Success!

It was a bit of a bleary start to the day but eventually we got ourselves moving and set about the first job of the day.



Removing the rudder proved easier than expected but I was glad of the help. It would have been damn difficult on my own

Next up was another attempt at getting the prop off. A friend had access to a hydraulic puller and it did the job. It made us all jump when it finally shifted with a hell of a bang!



The next job we tackled that also needed more than one pair of hands was removing the damaged wind vane steering gear

Removing the mounting bolts proved easier than I'd feared and off it came. It was heavier than I expected, must be 25 kilos at least



The stern certainly looks a lot cleaner without it. There's a fair bit of work to make good which I'll tackle over the next couple of weeks

The final job for the day was getting the bolts out ready to remove the cutlass bearing housing

The top bolt came out easily but the bottom bolt proved a problem. It's supposed to be in a tapped hole in the internal backing plate but it turned out on Pagan there's a nut which is totally inaccessible

In the end, the only option was to get the angle grinder out and cut the head off the bolt

That done, it was time to wrap up for the day

Tomorrow we'll hopefully get the stern tube out and see what's what with the shaft. Hopefully it's not damaged. Then I'll need to organise getting the cutlass bearing replaced