For the first time in a long time I went out to the big building and I can testify that it is almost spring-like today and it will be even warmer tomorrow. By Friday we should be able to start applying polish to the boats we already have compounded. I also have daffodils coming up in my yard much to my wife’s chagrin – they’ll be spent by spring.
The reason I went out to the shed was to check on a boat that was being surveyed for a potential boat listing. The surveyor reported water in the bilges and a pretty bad smell. He wasn’t wrong! I felt sorry for Izzy who was stuck down there pumping stagnant water that seemed to be some sort of science experiment gone awry. Unlike wine, bilge water is not improved by age.
The engine didn’t look much better. I was going to play “spot the problem” with this photo but decided there were just too many for that sort of game.
It didn’t get any better forward of the engine. This is obviously someone who should have been reading the blog the day I had the Deal 111 for the bilge painting!
The mast for the 46 was being put together yesterday. Looks like new!
If you are doing your mast, be sure to take care of the details like using never-seize on stainless steel screws into the aluminum and using rubber grommets on the holes where wires go through to keep the water out.
New Products
Another non-testimonal product today. This looks like a pretty good idea and maybe would help owners deal with their impellers if they had a problem or just to do standard inspections. Once again, if the manufacturer wants to send us one, we’ll install it on someone’s boat and then give a review.
SpeedSeal Life – claim:
- Extended impeller life for both generators and main engine pumps, with tests showing routine improvements of two to three times normal life.
- Prolonged and repeated run-dry tests gave results of 40 x 5 minutes dry starts (tests stopped) without damage whilst maintaining performance.
- Drive shaft bearings and seals last longer and pump life and performance is increased
- Quick impeller changes
- Increases run dry time
For more information visit the Speedseal website. If you try this product (or have already tried it) feel free to share your review – I’ll post here for others to read.
Owner Project
I love owner projects – send me yours and I’ll post here (if I truly do love it!). This owner has buffed out his mast light cover, got a new lens and has added an LED light. He should never have to change that light again as long as he owns the boat. This will be set on top of the freshly painted mast (above). He got his bulbs at Defender marine but you may find them cheaper by using my old friend Google but you can expect to pay up to $45 for a LED for this particular lamp.
The temperature is rising and the sun is shining – I can’t believe Florida could provide any pleasanter climate than this? Still not much to report in the service department as we are taking advantage of the last bit of shop repairs before the onslaught of new jobs begin. Tomorrow we are finishing up a big electronics job on a GB46 – the one with the freshly painted mast. In fact, the owner will be onboard to be the assistant. That’s cheap help! We also have some gel coat crazing to repair on the Legacy which is a lot of Dremel work.
The battery boxes are all complete and should be able to withstand years of service being made out of the best marine plywood we could buy and totally encapsulated in epoxy with a durable marine paint coating.
We rolled out about 4 1/2 gallons of paint in the shop. We could have used 10 gallons to be honest but that’s what we had in stock. Boy does it make a difference. It is much brighter and when we put in some new electronic-start florescent lamp fixtures in it should be a more pleasant and safer environment to work in.
The other project that had to be tackled was to fix some of the soft spots in the floor. I have noticed that some of these have been getting worse – especially in the high traffic areas. The floor was constructed 30 years ago and is just regular construction lumber laying on the dirt with 2 layers of plywood nailed down. As you could imagine, a lot of that lumber is getting a bit rotten. I could just envision a couple of guys carrying something heavy (and expensive) across this area and having a foot go through the floor. Can you say “workman’s comp?”
We could have done the 10 hour fix or the 1 hour fix. We elected for the latter (there you go, democracy in action again). We just laid in some new pieces next to the rotten ones and screwed everything together again. The surrounding area already feels stronger. Notice we are filling the void with a short piece of 2×4 in order to get a stronger repair. The new member is as long as we could use before running into things we couldn’t see.
New Products
Since I didn’t have anything interesting to show you today I offer up a new product. No testimonial intended since we have not used one of these. On the other hand if the manufacturer wants to send us one to review we would be more than happy to oblige!
AquaLens
AquaLens is an easy to use, portable, underwater viewing system with live video feed and LED lights. Simply use your boat hook or other guide pole to position AquaLens from the comfort of topside. Then watch live video of the underwater world below you on the AquaLens LCD screen. Very useful for checking props or looking for barnacles or maybe that item you dropped overboard.
Visit the web site to get your own.
Evidently it is a holiday (for state and federal workers and banks). We could have had today off but everyone voted for Friday instead (see how democracy works?)
Actually it would be better to take a day off later in the week when it is expected to be in the 60′s. Of course, John is still “sweating” down in Florida where it is most likely in the 80′s (I really don’t want to know!) Kevin is also now down in Florida on vacation – probably doing a bit of golfing. Up here in the real world we actually had a bit of the white stuff last night although I do hear it melting off the roof as we speak.
We have some real work to get back to but Pat is finishing up the custom battery boxes and Rumsey is still prepping the damaged mast for repairs and painting. We have just this last day to do a bit more in the way of shop improvements so Carlos and Izzy are prepping and painting the walls. These have needed paint since I started here.
Follow Up
I mentioned on Friday why I like Google. Some other sites I like are dummies.com where you can learn trivia like “how a diesel engine works“. I used to like Ask Jeeves but since they changed to ask.com I seldom go there. I went this morning and liked the fact that they have recently asked questions on the home page. The site I try to steer clear of is about.com which is about useless. Unfortunately they have pretty thorough Google penetration so I constantly find myself using the back button to find a site with real content. Also the howstuffworks site is good for killing a few hours.
My 2 cents
Bet you thought I wouldn’t be here. I am alone this morning as everyone else took advantage of the offered day off – who wouldn’t want a 3 day weekend – especially in mid-winter and on a sunny day. I’ll probably pack it in around noonish but thought I should be here at least a half day just in case. Kevin did come in for a while just to check in on the mast / parts paint job, which turned out great.
The tent is a narrow L-shaped arrangement which allowed us to paint the boom and the mast in separate sections. I think they enjoyed constructing the booth – maybe too much!
The shoot took much less time than the preparation. We did do 3 full coats just to ensure full coverage since lighting was less than optimal by late afternoon. It was toasty warm in there however – a good place for me to nap.
The outside of the battery boxes got epoxied and the lids were constructed. We used some white pigment in the epoxy to limit the amount of coats of paint we would need. The pigment is more visible to the naked eye than in the photo.
Anything Can Happen Friday
Why I love Google – I used to spend a lot of time in the library – just because stuff interests me – all sorts of stuff, mostly irrelevant stuff. Now from the comfort of my own home I can ask questions like “does Ritalin work on adults“. Someone from a UK website compiled a list of the most frequently asked search engine queries.
What was up with the Greenpeace Photos? – John told me he had a reason for wanting the photos on the site but for some reason didn’t tell me at the time what it was (N2K). Evidently the ship was in Baltimore and then the rest became too convoluted for me to follow. You can read something about this on the Greenpeace website. Personally I stay away from posting things that can be construed as politically radical nor do I publicly support any activist groups.
Yacht & Brokerage Show – Miami – Watch the TV ad. If you are down there, stop by and visit with John at slip 611. Tell him I said hi!
We may or may not be off tomorrow. John alluded to but would neither confirm or abort. I guess it may be up to me to decide (and I know you know how that would turn out!) John is down at the Miami Yacht and Brokerage Show this week. I tried to find a direct web link to the show but evidently they don’t have a web site or it is so far down in Google that my interest in finding it fades out to nothing. We are displaying this GB46 and maybe others – I am on a need-to-know basis.
Since we are in the mast mode, we have this mast that was damaged and replaced by a hard top a few years ago that we are going to revive. That’s a pretty gnarly hole where the spreader base was. We’ll have to see what the welder says.
I mentioned the survey haul out we did yesterday. Here was the main problem the surveyor found after hauling. There was also some minor tabbing problems associated with this. As you can see, this is not the first time this has been repaired.
The battery boxes are being finished today – maybe even painted, but that may not happen depending on how quick the epoxy cures. The insides were epoxied last night but the outsides needed some screw holes filled and a bit of finish sanding so they would be of the caliber expected in a nice yacht.
We are going back to the tent-within-the-tent to get enough heat generated with portable electric heaters to get the other parts done. The kerosene heaters work fine for primer but the fumes cause fish-eyes in finish coating. Even though it will be in the 50′s for several days, the cooler temps at night keep the concrete from heating up which keeps the booth at less than finish spraying temperatures. Kevin is going down to Florida on vacation next week so we have to resort to this in order to get things done.
Addendum
John wants you all to download the boat show app.
It is a celebration day for the blog. This was my count this morning – counting from the first of last year when I converted to the new format – Total reads: 100002. I guess someone is reading it! I try to entertain as well as educate although I have been accused at times of going a bit far – you know when it is just in jest.
We did haul a boat for survey yesterday – a J29. It seems odd to be hauling boats in the dead of winter.
The survey did come up with a few issues with the tabbing on the boat and some keel damage. The sale is up in the air because of that – but it is not our sale.
We are putting floor scrubber batteries in one boat and we have not found proper boxes to contain them. We will be building boxes out of AA marine plywood and epoxy. These should last for the long haul.
The trim tab job started yesterday. The first stage was to pull the cylinders out.
The caps on the cylinder is where the magic happens. They have sensors to send their position to the new gauges.
Happy Valentine’s Day. Buy your sweetheart a boat today.
The temperature is rising – should be almost in the 50′s right through the weekend. Yesterday was less than a productive day due to the cold but we did get more cleaning done in the work shop. It is almost looking professional now. Maybe a bit of paint?
One project that was being worked on is an extension to a radar bracket on another mast we are preparing. Evidently the new dome is larger and we need to get the plate further out from the mast.
Kevin brought the small parts that were primed into the office to keep them warm. Not sure why since the larger parts are still out in the shop. With a bit of heat in the tent they will all be fine but you must admit that is a nice spray job on these.
We will be installing a Bennett Electronic Indicator Control in a Chaparral 33 this week. More on that later.
We did the stuffing box job wrapped up the other day and the shaft seal is installed and everything put back together. Below is the old one. Bear in mind if you have these they do require periodic maintenance and parts replacement. If enough parts need replacing (as was the case with the stainless rings) it may be cheaper to replace the hole unit.
Happy Birthday John!
One word – COLD! The heat was off all weekend and I still haven’t gotten the office up to a workable environment. It may be an early day today. The wind blew like hell all day yesterday and we did get the snow on Saturday so it seems like winter to me. The polishing work has been put on hold until the temperatures come back up again. It is also too cold to continue with the mast painting today but by tomorrow the temperature should be more spray friendly.
We got some props off Friday which need some repair work – as you can see.
We were replacing some batteries in a boat and found these fiberglass battery boxes. FYI, they won’t pass any kind of survey if they can’t contain acid spills. This must be replaced as we can’t reuse it under any circumstance. Since it is fiberglass it could be repaired but that would cost more than buying a new box.
Work continued on the engine lifting on the tank replacement job. The winch was having some problems but that got solved and they had the engine up in the air. Now if we only had tanks.
Off Topic
John sent me a video that someone had sent to him. This is some pretty serious wave action.
Plenty of photos today – it actually looks like real work going on! I don’t need to bore you with the weather since I have the little widget on the site. But the chance of snow has changed to rain. Oh well, I can at least enjoy the weekend.
We had a coupling that we spent a lot of time trying to get out but it was stuck tight. As you can see in the photo we even resorted to heat. Pat assured us that he could get it off and voila – 2 hours and it was off.
In the fall when we started this we were trying to use the hydraulic press. Pat was out sick so we didn’t try the brute strength technique. This was the right way to do the job.
When she gave, you could hear it in the office! Of course we had to repaint it.
On the painting front we finally got space cleared up to do some spraying.
This will be a 3 part shoot. The first is the anti-corrosive that we use under the primer. This is necessary anywhere we are down to bare metal.
Suggested Photos
Anything Can Happen Friday
Wanted to start off by showing a photo of Teddy who is working on a boat here in the shop. That’s more fiberglass sanding than I want to be around but I love the halo effect!
Around the web:
I based my defunct deal of the day on Woot.com. I notice they now have a companion site (well several actually) called wine.woot which you will probably want to visit if you are a fan of the fermented fruit.
In honor of finding that, I decided to do a Deal 111 today. Engine paint touch up is in order since Pat commented on how nice of a job Carlos did on the Sabreliner a couple of weeks ago. Today only – will do the job for $60 per hour which is a 20% savings over our normal price. One taker only!! See you need to read the whole blog to pick the low lying fruit.
We only got the rain yesterday but snow is still in the forecast for Saturday. I wouldn’t mind one snow day but would prefer it was on a week day so I could get a snow day from work! John has been scarce lately. If you have called for him I have given him your message. With boat sales picking up he is devoting a lot of time to that right now.
One customer wanted a radar reflector installed on his mast but he evidently did not supply the brackets with the reflector. This was easy enough to fabricate. We used stainless and polished it to avoid painting.
And this is how they work:
We also made a command decision to extend the small paint booth that is the corner of our large booth so we can finally get the davit parts and the mast painted. What a disappointment to find that there was not enough room with the Legacy in there to extend it far enough. We gotta do something with that boat!
I have been experimenting with some new WordPress plug ins and now you can actually see the weather widget now instead of hearing me complain. I also added the boating RSS feeds from New York Times website since a lot of those may be of interest.
Off Topic
Since I have gotten my Kindle I have not spent a dime on a book yet. There are a lot of free Kindle books at Amazon and if you are a Amazon Prime member you can borrow books from the library. Right now I’m reading The Hunger Games which is excellent. It is actually written for teens but was recommended by AARP as a good read (I’m giving my age away here!)