It’s Me or Him said the little toe.

That’s it I heard from below. The blood stained little toe was throbbing away in pain. Either he has to go or I’m off. We have been here before this is not the first time these words have been voiced. The swim ladder just sat there as usual resting on the Port (left) rear transom. Quite a life he has with the occasional dip then back to sunbathing.

Cleaned up the little bloke now back here to survey the situation.

I can see it’s time to make a decision, off with the toe OR away with the swim ladder. As the owner of the little toe I will say I’m a little queezie when it comes to removing body parts. I am however quite good at dripping blood over the fibreglass and being disingenuous to the other body parts. The right knee looked up and smiled at this thought.

Time to get things sorted once and for all. Out comes the spanner, angle grinder and drill. First remove the ladder and cut off half the mounting tabs.

Then give it a clean up. Always makes you feel like progress is being made when you do a good clean.

Drill 4 holes and mount the replacement swim ladder.

That’s it were all done.

Nice to solve one problem and improve another. Now when we dive in and forget to drop the swim ladder it is quite easy to reach up and swing this new version over. The ladder extends automatically. The hand rails from the old ladder work well with the replacement.

This task was completed with a joint effort between the toolroom and kitchen. To install the lock nuts under the transom we had to make an extended socket. On the boat you have limited options. This wooden spoon did the job but reaching in through a small access hatch to the underside of the transom was quite a challenge.