What boat projects are you working on?

[THATBOATGUY]

Couple of things Geoff,

Take a look at San Louis Obispo Harbor. It's beautiful and one of the best kept secrets on that coast.

This might be a good time to pull the transmission and have a good look at the drive plate. If there has been any wobble going on you could have a time bomb on your hands. Those Kanzaki transmissions are light enough to lift out of the boat with one hand. It comes down to if you can get to the bolts that attach it to the bell housing and have enough room to move it aft and up and out. Also that nut is probably staked. By this I mean that its got a little flange that's been knocked into notch on the shaft. The illustration in the shop manual is probably showing that being, un-staked prior to removal with a socket. It might also be left hand thread. I've made steal bars that have bolt holes for front engine pulleys to keep the engine from turning. This works better than wooden models and in your case would keep the area free back where you are working.

One last thing to think about. Our boats are plastic and they do tend to flex a little over time when on the hard. There is absolutely no way to do a proper alignment in the yard. The boat has to be in the water for several days (more depending on the boat) ideally with half tanks and average load of stores aboard before a proper alignment can be made.

S/V Marquesa is coming along well. I've got all the head liner out of the aft cabin, all of the taffrail off of the poop deck (with minimal damage). Yesterday I reamed all the old screw holes and filled with thickened West System then glassed down a 4 inch tape over the entire bedding area, overlapping the hull/deck joint. If this sounds like overkill then you don't know how a little drippy leak can effect Kerri's attitude! I do NOT want to have to go through this again ever.

One new product I've used on this job I can recommend absolutely. West System Six10
A two-part, gap-filling epoxy adhesive in a self-metering cartridge. You load it into a standard frame caulk gun and pull the trigger. Out comes pre-mixed thickened epoxy right where you want it. I filled about 50 screw holes in about 3 minutes and only used half a tube. I think the pre-mixing nozzle is a one time deal although with the plug back in the end of the tube, you could use a new nozzle (not sure if they are available yet) or just pump some out onto a mixing board as needed the old fashioned way. If I had had compressed air handy I might have been able to clean up that nozzle. It's funny because earlier this year I was at the dentist and they had a similar setup for pumping epoxy to make molds for my crowns. I was thinking... hmmm how handy to have on the boat would that be?

George

[GeoffSchultz]

I picked Sue up from the airport on Friday and after giving her a few hours at home we headed back down to the boat on Saturday. I really wanted to figure out how to get that flange off of the transmission so that I could clean it up on the lathe. I was really prompted to do this after discovering that the new flange was going to run me $311 at Torreson Marine! Since the yard ordered the new flange, I can only imagine what the markup was going to be...

After checking with several people, I didn't believe that that locking nut was staked (thanks for potential heads up, George) and decided to go with a breaker bar and if worse came to worse, to use a compressed air impact wrench. Due to the Kentucky Derby, I didn't get to that on Saturday. We went out to dinner with some friends that night. He's a sailor and dentist and he offered some sage advice from the dental perspective: If it ain't broke, don't fix it. He said that if this was a tooth, that he'd do everything in his power to fix it in place. That made a lot of sense and the next morning I took 150 grit sandpaper and spent about 15 minutes sanding the flange. When I was done, the shaft flange smoothly slid into the transmission flange and you can easily rotate it in place. Yeah!

I also spent a couple of hours on Sunday replacing the broiler thermocouple on the Force 10 stove. I had to completely pull out the stove, disconnect the gas, remove the back of the stove and then manhandle the stove top plate to get to the thermocouple nut on the valve. Via a simple change, they could have made it such that all that you had to do was remove 4 screws to accomplish that. But did they? NOOOOOOO! The good news is that Sue is happy with a working broiler again. The bad news is that I managed to scrape some woodwork when replacing the stove. Arghhh!

-- Geoff

[Alain]

Alain, that's what I ought to be doing as well. But I'm saving it for next winter hoping I can get through the season with my ever overheating engine.

Michel, Geoff,
The engine (4.108) runs perfectly, but (engine) oil is dripping from the fly wheel housing into the bilge. I'm replacing the rear seal of the Perkins, a simple task when the engine is out (couple of hours) , something almost unfeasible (and certainly unpleasant) when the engine is in place.

Rear_seal.jpg (163.42 KiB) Viewed 5228 times

Rear_seal_2.jpg (149.01 KiB) Viewed 5228 times

While at it, cleaned the heat exchanger, changed pan gasket, valve cover gasket, intake manifold, etc, etc. And repainted it while it's out. All under the supervision of a seasoned diesel mechanic, who guaranteed many more years of use (at +/- 100hrs/year...). Engine was tested on the dry, at max rev, idle, to detect any flaw, but none, it runs like a new.
Not that I was expecting any problem except for the gaskets. Gaskets and seals will dry if the engine does not run for 6 months during the winter, that's a fact of life…
Next step, cleaning the bilge thoroughly, putting the engine back in place next weekend.

[Michel]

Alain,

I would gladly go through the same exercise as you did, for the same reasons (oil leaks) but I fear the operation of getting the engine out. On the F44, you can't just lift the engine up, it first has to go two' to port and than forward, then up and aft out of the hatch. It would require a lifting installation in the engine room with a slider and lots of other difficult stuff.

[GeoffSchultz]

As part of my continuing prop shaft saga, I reinstalled it yesterday after carefully sanding the transmission flange until the two flanges mated like new. I still see up/down motion on the shaft, but at this point I'm thinking that it's due to the boat being on the hard and the hull is torqued. I did manage to get it assembled before realizing that I had forgotten to put the PSS coupler on! It was also interesting to note that it only took me about an hour to complete the task. Explain to me again how it took the yard 9 hours between 2 guys to do this!

Today it's valve adjustments on the generator and Yanmar.

-- Geoff

[GeoffSchultz]

Yesterday was a good day. BlueJacket got launched!



And here's a photo album of the launch: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2 ... 870f3db89d

The engine fired up with no issues (which is always good when you've been working on it), as did the refrigeration, so I'm happy.

The day before wasn't so great. I got an e-mail from Life Raft & Survival Equipment that my life raft was condemned. It seems that the canopy is detaching from the tubes. I was told that the typical life span for this class of life raft is 10-15 years, and this one was 11 years and had spent many years in the Caribbean, so I'm not surprised that it will be on the shorter side. Well, that will be 3 boat units to replace instead of 1 to repack...

I also got the generator chipped, brushed, sanded, primed and first coat of paint on it. Considering the cramped space that I'm working in, it certainly won't win any awards for technique, but I hope that it will be protected better.

-- Geoff

[GeoffSchultz]

I spent the morning playing with Coastal Explorer 2010 (http://rosepointnav.com/CoastalExplorer/default.htm), which integrates http://www.ActiveCaptain.com into a very nice marine navigation package. If you haven't used ActiveCaptain, which is free, you should try it. It's a greatl web site that I've used for years. The fact that these two are now integrated makes it simply wonderful!

I then spent part of the afternoon getting the 5 HP Honda motor on my dive compressor running. I seem to have left gas in the carb when I last ran it (which doesn't make sense), but I had to disassemble and clean the carb to get it running. Happily it started after a lot of work.

The car is now loaded up with my sails and supplies for the boat and I'll be headed there tomorrow.

-- Geoff

[GeoffSchultz]

Yesterday I got the sails on the boat by myself. Normally this is a 2-3 person job, but I was by myself and I noted that the winds had switched from the N to the W (which is how I point at dock) and dropped to almost nothing. So, I decided to install the main. Trying to handle the 660 sq ft of sail (about 90 lbs) was like wrestling an octopus. And of course about 1/2 way through the process the sea breeze kicked in and I had 10+ on the beam! That was fun...but I managed to get it on. It's not flaked well and the battens aren't in, but that will be easy. I also managed to get the jib on and over the camber spar hooks without using any mechanical advantage. That's never happened before!

I completed painting the generator and an Edson mounting bracket by the wheel that was looking a bit shabby. And as mentioned elsewhere, I found an "issue" with the cylinder head studs on the generator. I'll be talking to the generator company today and ordering parts.

Today I'll be working on the electronics, checking out a new life raft and start replacing all of the hoses on the main engine.

-- Geoff

[GeoffSchultz]

I guess that I've been way too busy working on the boat to reply to this. For the last 2 days Sue & I have been doing a Finesse-It compound job on the boat followed by paste wax. I finished the heavy job of applying the Finesse-It with the Makita buffer and Sue has been following me with the paste wax and a small hand-held buffer from Harbor Freight. I did the same job last year, but this year it looks much better. I don't know if it's the fact this is the second pass with the Finesse-It or what, but the gel coat is just gleaming and my back is aching.

I've also been continuing my battle with my prop shaft. I had it re-aligned, but when I took it out for a test run, there was a lot of vibration...more than before. After that I separated coupling again and looked that the coupler on the transmission. I realized that the face of it wasn't flat. I turned the motor and engaged the transmission. I could see the face of the transmission coupler move in & out very slightly, whereas the backside (the side facing the transmission) ran flat. All that I can figure out that the front side must have rusted and when I cleaned it up, I removed about .0015" of material. At this point I can't remove the coupler with the shaft in the boat. The only option that was suggested was to pull the transmission, but also can't be done with the shaft in without pulling the motor forward. The solution that I'm going to try is to install a DriveSaver (http://www.globecomposite.com/pages/products_drivesaver), which is a 1" thick piece of flexible plastic which absorbs vibrations (caused by misalignment) and will also shear if you hit something, saving your transmission. It was supposed to have arrived on Friday, but UPS missed a delivery, so it won't show up until tomorrow.

I'm also finishing up varnishing the companionway. That's a real challenge with 2 people aboard...

I also ordered a new life raft. It'll arrived on Thursday. I'm not thrilled that I have to pull the old cradle out, fill the holes and then mount the new one.

Our plans are to leave a week from Tuesday. We'll see, but we're working hard to make that date!

-- Geoff

[Michel]

Now that you show it, I have a Drivesaver behind my Perkins 4108M and Hurth HBW125. A couple of years ago I found several bolts sheared. The Drivesaver itself was still fine though.