The Steamtug Blog

Edelweiss has finally had her new rear windows fitted. She never had these, and looked un-finished for the past 106 years until an old mate and shipwright Theo milled up the blackwood frames finally put it all together. So now that she is back at home, I decided she needed to taste some salty water! So I loaded up some bags of firewood and headed down to the water. Theo told me that working on this boat had been the hardest thing he had ever done. Apart from the fact that boats don’t have anything straight, as everything has got a curve somewhere, but worse than that is that every 5 minutes, someone comes up and asks a question about her, or wants to know something, or even just wants to have a look and a chat so it all takes twice as long!

I found this out when I finally got her into the water and alongside the jetty with the boiler simmering, so many people came to have a look. One man, who works up the hill at the maritime museum just hung around asking a million questions! All good… I don’t mind showing her off. I started up the engine and just ran her beside the pier with her 31 inch pitch propeller washing the water down behind to the beach and trying unsuccessfully  to tow the jetty along. We had done some repairs to her airpump which lifts the condensed steam and gasses out of the condenser. We had found the piston inside broken, so Tom made a new piston, and there was a break in the soldered connection which was leaking in air which I fixed, and after starting the condenser vacuum shot down to 22″ which is an amazing difference. Normally steamtug Wattle runs at 25″ and Ena can easily make 26″ but I was very pleased with what we had achieved. But the joy was short lived because the cooling water flow is not enough to maintain the low temperatures needed and slowly the vacuum is lost and the condensate comes back so hot that the boiler feed pumps refuse to pump it.

So after lots of experiments and the day used up, I loaded her back and took her home. Saturday morning I fitted up and extra electric pump to help the situation, and with the help of Steve and James Wilson put her back together and headed back to the boat ramp. Well it was Saturday, wasn’t it! And lots more people who all wanted to see Edelweiss on the water. I didn’t even stop to talk to the coast guard staff who man the boat ramp on weekends, just back straight up and chucked her off. After parking the car, the attendant had already written up the launch documents and as I paid the massive $4 launch fee the man told me that after I had been there last time, they sent a photo of Edelweiss to the coast guard head office and requested they keep a bag of briquettes onboard their rescue boat just in case I run out of fuel (like the do for other boats). It was a good joke… ha ha… She behaved herself much better, and with the sea as “flat as a shit carter’s hat” we headed out. She was still not entirely happy in the condenser, but the extra cooling water did help until I pushed her hard. But just running gently, she was happy. The condensate temperature was about 70 degrees which is still much too warm, but at least the pumps kept sending it back to the boiler so the run ended with some success. I will need to think about other options for permanent cooling water supply, or maybe ditch the inboard condenser that takes up so much room and run a pipe outside in the sea as a coil condenser. Got any ideas? Make a comment! Seeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeya Mark