Love Thy Neighbour... or at least give them directives!

This is how she looked the first part of the morning of day three of renovations. I cut part of the left locker/bench away.



This is a close up of the stringer as I found it. I find it kind of odd that it stops well before the bow takes an upturn.



I sliced away at the stringer and ground out a good bit of the old fiberglass lip that was left over where the wood decking and casting deck was.

Here comes the rotting hot wet stinking piece of crap. It came out in three pieces. I figured I would keep it for a template for the new one.



Here is how it looked at the end of the third day of destruction.
Left locker cut out.



The stringer is gone.




Fiberglass lips and wood remnants ground out.



You know... it might not look like much, but I feel like I got a lot accomplished.





I am getting a little bolder with my pneumatic die grinder; at first I was scared shitless that I was going to grind through the hull. Now I just go! Still a whole lot of grinding to do. Next time I will warn the little widow next door to move her Jeep. I was getting the stink eye from her the whole time. (Even though I warned her that I was going to do it today... I just didn't "instruct" her to move her ride!)

Oh ya... the ever growing junk (A.K.A. "Template") pile!




Gonna piss rain for the next 24 hours or so... that will bring me to Sunday the next possible work day. It will have to be in the afternoon as I will undoubtedly be fishing in the AM. One last kick at Meech Lake before the swimmers force us to start paying for parking! I think the beech opens next week.

Let 'Er Rip!!

This was the first exploratory cut.


It was obvious that the rot went right to the transom.


So cut number two came, and I was able to have a look at the stringer;

Starting to look like a renovation!

Better view of the stringer here;

The stringer was certainly rotted.


The first pile of guts and skin;


The progress so far;


And now, for what every Encino CA, teen aged girl wants for their sweet sixteen; Nose Job Time!

Here is the "Before" picture.


During;


Nice Styrofoam. This how it was stacked in the bulkhead. Not much buoyancy. It was a spore incubator. There were trilobytes and snails stuck to the underside of the casting deck. I am starting to wonder if the guy who sold this tub to me was Relic from the Beachcombers and some how raised it from the bottom of Lake Ontario.


The ever growing pile of junk;




I took a bunch of other pictures, but I am using my daughter's camera and I messed up somehow. It made noise like it was taking pictures, but it didn't for some reason.

I tarped it up because I was not sure when I was going to be able to work on it again. I may skip a doctor's appointment to get some work in. But if I don't, we are expecting at least 10mm of rain.



Until tomorrow! (I hope!)

Prince's Craft

Hi,

My name is Craig Prince, and I am renovating a 1989 Canot Grand-Mere 14 foot Fisherman Super Delux boat. I bought this thing for $250 in a snowstorm in November of 2007. (Thank you CaptainZapo!)

Now, here I am in May 2008 starting the big renovation.



I buddy of mine fixed a few holes and dings, sanded and painted the hull using Weather Gard paint. I bought a 1.5 HP 5gal compressor for $40 to do the job. It worked wonderfully. I bought a cheap old trailer and fixed it up too. I should have taken some before pictures, 'cuase it was REAL rough. My buddy swore that I was anally raped when I bought it. (I wasn't!) The tailer is solid. I had my kids sand and scrape the hell out of it, then we painted it. 2 coats of spray enamel later and it looks acceptable.

I bought a 15HP 1977 Eska outboard. Then I bought a Minn Kota Power Drive 40 Bow Mount. The next thing I thought I would be doing is going fishing.

WRONG!

I noticed a small hole near the back bench in the decking. I probed it like a civil war doctor would a festering wound... and let me tell you; this thing WAS festering. All the wood in the decking was punky and rotting.

So I started looking closer at the whole boat... kept finding more and more... I had a decision to make; Patch it up and start fishing, or rip it all out and wait a month (I hope I am not be naive) or so and have a real solid and satisfying tub.

Hijinx ensued! I joined a board on the internet ('cause the internet knows all!) on the iboats.com site. It is AWESOME. People there are not too snotty and are willing to help out idiots like me who want to get nuts with fiberglass. Lots of great resources and advice to be found on that site.

So I decided on keeping the original floor plan;



with a couple of small adjustments;

1) Install the casting deck's bench PROPERLY.
2) Design, create, fabricate and install a bow mount bracket especially for my boat.
3) Extend the left side bench/locker. It will grow from 48 inches long to 84 inches long. This will enable me to stow fully assembled rods with no trouble.

There will be other adjustments made; Totally seal the decking so that NO water can get in, make a bilge bowl that will be sealed properly. Increase the buoyancy of the boat with foam under the decking (There wasn't any) and pack under the casting deck with as much foam as humanly possible (There was very little in there when I got into it), AND fill and seal the back bench with about 2/3rds of the cavity with foam, and *some* waterproof storage space.

Thats the plan anyway!