The yard machinists are ready for anything we can throw at them. Here is but one of their storage racks for roundstock of workable materials such as bronze, copper, aluminium and zinc. 
A unhurried yard machinist carries out some some delicate work to reconstruct the seat of a valve which controls the flow of seawater into the cooling lines for Narrabeen's diesel powered generators. In this instance, the surface to be taken off is so fine that he has taken that huge chuck behind him out of gear and is actually driving it by hand. 
The blue dye proving test. This is the classic test used by machinists, and recognised by the ship's engineer, to demonstrate the proper closing capabilities of any spindle valve. At right, at the base of the valve casing, is it's recently re-machined seat. At left, resting atop the valve, is the valve's lap mechanism which, when in operation, is actually turned upside down and is wound down onto the seat by the valve's threaded spindle. To conduct the test, the seat below is lightly smeared with blue dye, then the lap is lowered down onto the seat along its guide pin until it rests on the seat. The lap is only partially rotated, then quickly withdrawn to reveal the perfectly mating surfaces by virtue of the unbroken thin ring of blue dye which is left imprinted upon the base of the lap after the test. This can't be faked. That thin blue line is like an iron-on transfer in that it directly replicates the actual closing surface where the lap meets the seat. The contact surface on Narrabeen's main seawater gate valves is less than 2mm wide. If the valve is properly tuned, that is all that it takes to keep the sea out. 
Narrabeen's aft propellor shaft has been surveyed and tested and has already been re-installed by the riggers and fitters together. Here, a fitter prepares the intricate surface for the re-installation of blade four after the removal of the lifting eye. 
Narrabeen's forward propellor is also now fully re-installed with all four 309kg copper/nickel alloy blades buffed and polished. Both shafts were re-installed within two days. The hull painting will step up soon, and the safest place for each of the very delicate shafts is back within it's respective stern tube. The hubs will all be wrapped in protective canvas whilst the hull painters go to work. Next up for this end of the ship is the return of the forward rudder stock. If you look closely here, you may note that you are staring right up the stock tube at an overhead lighting fixture hanging directly above the steering box.
Other than the props being back in and canvassed, can you spot the significant change to Narrabeen since the last shot we put up from this spot? 
With regard to our funnel lettering, we think bigger is better. Hard to believe anyone ever thought otherwise. At top is how the funnel's port side looked when Narrabeen came off the run in early September. At bottom is the exact same area as it looks now with new, larger lettering. 
A rare look inside and through Narrabeen's funnel. This is the forward section, which has been compartmentalised as a seperate area than the larger aft section. Located in here, with hatches currently closed, are the three induction fans used to push fresh air down into the engine room to keep both of Narrabeen's 5500hp/4100kw Daihatsu Main Engines well aspirated, along with it's two diesel generators. You may notice, especially in the photo at left, three steel hook type gadgets protruding from left to right, directly over the closed fan hatches. During normal operation, when the hatches are raised and the fans are running flat out sucking air down into the engine room, these keeper hooks are used to hold the hatches in the open position. The hooks are actually attached to steel cables running all the way down to the lowest level of the ship. In the event of an actual engine room fire, the hooks can be tripped and hatches closed tightly in less than a second by pulling on the cables below. The hatches are very heavy, and when they are dropped and closed you can hear it throughout the ship. The instantaneous closure of the hatches assists in stopping a fire by starving it of life-giving oxygen. The fans have already been taken off ship, serviced, returned and bolted back into position. The missing sections of bulkhead here are normally occupied by removable panels. These panels, currently being rebuilt and repainted, are fitted with giant framed filter units (also removable) which filter the air being drawn in by the whirling induction fans. 
Narrabeen's funnel filter frames were rebuilt from brand new aluminium during our pre-docking period at Balmain Shipyard. As with any new material, they warrant a very long time being preserved before being fitted. The preservation of aluminium requires a different process and different coating than that of steel. Dry conditions and time greatly aid the preservation process, but you don't often get both. We got lucky during September as the drought rolled on. The filter panels have sturdy frames, yes, but the louvre sections are made from understandably quite thin material and are thus red-hot candidates for corrosion if not properly preserved. Once fitted, they will spend their lives under constant load from the corrosive blizzard of salty sea air being drawn in through them all day long by the induction fans. We are pretty confident these panels are ready for war. 
Narrabeen's forward and aft propellor hubs will go into conspicuous hiding for a few days while the hull painters make up some ground.
Narrabeen's two wayward anchors showed up in the centre of the western crane tracks yesterday, unceremoniously dumped there and left to continue rusting. The 1092kg anchors were cut off in Balmain way back in early September to enable repairs in the anchor pen area. They will be dropped into the dock and rejoined to the chains next week. 
Narrabeen's two aluminium upper gangways were on a clean run through the painting schedule until we looked at their undersides and found proof of age hiding in a few cracks and fractures. They were apprehended and frogmarched into the boilermakers shop where they will get worked over in the same makeshift surgery pen recently vacated by the two steel lower gangways, both of which were sent to the blast shed for more in-depth punishment. 
Narrabeen's port lower gangway has just been worked over in a behind-closed-doors private session in the yard's eerie blast chamber. In this chamber, selected victims are subject to abrasive garnet blasting over large areas of their surface and also in small localised areas where needle guns and grinders cannot reach. All blasting spoil falls through grates in the floor and is collected up in a giant vacuum system which seperates spent abrasives from fragments of removed paint. After blasting is completed, the shed's huge doors are swung open and blasting victims are wheeled out on rails into a giant recovery room. 
After emerging from the blast shed, Narrabeen's port lower gangway shows its age - warts and all. Some intense localised corrosion was discovered. Here are the four finalists. 
Narrabeen's forward rudder stock begins its homeward journey up into the steering box. The upper end of the stock, attached to a 5-tonne chainblock which has been lowered down through the stock tube by riggers directly above in the forward steering flat, has been hooked up by the upward-looking riggers in the dock. The connection between the chain block's hook and the rudder stock's lifting eye is a bulky, edgy cluster of raw steel and presents a danger to the delicate lining of the stock tube during the two-metre journey upwards through the tube into the steering box, so it is wrapped by riggers in a protective layer of gasket rubber and bound by gaffer tape. 
Narrabeen's forward rudder stock on its way up through the stock tube. Riggers in the dock communicate with those in the steering flat above during every step of the process. There is very little clearance between the stock and the lining of the tube. 
Narrabeen's forward rudder stock has been housed into its taper, but the job is not over until the locking nut is wound onto the stock's threaded upper portion and locked into position. As the nut is wound onto the stock and begins to bind, the stock wants to rotate right along with it. Down in the dock, the savvy riggers have configured two chain blocks to act as brakes to stop the stock from rotating while the nut is cranked down onto the stock. The locking process is a push-pull, final-showdown saga and can take a very long time to complete, especially when you consider the fact that the locking wrench used to secure the nut weighs well over 150kg, and it takes two riggers using two chain blocks to re-position it during the crankdown.
Narrabeen's Starboard Lower Gangway returns to the spray painting vault for yet another undercoat of epoxy, a two-part preservative coating which is built up layer after layer, and sets to the hardness of stone. By the time the undercoating and finish layers have been applied to these gangways, they will be covered in almost 600 microns of corrosion-inhibiting preservative - with some spots having a thickness of almost 1000 microns. The average brand new car has a paint thickness of about 30 microns. 
Some detail of the thick preservative coating being applied to Narrabeen's lower gangways ..... and they're not done yet 
Narrabeen's outcast anchors somehow found their way into the blast shed to get some tough love from the gun of the blast master. When this one emerged in the aftermath, it looked like a whale bone. That is not a layer of coating you are looking at here, but rather the actual metal of which the anchor is made. Rust and corrosion are oxidising attack forces, and when they do their business on metal it literally dissolves into thin air. The result is surreal, especially when you see it on low grade metal like that contained in anchors, where corrosive degradation is allowed to perpetuate for long periods of time. However, only blasting away the heavy corrosive layers of an anchor will give you the view you've got here. From the moment the anchor emerges from the blast shed, corrosion gets underway. 
What the blasting reveals. At the top end of the anchor's stock is a transitionary joining section of linking pieces which connect it up to the anchor chain but also allow it to swivel independently of the chain. This two large D-Shackles you see here are normally red to brown with heavy, established rust. You'd probably be going back to the date they were cast to find when the last time their cast-in or stamped-in letters were legible or even visible like this. Look closely at the second shackle and the first link. Dip these into seawater for a few hours and let them air for a few days (the story of an anchor's life) and it will quickly become difficult to read these markings. Rust moves that fast on pristine, exposed steel such as this. 
Every single one of Narrabeen's fireproof doors is getting a fresh coat of paint. Throughout the vessel, the number comes to well over 30. 
Things must be pretty bad for an anchor if you send it to a blast shed. Things were pretty bad, actually. The anchors were known to be sluggish and refused to house properly into Narrabeen's hawsepipes. A date with the blast master was arranged so as to remove as much of the corrosion as possible from the anchors, especially from their moving parts. Looking at the photos at the bottom, it is easy to see how much corrosive buildup was taken away, first by high pressure water blasting, then grit blasting, and finally a quenching layer of epoxy to seal up the porous exposed steel. Blasting the anchors, however, was just one part of a larger plan to solve Narrabeen's anchoring issues.
Shipwrights are underway with a fairly large task. They will remove each window from each of Narrabeen's 90 double slider units (180 glass panes in total) attach a new handle to it and repair or replace each pane's vertical weather seal edging. Also, each of the 90 slider frames will have all of it's old surrounding track seals removed, tracks cleaned out and brand-new custom made seals installed. 
Narrabeen's forward rudder is eased up towards the rudder stock palm. A 16-tonne forklift takes the lead, but only the precision of the riggers' chainblocks will ever get it into the right position. In tasks like this, fitters and riggers have virtually interchangeable jobs. 
A different view of the same operation, at virtually the same point, gives a greater appreciation of what it takes to get the big ticket items safely up and in at classic shipyards like this. 
Narrabeen's forward rudder is in position and secured with temporary bolting plates. Riggers will now drop back down into the dock and retrieve all six of the 25kg bolts needed to lock it into the rudder stock for another five years. 
With Narrabeen's forward steering gear all re-installed, the area is conceded by the fitters and riggers. The forward end of the hull is soon claimed by hull painters who quickly make their marks. 
Look how far this anchor has come. 
Narrabeen's starboard lower gangway has had basal and cosmetic work done to near Hollywood proportions. It's surface coatings and final colours are starting to be blended in. Spray technicians take spot readings around the gangway to gauge the thickness of the surface coating, at times building it up if called for. The thickness detectors base their readings, given in microns, on the magnetic response of the metal being gauged. 
Narrabeen's lifeboat davit has been revitalised by the yard painters. Though it may look like a crane, it's 500kg limit makes it just a poor cousin to some of the company it is keeping at this yard. It exists primarily to swing Narrabeen's rescue boat onto and off the vessel in times of emergency. 
Fresh paint makes it all seem new. Narrabeen's storm grey navigation decks are being decluttered and readied for re-coating. Scaffolding is still in place on both the forward and aft monkey islands. 
Narrabeen's aft propellor hub is unveiled for a few hours while fitters run pitch and rotation tests on the aft shaft. Hull painters are eager to keep going with the white undercoating, but will have to wait until the hub is re-wrapped in protective canvas. 
Narrabeen's four steering pumps are re-joined to their drive motors and readied for return to ship. All components were serviced individually. The hydraulic steering system at each is supported by two electric pumps and also by a third emergency drive pump which operates on pressurised air. The air-driven pumps are the odd ones at left in the bottom photo. 
With just over three weeks to go until Narrabeen is returned to passenger service, the pressure to get things back together is starting to build. The seat bases on Narrabeen's upper passenger areas are starting to be re-fitted onto her brand new decks. The king posts all around the passenger areas, as well as the bulkheads between and below the windows here, are all sporting fresh new paint. 
Onto Narrabeen's freshly painted seatbases, finally, after years of waiting, will go the brand new seats. They are stacked all around the ship at present, individually shrouded in bubble wrap. 
To complete the mission, every one of Narrabeen's fold-down bulkhead seats has been removed, re-upholstered in fabric to match the new seats, and returned to the ship. When Narrabeen returns to service in early December, every single passenger seat, both inside and outside, will be new. This has not been done since her last major refit in 2002.
The painters were busy over the weekend. Some features of Narrabeen's hull will come out the other end looking a bit different. 
Starboard aft. Narrabeen's new letters are passing through their first official stage of STA Ferry Green. Once the hull sprayers have stepped aside, the steady-handed brush painters will ascend up in the cherry pickers, carrying pails of white, for surgical detailing -->> Go to Narrabeen 2017 Dry Docking Part 4
-->> Go to Collaroy 2018 Dry Docking Part 1
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