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!