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Skylax Coming Home
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“Yusuf re-built Tetranora. And I mean re-built.”
Coming up the Red Sea Skylax was limping along. Not mortally wounded but licking her wounds. After over 30,000 miles on her circumnavigation there was general wear and tear and worse, some wounds we had inflicted on her.
In Malaysia
in the last race of the Raja Muda an insane moment of adrenaline
inspired racing put her briefly up on a coral outcrop. Worse I
knew it was there and stopping dead from five and half knots was
chilling.
In Ao Chalong
in Thailand we dragged anchor in a squall and came to a stop on
a robust aluminium boat. Aluminium boat one, Skylax nil and a
lot of scratched gel coat and a mangled toe-rail. Beating up the Red Sea is brutal on a boat and some known problems with the anchor locker bulkhead and the half bulkhead behind that surfaced.
Some
of the sails had more than 50,000 miles on them and standing and
running rigging was taking a beating. Chafe and more chafe, the
perennial problem of ocean passages. And the rudder. Ah well, another known problem with the mount for the top bearing. The ply pad in between the fibreglass had evidently delaminated and no amount of epoxy filler was going to solve the problem in the long term. Rudders take enormous loads in the Tradewind passages with huge forces on the rudder every time you come off a wave. Numerous boats had serious problems with spade rudders where there is no supporting skeg, but even on Skylax with a full skeg the loads were working away on the top bearing mount.
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PROFESSIONAL YACHT AND BOAT CARE, SERVICE IN TURGUTREIS - DİDİM - BODRUM - GÖCEK - TURKEY