Owl Moon is back on the hard.

April 12-14 While waiting for the tow boat to show up, I emailed Art Averal, Tartan customer service, and told him I suspected our prop might have dropped off.  He got right back to me with the part numbers and first thing in the morning I was on the phone with Superior Diesel in arranging to have the prop ground shipped from Alabama and installed during a short haul Thursday afternoon.  Not bad considering this is the lead up to Charleston Race week.

John W. and Greg arranged a one way rental car to Annapolis and left late morning.  They were sure a big help.  I only wish we had been able to continue on from Charleston.

Carol drove down from Suffolk, VA to join Neil and me aboard Owl Moon.  They were great to have around a couple of days while we accomplished a few things on the list.  They got away for a bit on Wednesday to visit some of the places from their time in Charleston soon after they were married.

After Carol arrived, I used her car to take sheets and towels to the laundromat.  Owl Moon had taken in water through the hatches as we plowed through some of the steeper and higher waves with water flowing down the deck. Wet mattresses were put out on deck to get a little sun.  Fortunately, Wednesday was also a mostly sunny and low humidity day to dry out mattresses.

Finally, Thursday afternoon came and we hauled Owl Moon to have her new prop installed.  The shaft on the saildrive was shiny and new looking, being less than a year old.  There was no apparent reason for the prop to have fallen off.  We watched Matt from Superior Diesel install the new prop and saw how impossible it would be for it to fall off.  The key part of this is the locking tab that needs to be installed correctly in order for the nut holding the hub on the shaft not to loosen from vibration and back off.  We can only conclude that something was done incorrectly with the previous install.

Saildrive clears the surface sans prop.

Good as new shaft

New prop is installed (folded).

Bright and shiny new prop.

While inspecting the hull, we noticed daylight coming through aft end of the keel/hull joint and consulted with Edward, the manager of Charleston City Boatyard.  We decided to have Owl Moon blocked and left at the yard for further investigation into the keel/hull joint.  Edward also pointed out that we might want to have our shiny new prop and hub painted.  We had just had the missing prop painted in St. Augustine in February.

Aft section of keel/hull joint

So, the short haul turned out to be a haul and block.  Owl Moon is on the hard at Charleston City Boatyard for a couple of weeks.