The Radar Mount

I made the radar mount a few years ago out of hardwood - oak and ash.

(See Radar Pole posts)

The ash was a mistake. Ash rots outside - it takes a while, and it hides it well:

I thought that since ash was used for oars it should be safe to use in a marine environment. I guess oars aren't expected to last as long as radar poles ...

Reflections ...

Well - I've had two bad seasons, now.

I didn't post about this, but last summer (2025) I went to Orkney and ended up coming home in a bit of a hurry after a minor medical emergency that left me unable to continue the cruise.

I was hoping this summer would be better. The replacement engine was promising - it ran well, and gave no particularly troubling signals.

Well, to be honest, there was one. I couldn't make much sense of it, and had kind of 'parked' it while I figured it out: When the engine was running, the coolant level in the header tank went up a bit (normal), but it didn't come down again when the engine cooled (not so normal).

I wondered if it has something to do with the position of the header tank, or a possible blockage in the tube from the pressure cap.

Anyhow, I kind of ignored it because everything else was working well.

I took Raasay to the Portsoy Boat show - I have quite often started the sailing season with this. Angus and I took the boat through on the Thursday and anchored off Sandend overnight.

In the morning, we were motoring round to Portsoy and I went to the aft end of the cockpit. leaning on the radar post as I did. It snapped off in my hand. I'll put up another post about this, because it was a very unpleasant surprise.

I spend a good part of the weekend repairing it, and also taking advantage of being in a drying harbour to give the boat a scrub and do some underwater maintenance.

Then I headed over to Portmahomack for two or three nights to do some visiting and some online meetings before heading to Clachnaharry to go down the canal.

After a day in the Seaport Marina, I got ready to go up the Muirtown flight, but shortly after I started the engine the overheat alarm went off. This was the beginning of a depressing sequence of investigations and false dawns. On two or three occasions I thought I'd found the problem, but after varying lengths of time - sometimes several hours - the overheat alarm would come on again.

It was particularly prone to come on after a long passage (up to five hours) under power, just when I dropped the revs to start maneuvering. I.e. at the worst possible time.

I persevered, and during an optimistic spell I exited the canal at Corpach and headed down Loch Linne. Everything seemed to be going well until I dropped the revs near the Corran Narrows to put the mainsail up.

This time, it really didn't calm down. After the engine cooled, I couldn't run it for more than 10 minutes or wo without triggering the alarm.

I discovered this after beating through the Corran Narrow, which was an interesting experience. The tide was with me. (Of course).

I muddled about a bit south of Corran trying to decide what to do, and eventually ran back up to Corpach under sail, anchoring near one of the islands opposite the sea lock.

By this time I knew I couldn't go anywhere ambitious with the boat, and should really just take it back up the canal and back to Findhorn.

I managed to get back into Corpach - partly under sail and partly using the 10 minutes that the engine would work, and spent a day in the basin really going through the cooling system (again!) and trying to figure out what was wrong. The engine ran flawlessly for two hours on a couple of occasions during testing.

Although I was getting an ugly feeling that I knew what it was. A feeling that turned out to be right ...

We had no real trouble going through Fort Augustus and up Loch Ness. We did notice that the coolant header tank had bubbles in it now. I put some K-Seal (I had forgotten this was on board!) in the coolant, which helped a bit. (Fewer bubbles). But it was becoming clear we were on borrowed time.

Angus had to go home from Inverness, and I took the boat back to Findhorn on K-Seal and hope.

The only overhead episode we had was in Gairlochy as we were tying up.

I nearly made it home without another one, but the alarm went off as I was coming in over the Findhorn bar and I had to sail in. I didn't quite manage to pick up my mooring, but I had prepared the anchor so ended up quite close to it.

The header tank now bubbles furiously, even after I tried another dose of (stronger) K-seal.

So the head will have to come off. The head gasket must be leaking.

I had a gout flare on the way home - it started just before I came back into Corpach. It didn't help.

And I'm getting old. Old boats, old men, not enough money. Maybe this is the way it goes ...

While going up the loch, with Angus in the cockpit, I did a bit of online research about gasket failures and also discovered some 

Angus came to Corpach to help me to get back up the canal. The pattern remained the same