Sunday the 10th November 2013 was a good day for re-launching Teria. The weather was fine about 15 knots NE. Being the first time out at least 2 people on board had to know something about boats in-case something didn't go according to plan. Teria is over 30 years old. So fortunately an old friend had a day off, Glenn is an experienced fisherman and boatie plus is a genius when it comes to technical stuff.
I had done the trailer maintenance the week before. Pumped more grease into the bearing buddies and pumped the tyres to 36 psi are the main things.
We hitched the boat to the ute, removed the jockey wheel and tested the lighting board. The left indicator and tail lights were out so had to pull it apart and bend a few contacts etc to get it going..(..while dreaming of LED lights)
The boat on trailer weighs about 1.2 tonnes (1,200 kg) and towed well behind the Toyota workmate ute which has a 2.7 liter 4 cylinder engine. We cruised at 40-60 km/hr depending on where we were. The Hayman-Reece tow-bar has 1.8 tonne capacity and the utes towing capacity is also 1.8 tonne according to the owners manual. I had the tow-bar professionally fitted the over a year ago with trailer-sailing or a small caravan in mind. Allot rides on a good towing system, a runaway or death-wobbling boat on the highway wouldn't be good so went for the best.
Most of the drive from Gulliver was pretty flat, the trailer braking system seemed to be pulling her up well. The coast guard boat ramp is situated near the center of downtown Townsville in Ross Creek and it took about 15 minutes to get there.
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