So its been nearly 2 weeks since Annanetta returned to us. Its been a very very busy 2 weeks!
Here's a little video that I put together consolidating some already provided video, there is audio so have your speakers on, see if you can hear the cat :)
Have to say that its been pretty full on since she returned - and this is that tale!
Before we left Dennett's we'd fired up the boiler, no drama, we'd checked the electrics, all well. We knew we'd have some challenges getting back to domesticity , but we hadn't reckoned on it taking nearly a week!
So first of all the boiler! Foolishly I'd not ensured that the fuel was on when I fired our venerable boiler up while at Dennett's, it wasn't. So all I did was to empty the fuel from the line! This would normally then require a dull but doable lift pump which requires a small diaphram thumb pump to draw the fuel through. Literally hours of this produced RSI in my thumb but no diesel! Hmmmm.
Stu and I then had to find a way of reliably and more forcefully drawing the fuel through which we succeeded in finding but still no diesel, just diesely air despite over £500 of fuel definitely in the tanks!! Next we then went methodically down the line checking for air leaks, all to no avail. Eventually at about 8.30pm we decided to remove one of the 2 fuel filters from the line altogether. We're still not completely sure but that seemed to do the trick!
A days worth of diesel infused clothing and hair eventually delivered a working boiler!!
Next the loo! So the loo is a macerator saniflo that shoots "brown waste" up out of the boat along a 32mm pipe out to our mains sewage. It's normally very effective. However it's a system that's been in operation for nearly 10 years and unfortunately when we connected it all up again nothing pumped through! Yikes! So the go to solution is a long rod down the pipe (about 8 feet) to flush and clear the pipe!
Initially we managed to get a length of cable in about 2 feet before we seemed to hit an obstacle. Pull it back a bit and try again. No. Repeat. No. Repeat, yes another foot! Then no no no. Ok so cut the cable (required an angle grinder) and then we fixed the end of the cable to a cordless drill: long range twisty drain cleaner!
It worked, we moved forward, until we reached the end of the cable. Then we cut a much longer length! Great but the cable starts to go crazy if we have too much length before the pipe. So another little add on : lengths of other pipe before the actual pipe! Yep worked. Foot by foot the cable edged through until it popped out at the bottom! Phew!! We had cable all the way through. Now with Stu on one end and me of the other all we needed to was to pull it back and forth to grind out a clear passage. So that's what we did!!
After 15 mins of grinding we knew we were clear, pulled the cable out and reconnected, flushed, nothing!! WTF!! How can that be?!! Take it all apart again and the cable is reinserted and rodded down. Nearly all the way through to the end. I'm on that end waiting for its reappearance and put my finger up the pipe. There's something up there!? I pull. Out comes a brand new blue industrial wipe!!!? Still smelling of the disinfectant. How can that be?? The current theory is that somehow the prickly end of the cable "picked up" a wipe that was lying around in the engine room when we weren't watching and was then pulled up into the pipe when we removed it after the grinding exercise!!
Re-connect and result, everything flows!! Phew. So we have warmth AND the ability to defecate!!
I'll skip over the challenges of the internet, tghe wheel house lighting, the gang plank and the netting as we are now largely sorted! Everything is in the general vacinity of satisfactory, the pictures are up, the clock's ticking, the kids are bathed and I'm typing away in the wheel house looking over the river with a nice glass of Sancerre!
Fortunately the competing smell of diesel and poo has now passed!
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