New Boat Project – Update

Here is my new, just finished motor mount, minus the wood & rubber parts.

I designed it for a 35HP motor, with the thought of spreading the stress of the motor over more of the boat. We are running a little 6HP motor this season, so it is a bit of overkill, but we have room to grow.

It is made of steel, and I am not really happy with the look when mounted on the boat. I just talked to a neighbor who has a metal shop and at the end of the summer I will design another with a modern streamlined look, perhaps with a integrated light bar, to be made of polished aluminum.

New Boat Project – Update

New gas tank and a 10ft extra long fuel line is ready. Nice to be able to move a little weight up front to get the bow down now.

New Boat Project – Update

New benches are finished, painted and ready to install. These were made from the top of our old Birch wood dinning table that I have had in the cellar for over 10 years just waiting for the right project.

I also got the last pieces to the motor mount painted, I just need to drill the mounting holes and assemble it all now.

New Boat Project – Update

It's alive!!!

Test run on the balcony goes great.

Easy to start. Nice idle. Good water flow. Smooth shifting.

It will empty the water in the container in seconds. ;-D

My nieghbors think I am a nut, a nice funny nut, but still a nut.

New Boat Project – Update

Did I mention we finally got a motor!

Lost 17 bids in a row in E-Bay all in the last thirty seconds. Well we won the last one, problem was we had to drive two and a half hours one way to get it.

It is a 1981 Evinrude 6HP, made in Belgium.

It is the same as the 7.5HP made in the States for this year but has restricter plates in the carburetor and exhaust to reduce the horse power to a level where you don't need a license in Germany.

I will restore it to it's originally designed “earth thundering” 7.5HP and do a little tuning on it this winter as a cold weather project. For now it is perfect. Should be just enough power to get the little boat up on plane with two people onboard.

The prop is in good shape. It has good water flow and a newer Impeller. Starts the first pull and idles good. I haven't had a chance to test it in a drum yet so I can't tell if the high speed jet in the carburetor is clean, but the fuel system seems OK. I should pull this all apart clean it and replace all the gaskets. I should also replace the gear lubricants in the lower unit, but I will check this and if it has good color I will do this in the fall. I don't have a compression checker so I don't know how the cylinders compare, but this too is on the list, just so I know what kind of shape the head unit is in. Seems to be getting good spark, so hopefully the ignitions system is OK.

The little motor also has a on board charging system for running navigation lights and charging a battery.

It also has a forward, neutral, and reverse, not found in the cheaper brands at this size. Seems to shift well, I hope the transmission is in as good a shape as the motor looks. I really don't want to rebuild it. I do love two stroke motors though, they are so simple to work on.

No electric start, but hey, you can't have everything. Maybe next year I will add remote steering and gas control to move a little weight up front (me), but for this season I will be sitting in the back with the tiller.

Did I mention that boats are a “hole in the water that you throw money in”?

We are building this thing on the cheap, so it is not much money, but if you never had a boat you never think about how many stainless steel screws and bolts even the smallest of them need.

I bet I have used 100 sheets of sand paper for three different kinds of sanders, plus grinders and wire brushes. Two kinds of sealer, three kinds of paint & primer ...

... it just goes on and on.

I guess I should not complain, not counting my time (which is worthless anyway) we have a total of $325 invested in our little boat at this point, and I can see a light at the end of the tunnel.

Now I am, to add to the list of things still needing to be finished on the boat, polishing the lower unit on the motor. It had a little corrosion and as I was striping the paint I decided to polish the aluminum for that racer look.

I also need to order new Evinrude decals for it, but I will do that next year.

The attached photos are after I did a little clean up, but basically as it was when we brought it home.

Have a look!

New Boat Project – Update

Finished the cleanup after sanding today and put everything away and had lunch. I was debating working on the motor or doing a little detail work on the hull. In other words painting the edges and the transom.

I started but couldn't stop and now the boat has it's first coat on the hull.

After finishing the first coat and looking at it a couple of hours latter, it looks like I may be doing a little sanding before the next coat. :-(

I hate sanding!

New Boat Project – Update

Well I spent another seven hours in the garage today.

Hull is prepped and just received the last sand. I found new stuff to fill and sand every time I thought I was finished.

But today I said enough was enough. I am finished with the sanding, at least I hope. We will have to see how the paint lays.

New Boat Project - Update

Inside has been sanded down (four or five coats of some really thick, bad paint) to glass and sealed and painted three times. It is not visually perfect, but the old paint is gone and all things not barefoot friendly have been removed. Maybe next year it will get some carpet to clean up the look a little and add to the comfort factor.

The gunwales & sun-deck/bow (well it is a deck and it will receive sun, so it is in reality a sun-deck, just a very small one) have been primered twice. They need to be sanded again before the final painting, but I have to flip the boat to finish the hull and paint it, so I will paint the deck last. Anyway, on with the show ...










... more to come.

New Boat Project!

This little boat started it's life as a combination sail & row boat. Somewhere along the way it became a motorboat. This is what I am going to use it for after it is finished. This requires fabricating new supports for the hull and the transom, while at the same time keeping it a light as possible.

I didn't shoot any photos from the very beginning of this project, so what you are seeing here is about 40 hours into the job. Yes, 40 Hours!

How can you spend so much time on a boat and have it look like this. Ask the people who spent the last 20+ years screwing stuff onto the boat.

I spent a the better part of a day just washing it of 10+ years of sitting in the open, dirt, and grime off, and out of it.

Then I remove all the crumbly, water logged, flotation foam, and washed it out again.

I also took out various water rotted, wood supports.

I spent at least two days removing old cruddy, broken, rusty stuff, and a small, but very long, crooked mounted, homemade splash shield. Tools needed for this work: a hammer, a metal chisel, and a drill with grinder bit.

Then I started sanding what I think was swimming pool paint off the hull.

It always looks real good at the end of the day after working on it, and then the next morning you find a long list of new things to be addressed.

I am now in the process of, repairing, filling, and sanding all those holes were the rusty stuff was mounted, and a couple of holes in the hull were the previous owners attacked, under- and above-water pointy things. The old bench seating has been removed and new ones cut to fit. A new custom motor mount with extended stress bars has been made of steel and is now painted and waiting in my living room to be added to the boat later. It looks great!

I also reshaped the bow of the boat. It had a off centered, square, blunt nose. It now has a centered, rounded pointed nose. I think the original manufacture must have built this one on a Monday, after a very long “Oktoberfest” party weekend.

Enough for now. Here are some photos.

P.S. I forgot to mention I am doing all this at a 20 degree angle, in a hydraulic piggy back garage, were the head room is about a foot and a half less than I am tall. Needless to say after a afternoon in there, my back is killing me.