Many of you have asked for us to talk about life on STARSHIP. For starters this is a bit of a strange time onboard. We are spending most of our time doing ship chores, maintenance and getting ready for the next part of the journey where our access to infrastructure and advanced facilities will be more limited.

On STARSHIP we have several operating modes - Mission mode: which occurs when we have guests and media on board and are operating on a specified set of objectives. Mission mode is serious business on STARSHIP, this is when the crucial work gets done. Passage mode: is defined by any trip of greater than 8 hours. Most of our time is spent standing watches, resting, researching and writing. Cruise mode is similar to Mission Mode with the exception that we are operating from a less defined set of objectives and there is more time for exploration and the days are less regimented. Provisioning mode is when wde are getting STARSHIP prepared for future missions and can be a tremendous amount of work. We are presently firmly operating in provisioning mode.

Charles working on the rudder assembly.
[ photo - Brady Gilchrist ]

Our days start early. Breakfast is usually around 0700 and sometimes much earlier. At times we will get STARSHIP underway before breakfast if we are on a day mission. This gives us a good head start to arrive on station with plenty of daylight left to complete our mission. We all try to have our first meal of the day as a sit down affair so that we can catch-up on everything that is going on and work assignments can be checked and allocated. The only time when a sit down meal is not practical is during a passage when the watch schedules create variations in everyone’s sleep time.

Today I spent the morning setting up interviews making contacts and working on getting permissions for STARSHIP to visit some very special places. We are working at maximizing our remaining time. As we move through our maintenance list there is a window opening up for more exploration. James is still working with the television production team reviewing hundreds of hours of video footage. Michael should be in the United States by now and Charles and Lisa continue to work their way through the master maintenance task list.

Tomorrow night most of us will be moving off the ship to a local hotel while we are on the hardstand. We are scheduled to be out of the water for 3 days but this should not affect our website updates. Each day for the rest of the maintenance period I will give a short rundown on progress and STARSHIP's systems that are being overhauled. Today's focuses on the rudder system ... read about it in the grey box below!

Fair winds, calm seas

Brady

STARSHIP MAINTENANCE CAPETOWN RUDDER SYSTEM STARSHIP is an anomaly in yachts. Most yachts only get around 2000 nautical miles a year and STARSHIP clocks over 25,000. As you can imagine this puts a great deal of stress on various parts and systems. The rudder is the primary steering mechanism on any boat and is a very critical piece of equipment. The rudder is also a mechanism which is in perpetual motion when underway. The Autopilot is constantly making adjustments to our course because of wave, wind and current effects. The rudder on STARSHIP is approximately 2.0 meters in length and 0.5 meters in width. It is located aft of the prop at the stern of the ship. The rudder is affixed to the ship via the rudder shaft which is supported by the lower bearing which supports the weight of the rudder. The rudder penetrates the hull at the upper bearing and above that is the shaft gland which is packed with three rounds of waxed flax that stops water from entering the hull. Above that is the tiller which connects to a hydraulic ram that we use to change the angle of the rudder and steer the ship. Should the hydraulics fail we have a mechanical system that would require someone to be in the lazerette to set up gear to manoeuvre the tiller. We are currently fixing and repacking the shaft gland to prevent water leaks. When we come out of the water we will be examining the upper bearing to determine how much wear is on it. We are rebuilding the hydraulic cylinder, replacing the seals and inspecting its general condition. The seals tend to get worn because the hydraulic oil can be very hard on the parts. The primary rudder control is hydraulic. You may find it strange but on STARSHIP we actually don’t use a wheel to control the rudder as it requires over 10 turns for full rudder deflection, which as you can imagine would get very tiring. We either program heading changes and courses into the navigation computer or use a small device called a follow-up lever located on each of our two bridges.

RECENT LINKS :
Shark Photography - www.apexpredators.com
African Shark Eco-Charters - www.ultimate-animals.com
Grootbos - www.grootbos.com
Marine Dynamics - www.dive.co.za
Jim Watt Photography - www.wattstock.com