Out with the Old
Stage one of the engine replacement for Samantha took place late last week over at Allnutts. Now it's a matter of some careful planning and a lot of elbow grease to complete the job.
Having carefully craned the old 1.5 ton Perkins from the hold, Graeme estimates at least three visits to the slipway before the new engine will finally be in and running. For a start theres a powerful lot of scraping and cleaning to do in order to remove decades of grease. After things are all cleaned up, a new rib needs to be inserted and repairs to the hull completed. Patterns will then be created in order to make supports for the new engine and a new fuel tank will be installed.
It's only then that the new lighter engine will be lowered into place and Samantha will be under way again. Graeme's not rushing things and estimates it'll take a couple more months to complete the work.
