In this episode of Sailing A B Sea we take her out for a full test after rebuilding the engine and we announce our plans for Christmas and New Year.

When Aannsha and I watched the finished edit of this episode, which includes the announcement of our four week break from weekly uploads, we both had the same feeling that it was a fitting end to a year of episodes where we have come full circle in relation to engine work.

From removing our rusted through exhaust elbow in Greece in the winter of 2019 and all of the follow on jobs that created, to finally testing our rebuilt engine with a new turbo here in Turkey for the winter of 2020.

It's been an amazing year and it has been our privilege to document the ups and downs, the highs and lows, the stress and elation and to share it with you, our Patreon family, our subscribers and our viewers.

We wish you all the very best Christmas, a happy New Year and a strong hope and belief that 2021 will be a time for getting all of our lives back to normal.

Closed Captions (CC):
Just doing a quick visual check inside the
engine bay to make sure that there are no fluids

in particular oil and coolant leaks. The plan
is that we'll come out of the marina and out of

the channel past the peninsula probably head
out to around about somewhere here and then

just around and head back in. As you can
see there's not much chance of any wind

here today but that's not important because
this is essentially a test of the engine

Once we're underway I'll be able to come
below every five or ten minutes or so

and just check that there are no leaks, there's
nothing underneath the engine in the bilge area

Kas marina, Kas marina, Kas marina, this is sailing yacht A B Sea, A B Sea, A B Sea over.

A B Sea, A B Sea, this is Kas marina, do you require assistance?

Yes thanks we would like assistance
in departing from Pontoon B56 please, over

Yes, no problem

Thank you this is A B Sea standing by on seven three
Right I'm going to drop this line.

Kind of excited, kind of nervous should be fine. I'm just
going to test it to the end of the peninsula

and if something goes wrong we're
in radio distance for assistance

Marineros are on their way

Clear. Thank you

Tesekkurler

Behind me is a proper super
yacht, it's not a motor yacht

it's got sails and we're going to take a look
at it this afternoon when we get back, can't wait!

Baz is ramping up the engine slightly

It's so great to have the engine working

and to be out on the water even though we're not
sailing today we're just testing the engine we're

just motoring just for a little while but it's so
great I can't express to you how good that feels

It's fabulous

Well thankfully that all looks pretty good.
We've been out for about 20 minutes now

so we'll give it another 20 minute
run. There is a little bit of a leak

on the expansion tank and I think that's
coming from the actual hose connection so

I'm gonna have to have a quick look at that hose
connection but apart from that it's looking good

That's the isolated danger point. What we
might do is because we've never done it before

let's go around the island, the little islet over
here and uh go around that instead. That's Turkish

isn't it? Yes it is.

We must be a normal drive because
we're doing 2 400 reps and we're doing 7.2 knots so that's normal. It's decent speed isn't it? Yeah

More decent. Look at that!
It's kind of quite smoky

Yeah a little bit of white smoke but certainly
nothing to be concerned about obviously

uh we'll check the oil level when we
get back. But it sounds alright doesn't it?

It does. That rattling up here is just this lock
here it's not the engine. That island there

is that and that's what we're
gonna go around. All these seagulls

Sometimes from a distance they look
like buoys but they're definitely birds

This seagull's playing chicken

Looks like somebody's dumped a whole heap of

stuff in the water, gross.

That's the island that we're going around

and that island there is Greek so we're going
to be very sure that we stay in Turkish waters

and that line is showing the
boundary between Turkey and Greece

so that's the Greek island but
we're just going around here

So long way away. Don't want to cause any
international incidents today Baz.

No I'll do my best

Happy. Yeah I'm very happy um yeah Relieved? Relieved that's the word, yeah

I kind of felt that before, I had a bit of a moment

A lot of debris in the water today, lots and lots
of floaty debris so I'm just keeping an eye out

for that because uh some of it looks as though it
might foul the prop if you accidentally ran over it

yeah. Somebody must have dumped something. I
think that's what those seagulls were sitting on actually

Some kind of buoy over there look it's
definitely not a seagull, can tell that.

Yeah it's for one of the Kas dive boats or something.
Okay

When you see the mountains from
this distance you really get a

good perspective on how tall they actually are

And we're on our way back
now. So we've got 2 000 revs

and we're doing a very nice
six knots speed over the ground

Oh I'd almost forgotten how gorgeous it is

out on the water

even with the engine running you know it's
just something about the fresh air and being

on the elements and the sun and sea and birds and
looking at the land from a different perspective

And this is 26 November and we're out
here in shorts and t-shirts. Yeah. It's great

Okay we're probably going to get some people
saying oh you didn't bring your fenders in. Captain

tell us why. The reason why we left the
fenders out is because this is an engine test

and if the engine had failed
we'd have to call for assistance

and the last thing I wanted to be thinking about is the
fenders out so the fenders stayed out in case we

needed to get towed back in, anyone was going
to come alongside either side the fenders were

already there, one less thing to think about
Luckily the test has gone very well we're

doing 6.1 knots at 2000 rpm and the
temperature is rock steady at 80 degrees

I'm happy with that

There's the isolated danger and
there's the isolated danger marker

It actually gets quite shallow although it's about
15 to 20 metres in depth here so that's fine for us

I think that's Claire, Elaine and
Bridgette. How cool is that, hi ladies

Bang on for the leading light so if we were
coming in at night this is green coz as long as

we can see green we know we're on the right course
If we're heading towards that red sector then we

we know we're not meant to be there, so uh yeah a
nice leading light for coming in at night.

We've had a lovely trip out testing the engine
today and I've thoroughly enjoyed being on the

water as I've already said and I hope that
you've enjoyed coming along with us we've

put lots of sights and sounds in there for
you. Our adventures are going to begin again. Yay!

Because we have a Gory folding prop which goes
into overdrive if we've got too much way going

backwards that can be an issue when we're trying
to stop at a pontoon so Baz just reverses in very

very slowly obviously fast enough that he's still
got control but you have to really think about how

you're going to do it rather than just go in and
then slam it into forward to slow yourself down

as you can with most props. Marinoes
very patiently waiting for us

but you know what they say slow is pro

So throw a line

So Baz has now got to get that

Back here. Attached to them.

Off you go!

Oh gazelle like!
Get the old bungee cords on

And we're home

Yay! Well I'd say that was a success, all good, no
one died. And the engine functioned really well

and Kev's going to say I told you so. Yeah thanks
Kev. Cheers mate. Now we've got a turbo that's

functioning. Now we have a fully functioning turbo. Yes that's
not seized, that's not been cut off, that's

now actually brand new and in there yeah um how
long do you think we need to let it cool down?

The truthful answer is I don't know nobody's
actually explained that to me but I would imagine

that we we dropped the revs right down as we came
to the beginning of the pontoons and we were doing

I think two and a half knots so we weren't having
many reps at all. I think the only final bit that

I'm a bit confused about is the amount of reverse
thrust that I've got to put on to get the boat

to the right position on the pontoon for the
back end to be tied off correctly for the passarelle

to reach the pontoon

so I don't know I guess we wait for five
minutes at that tickover? Yeah, long enough

for a kettle to boil for a cup of coffee do you think?

We'll get the electricity on right now

Oh thanks Jimness. Look isn't he
good? See this this is what I

love about the boating community
your neighbours help out, sweet thanks

I'd call that a success Baz. We won

It's really hard to see because it's so pale
uh yeah the level's about here isn't it?

yeah - where my thumb is - yeah yeah.
So that's where it was when we

topped off the oil with fresh oil and it's
still a good colour so very happy with that

We're being distracted, there's
a little local dog here that's

wanting our attention. Yeah because there's no
one else around. No it's empty. No we are sitting on the

terrace of Alp's Wine House in the marina, tables and
chairs are still here but the restaurant is closed

basically uh the curfew restrictions in Turkey
have said to restaurants you can only do takeaways

or deliveries and a lot of the restaurants
have just said well there's not enough money

in that for us so we're just going to close
down completely. Um talking about closing down

we're also going to be closing down for four
weeks. Yes the last two weeks in December and

the first two weeks in January 2021. Yeah and
the reason why we're doing that is because

last week's new patron Alan Jacobson sent us
off on a little bit of a tangent with regards to

a playlist that we can put together and we just
had a lot of conversations with him, thought it

was a great idea, but it's a lot of work and
we simply don't have enough hours in the week

to produce our weekly video and get this big
playlist together. Because it means sifting

through all of our back videos and pulling out
relevant bits of information that's going to be

really um it's going to be a really good playlist I reckon.
I think so too yeah it's a great idea yeah. But we

need the time. We do and talking about patrons
our newest patron that to welcome on board

is Adrian Hill. Yes welcome Adrian it's great to
have you aboard, welcome to our family. Yeah um

so the plan for this four-week holiday
apart from going through the old footage - lying in - no

there'll be none of that - eating bacon sandwiches - no

no there'll be none of that - putting our feet up -
no there'll be none of that - okay - just gonna work

work work. Within the parametres of the Turkish
curfew hours we'll also be renting a car - lying in

We'll rent this car and we'll go and visit
and film some of the places we want to visit

locally to here within the parametres of where
we can travel to so we will be doing quite a lot

during those four weeks and um. And it's all for
you - yep - all of it's for you! Plus we're gonna

have some fun as we discover some new places
that we haven't been to before yeah locally

yeah. So right now what we'll do is wish you all
a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year and

all the best for 2021. Let's hope it's a bit
different from 2020. Yes well if you're into

astrology like I am kind of on the sidelines
there are some very interesting alignments

happening and they do hold the potential they show
the potential for some really good new developments

so let's see how that pans out. I don't mind stars
aligning, it's the world's colliding that get me

No there won't be any of that! So stay safe
and healthy. Yep and we'll see you in 2021. Yay!