Pat's Progressed Heavy metal day had arrived - in a large lorry which reversed into the yard for a manual unloading process. Hand balling the lumps of metal direct from the load deck into our CCT vehicles saved double handling. We had some 2.5Tonnes to shift.
With Patricia, our first job was to lift the deck plates and commence the removal of our existing ballast metal. The old material was taken away to the transport and was swapped for the new metal which was in 13.46kg rectangular lumps which could be densely packed in the bilges, so keeping the centre of gravity as low as possible.
It took all morning to complete the procedure. Soon it was time to check the trim before too much load was added. This was a case of fine adjustment of the trim. Pat's legs were lifted so that she floated. We aimed for a level trim port-starboard and a slightly heavy stern.
In all we added 1.4Tonnes of metal, replacing a bit over 700kg of less densely packed rail and iron lumps. The transformation of the buoyancy behaviour was quite remarkable. Particularly noticeable when stepping onto the boat. The displacement of the trim was far less than before, suggesting a much lower centre of gravity due both to the effectively lower load and the increased weight.
Our next job is to repeat the stability measurements that Jim conducted before so that the actual improvement can be quantified and recorded. We're pretty confident that she'll get the all-go to start dredging trials very soon. A great day for the team.
