Haul out day: My Drammer 935 yacht goes in for maintenance

From the moment we pulled Sirion under the crane into the two slings, till the straddler had parked her in the workshop tool for 35 minutes!!

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Today was "haul-out day".

So I cycled over to the marina at around noon and got Sirion all ready. I had made a 1400-hour appointment. Plenty of time.

The shipyard is in Heukelum, the next village from us. About 5,5 km. So I took my bicycle onto Sirion so I could peddle home afterward.

At 1300 I casted off and I arrived at Koornwaard shipyard at about 13.50.

Moored Sirion next to the crane.

The crane operator asked me to remove the fenders on the port side and to get two long mooring lines fixed on the starboard bow and stern. He lowered the two slings into the water. With everything shut down on Sirion the two of us pulled Sirion into the slings.

I had shown him some images of Sirion hull, so he knew exactly where to put the two slings. With everything lined up properly, he started to hoist.

This crane has a large display on the side that tells you the total weight it is lifting. Sirion came in at 5,2 tonnes. Which is about 1 tonne more than I thought, going by the specifications!

With Sirion sufficiently high in the air the crane did a 180o and swung Siron over terra firma.

I had agreed to check the hull first before he would start cleaning. As I suspected/hoped there was very little growth on her hull. So she only needed a very light hosing down.

The next step is to get her settled on a large frame. The frame is put in place with this huge straddled machine. The guy who operates it does so from his Segway. He told me at the start of his day that the range of the Segway is 20 km. By 1500 he usually runs out of puff! This guy does a lot of mileage. Have a look at the video further down below how he whizzes around on it!! Very cool!!

They propped up Sirion with wooden kegs under her keel and hull.

All stable, time to remove the slings

Watch this guy go through his "moving Sirion moves". One thing is for sure, both the crane operator and the guy on the Segway had done this thousands of times.

Video

The workshop of Rien, the Yacht painter was only a short drive, but Sirion and the Segway took it on full power!! Now she had to backed into the workshop!

I had to take the mast down, but it was particularly tight on the two sides. At one point less than 2cm between bits of Sirion and the other yacht already parked in the workshop.

Finally in position!!

Watch our Segway hero move the straddler out from underneath Sirion and out of the workshop. Look how he adjusts the width!! Very impressive handling.

Video

From the moment we pulled Sirion under the crane into the two slings, till the straddler had parked her in the workshop tool for 35 minutes!!

Rien asked me to clear the deck as much as possible. So I took all the lines off and put them away. All the fenders too, put them in the cabin as there is no other space.

One tiny mishap, nothing to do with what we did today. But the VHF antenna socket broke. I had a good look at it and it is a bit of an odd way how they attached the antenna to the mast in the first place. Not that sturdy. So I will need to get a better solution.

Sirion needs to dry out for a few days before they get going again. On 1oth of June, 13.00 hours we will meet again with the Segway guy and his colleague the crane operator. Hope it all goes well with the work on the teak bits.

Jeroen

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