The weather is crummy on Saturday afternoon, so instead of cleaning up the horse's paddock in the rain, I decided to put a little time in on Odyssey.
First, there is an old broken up block from the original main sheet system on the port side (the starboard one was gone before I got Odyssey). It's ugly, non-functional, and I want it gone. I don't want to unscrew the padeye it's connected to because I'm not sure how I'd get it back on, and the padeye will be useful if I ever install a tiller tamer. I try to use a hacksaw to cut the loop on the block, but the stainless steel block is stronger than the teeth of my hacksaw (need to remember to buy new hacksaw blades when I go to the hardware store).
Not one to daunted by mere details, I break out the power tools. Ron, my father-in-law, gave me an angle grinder for Christmas. He intended that I use it to clean up rust on my trailer and/or my keel, but he isn't around. About 10 minutes later (get the grinder out of the box, laugh at the fractured English instructions, put the grinding wheel on, get an extension cord, plug everything together, then start cutting) the block is bouncing into my trash bucket. Success.
Then I get Katie to help me rebed the bow fairleads. As usual with things put on by this person, the fairleads are bedded and have a backing plate. He just chose to use galvanized screws instead of stainless. I broke the bolts loose, cleaned up the deck and the fairlead, then re-bedded with Life Caulk and fastened with stainless screws. Having Katie to help makes this go much faster, she stays below and puts the washers and nuts on, I stay on deck and turn the screws.
Next, one of the mast base blocks for turning halyards back to the cockpit is on backwards. How the original installer missed that, I'll never know. The nuts are just finger tight(!), so I remove them below, then go on deck and pry the block off the deck. No bedding. Argh! There are two other base blocks and three turning blocks that match this one, so I check. No bedding there either. Turns out there was a person who used high-quality parts (Harken blocks), stainless bolts, etc. to put parts on Odyssey, but was too lazy to bed them properly. Disgusted, I tape the deck, bed the fitting in the right way, then tighten the nuts. Katie has had enough for now, so I put off bedding in the other blocks 'til later.
Finally, I decided to fill the holes in the port side of the transom, where it's still solid. But that's a whole other entry.