Blue Discs and other things

Jan has been to Thatcham on a shopping expedition.  Apparently the bus journey took considerably longer than usual due to all the road works.  On her return I discovered we were now the proud owners of eight 15” blue foam discs.

The shop owner who cut them out even gift wrapped them !

Well half of the discs have had their first trial.  They fit quite snuggly into the porthole liner and appear to be a good insulator. 

Jan is now considering how she will fit a fabric cover.

This morning I was down on hands and knees in the cratch sanding the floor ready for Darren to prime.  The area had collected a considerable amount of surface rust which needed to be removed.  Obviously there was no point in doing any of this until the cratch cover had been made and installed.  Darren managed to get the first coat of primer on by mid afternoon and hopefully it will be dry by tomorrow morning ready for the first undercoat.

Nick has been busy fitting the majority of the safety labelling before replacing the four light switches in the cockpit with a different type of switch.  The previous switches had an IP55 rating but were failing due to water ingress.  The latest switches have a rubber cover.  Nick also fitted the CO detector in the saloon.  It’s adjacent to the smoke detector.

Richard fitted chute bolts to the cratch windows and also fitted a safety ‘grab’ handle in the shower.  It’s something we thought about when developing the specifications for Waiouru.  The last thing we want is for someone to fall over in the shower or burn themselves by grabbing the shower mixing valve.

He has also fitted a chrome rail across the top of the shower.  We included this in the specifications because we thought it might be a useful area to hang wet coats and other clothing using coat hangers.

One concern we had was the rail might ‘foul’ headroom in the shower but we’ve discovered this isn’t the case as the headroom in Waiouru is very good!

Nick has also fitted stainless steel catches to all the outside doors.

Richard gave me some ‘Terry Clips’ which I have used to secure the tiller arm inside the back wardrobe.

I’m not sure this will be its final location, but it will do for the moment.

The guys are quickly working their way through the list of small tasks.  Andy mentioned today that the carpet and vinyl flooring should be laid next Thursday and it’s quite possible this will be the last job to be completed. 

I’ve been continuing with the preparation of the documentation to obtain a CaRT licence.  We are waiting on the successful pressure testing of the bow diesel tank before being given a BSS certificate.  This is the last piece of required documentation before we can submit the Licence Application (and part with yet more money!)