MFV BF494 'Pansy', an old Motor Fifie Conversion

ok so she sets fire to herself and wets her pants a bit, thats old ladies for you. but a cure has to be, and I believe has been found.

Down in the hole there is an accumulation of 70 years of oil, grease, soot, dust, rusty bits, diesel, hydraulic oil, and very possibly fish and and past crew members breakfasts, and it all has to come out. So the time has come to boldly go where no cleaning products have gone before. The vile black sludge has to be removed. First job has been to remove what may well turn out to be mini torpedoes, we're still not sure, there's maybe 50 of em, all neatly stacked in the bilges under the engine and tanks. A couple or 3 feet long, 3 or 4" in diameter and of hernia inducing weight when your on your back partially upside down and trying not to breath whilst you're shifting them. But shifted they are, and seeing daylight for the first time this century, alongside some of the other mystery ironmongery we've removed (the big cheese shaped bits, the stripey bits etc)

So how to attack the filthy slurry that remains. the answer came to me in flash as I was stood in the queue in the post office on pension day next to one of tenna lady's best, but evidently least successful customers. Nappies!

So for those likewise infested with bilge blight, get yourself some nappies, open them out and press them down into the offending area and leave for a bit, all manner of nastiness soaks into them, then simply remove and dispose of. If you live in herne bay, I believe the correct procedure for disposal is to leave them on the beach

For those smaller harder to get at areas, sanitary towels (with or without wings) do a similar job.

The plan is, once the worst has been removed to throw some cat litter down there with a bit of sawdust to soak up whatever's left, then scrape that out, hope fully to reveal a nice clean bottom, ready for talc and paint (ok I made the talc bit up)

As a word of caution though. I have it on very good authority that if you leave the nappies down there too long they may well explode.

*No. 2 swings his good leg on board and leaves the spare on the pontoon*

Duck egg blue down below - very nice. How do I know? I spent 137 minutes down there yesterday with 4 elbows, (Elephants have 4 knees apparently) some grease and a laser beam. Managed to expose a postage stamp area of cleanliness ready to accept our lovely white bilge paint. Realised that using your teeth to tear bits off a roll of stockinette doesn't work so squeezed meself into a man sized portion and rolled around for a while to soak up some of the damage I'd done with "The Cleaning" (note to Skipper - there may be a stanley knife blade lurking around point upwards next to some of your "Thingmys"). It all looked quite good by the time I left but then the batteries were just about out which power the engine room lights and my headtorch actually makes things darker when you point it at things. May have to consider putting head torch on the other way round as I'm often startled by a strange white light behind me but everytime I turn around it's gone.