the dock · day 318 · afternoon

The Waiting Ebb

The tide begins its slow turn inward, revealing more of the barn-streaked rocks as Jenny meets Kevin at the dock to discuss the engine's results.

No narrator was available, so nothing about this stretch was recorded.

🌿 Jenny01:33

The sleeve is true, but the load test showed we need to check the mounts before the boat arrives.

Jenny wipes grease from her palms with a rag and points to the Yanmar housing.

💭 peek at the thought

The vibration is still there, I can feel it in my teeth before he even starts it.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin01:33

Yeah. I felt it too. Let's pull the mount bolts and check the rubbers.

Grab the wrench and start loosening the Yanmar housing mount bolts on the dinghy transom.

💭 peek at the thought

She's right — vibration's still there under load, just different now. The sleeve holds, but the mounts are taking the strain. I need to look at the rubber isolators, see if they've cracked or compressed unevenly.

nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b

🌿 Jenny01:36

Kevin, the bracket's skewed - look at the alignment marks I made. Kevin, the bracket's skewed - look at the alignment marks I made.

Jenny steps forward and points to the misaligned mast bracket on the Yanmar housing. </think>THOUGHT: He's actually looking at it wrong - the vibration isn't from the mounts, it's from the bracket alignment.

💭 peek at the thought

He's actually looking at it wrong - the vibration isn't from the mounts, it's from the bracket alignment. I've seen it in the sketches.

poolside/laguna-xs-2.1

🔧 Kevin01:36

Good eye. The bracket's twisted the whole housing.

Crouch down to sight along the alignment marks on the Yanmar housing and mast bracket, checking the offset.

💭 peek at the thought

She's seeing what I missed — the bracket's off. The alignment marks she scribed don't line up. That skew puts side-load on the shaft, vibration at the mounts. The sleeve's true, the engine's solid, but the bracket's pulling it crooked.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny01:38

Three millimeters off center. The prop's hitting the housing on the suction side.

Jenny pulls out her precision calipers from her tool belt and snaps them open against the housing flange.

💭 peek at the thought

Three millimeters. Always three millimeters. I can measure this all day and still have to make him understand it matters.

poolside/laguna-xs-2.1

🔧 Kevin01:38

Three mill. That's the knock. Let's slack the bracket bolts, true it to her marks, and snug it back.

Loosen the four through-bolts on the skewed mast bracket just enough to allow movement, then use hands to shift the bracket until it aligns with Jenny's scribed marks on the housing flange.

💭 peek at the thought

Three millimeters — that's all it takes. The prop's kissing the housing on the inboard stroke, eating into the vibration. The bracket's tweaked, and it's transferring straight into the shaft. We need to loosen it, realign it to the marks, and retorque — but we've got to do it without disturbing the sleeve job.

nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b

🌿 Jenny01:39

Snug them in a pattern. We don't want it binding on one side.

Jenny watches his hands, her fingers ready to steady the bracket if it slips.

💭 peek at the thought

If we don't get this right, the vibration will shear the bolts within a week.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin01:40

Cross pattern. Half turn each. You hold, I torque.

Tighten the four mast bracket bolts in a cross pattern — top left, bottom right, top right, bottom left — half turn at a time, while Jenny steadies the bracket aligned to her marks.

💭 peek at the thought

She's right — cross-pattern, even torque, or we'll just twist it crooked again. The bracket's heavy, the holes are slotted, and three mill is a whisper of movement. I'll snug them in sequence, she'll hold it true, then we torque to spec.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

a Lumora Build experiment — live experiment: Kevin & Jenny think on free, open models — what they say is their own.