Last weekend, I found that the 1000lb lifting keel in my Seal 28 was jammed in its case! I keep the boat on a mud mooring, but had no problems last season. With the boat afloat, I tried poking down the case around the keel and hammering on its top to no avail. It occurred to me that maybe a small stone had got jammed in the bottom of the keel box, in which case, lifting the keel slightly would allow any debris to drop free. But the keel was wound up as far as it would go! I very carefully unbolted the lifting jack and slackened off the wires about 1 inch. This was a risky thing to do, since I was relying on the jam to hold the keel. I inserted some packing pieces under the jack's feet and gently took up the slack. Sure enough, after some gentle winding up and down, the keel descended to its full extent - but not far enough for me to get the packing pieces out! That required a wait for low tide.

I learnt the hard way - make sure you keep a few spare turns in hand on the lifting jack if you take the ground.

Neil Sinclair

---