Accessories

Hello Allan

I remember talking to you, which explains why the name Muscadet seemed so familiar yet I could not place why!

The ventilation holes have been drilled in the panel supporting the left hand side of the cooker at the back and low down. I did not fit any extra insulation as I thought I would see how it performed this Summer.

As regards the rope cutter I had a 'Spurs' cutter on the last boat (which had a prop shaft) as used by the RNLI. In the Solent it was always working even if only through buches of seaweed. The first sign is the significant drop in engine revs followed by a trail of bits from the stern. In 2003 it successfully cut through blue nylon rope on three occasions. The worst incident was delivering the old boat to the new owner from the Solent to the Thames estuary and catching 2 pot lines off Beachy Head just after sunset. The severe drop in engine revs was bad enough, but the thumping on the hull will never be forgotten! Got it quickly into neutral then used forward and reverse to chop my way free. Only took a minute but was one of the longest minutes of my life. So, prime example of surviving but could have been a lot more inconvenient if no stripper fitted.

Fitted the Ambassador stripper to the 312 as Spurs did not make a saildrive version which came out tops in the Sailing Today test.

Munched through plenty of seaweed bunches(you never know what is also tangled up with it) till we left for Newhaven in July since then no incidents to report as the water in that area does not seem to have as much debris as the Solent.

You will have read Bryans account above so, I think a stripper is a must for your shopping list Allan in order to stand a reasonable chance of getting to your destination without problems.

All the best

Geoff

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