work we can stay on plane at that speed and Iron Jenny can keep up. So we followed the channel out and then set the course to the waypoint off Mac Ray. Having done this before we were at least ready for the shallow water but still – traveling at speed in 5 ft of water is un-nerving. But we made it and got into Mac Ray without touching although we sure stirred the sand up in the approach channel. We tied up by the fuel docks and went in to sort out our transient slips. Hmmmm, no record of us. Apparently the lady I had e-mailed the papers to was off with a family emergency and no one could access her e-mails. Well, we are here so…….


They did get right on it. All the large transient slips were full so they asked if we were OK in a 42 ft slip. Fine by me as long as they don’t mind our bow sticking out a bit since with the dingy on we are over 46 ft long. The dock hands were super helpful and we were soon docked and hooked up. We were right next to the pool and restaurant – excellent since it was over 30 degrees every day.

We had an excellent couple of days at Mac Ray – lots of swimming and dingy rides exploring the marina, the adjacent canals and Belle Mar marina next door. Saturday afternoon Sea Ray Girl mixed a couple of killer batches of Pina Coladas which we enjoyed on Iron Jenny. We had a couple of great dinners at Mac and Rays – including one in the Sea Ray room – ah how fitting. And speaking of Sea Rays, I know I wrote this last time we visited but wow – there are so many Sea Rays here – there must be 8 Sea Rays for any other brand. And there are a lot of big ones. Liddy said it was like the mother ship calling Plan B home!

Sunday we cast off about noon and both boats made a bee line to the fuel dock for some go-juice and free pump-out. With it being the week-end before the July 4th (Wednesday) events it was BUSY. Iron Jenny got tied upon the fuel dock wall and there was a Tierra on the dock where the pump-out was. So that left a gap between them. The dock attendant suggested we try to squeeze in that gap. OK – let's have a go. I basically came alongside the Tierra and then reversed in – parallel parked in effect. Our bow swung over their swim platform as I slowly edged Plan B in. We fit smoothly with no touching but with about 3 ft to spare. Wow – tight maneuvering.

The amount of boat traffic was staggering. There are 5 fuel dock fingers plus the area on the wall to get boats in and everything was full. The guy looking after us said they carry 27,000 gallons of gasoline and last year sold it all in one week-end………that is a staggering amount of fuel. The really big activity down there is to go just outside the north wall into Anchor Bay where the water is 3 – 4 ft deep and drop the hook and 10 ft of chain, stand in the water, crank the tunes and relax. Most seem to give the waterline a quick wash also. And hundreds of boats do this – way cool.



The trip back was uneventful although a lot more traffic and wakes than there was on the way down. Sunday evening back in Sarnia we went out on Scott’s trawler to watch the Canada Day fireworks from Sarnia Bay – great view and impressive display. Monday afternoon it was back home to then go and pick up Will – coming back from Road Nationals in Quebec.



Plan B - Dingy loaded and ready to go.

Sea Ray Girl at the helm. I am not sure if the hat holding is because it was going to blow off or more likely part of her "get that camera away from me"  response!

Liddy relaxing

Sea Ray puppy - she loves sitting by your feet when we are under way.

Whats not to smile about - family, sun, water and a Sea Ray doing 20 knots!!

Fair being set up at Marine City - I am sure part of thier 4th July celebrations

No wake zone on the North Channel approaching Anchor bay. Iron Jenny is ahead with the tan canvas

Transiant slips in Mac Ray

George and Sea Ray Girl. The building behind is the resteraunt and pool - very convenient.

A group of poker run boats coming in for dinner - very loud.

One of the canals we explored by dingy.

Belle Mar Marina - another huge marina with thousands of boats.

This is the view Suinday from the fuel dock. It is just a line of boats heading our of the marina - most to anchor.

Hundreds of boats anchored in the shallow water.

On the way back home. Traffic in the North Channel.