Dreams of rudder cheeks and boomkins danced through my head

I guess by the title you can tell I dream of boat projects even at Christmas time! I picked up the new mahogany rudder checks and boomkin from H &L Marine on 12-21-12.

 Took them to the boat and checked the fit. All seemed well so I brought them home to put many coats of protection on them. (H&L always does a great job! Plus they are nice to deal with.)

The very top of the rudder cheeks get s a small block across the top. The one I took off was just a rectangular piece of wood with square edges. It really didn't look right sitting on top of the curvy cheeks! I thought that the new piece should have a bit more flare to it and match the cheeks. So I clamped the rudder checks to the stainless steel rudder housing and screwed the top piece on from the bottom. (The original was glued on.) I grabbed my rasp file and plane and went to work. The reason I needed the plane is that the new piece was about an 1/8" longer on one side. I could have cut it with the table saw but wanted to try the plane. I haven't really used a plane before but really want to learn how to use one as I think it will be a good tool to have when we take off cruising.
Any way below are a few pictures I took as I filed and shaped the top piece by hand. Let me know what you think. Like it or no?

All in all I think it came out nice and it looks so much better than just a rectangular piece of wood sitting up there.
Now I get to coat them all with 2 coats of penetrating epoxy, two coats of cetol light and 3 coats of cetol clear....stay tuned!

P.S.
I will be taking the unfinished boomkin to the boat for a complete test fit. I will figure out where the stern pulpit will be mounted, the not-yet-bought main sheet hoop and the monitor wind vane.

Laying out in the engine room

I finished the engine layout on the mock up liner I made at the house. Then on 12-19-12 I went to the boat to lay it out on the real engine liner.

I used blue painters tape to cover the pan where I would then mark out the areas that need to be cut away.

You can barely see it but I marked out where I need to make the cuts.

 

 I didn't have much time at the boat so that is about all I got done on this visit. I try to do at least a little on the boat every day even if it is just trying to figure things out. Gotta keep moving forward!

Chain Hawser or the chain pipe continues

If you look back you can see where I installed a 3" ABS pipe to guide the 250' to 300' chain down to the front of the V-berth.

Look how the top two pictures lined up...like I planned it...but I didn't.

 

I can now throw away that piece of wood I spent a couple hours on.

(This picture looks like it was taken in the 70's. Whooo...dude)

 (As a side note I have not purchased this chain as of yet.) This will get the weight of the chain out of the bow and farther back and lower which will help with the way Nellie Jo sails. I still had to make a "floor" for the original chain locker as that is where the  rope for the "day" anchor will go. This will be some chain and a butt load of rope. (I think "butt load" is a nautical term meaning a lot of rope. Correct me if I am wrong, I found it on Wikileaks and they only put true stuff in there.) Where was I... Oh, so I am measuring up for a floor in the "rope" locker and cutting it out of cardboard. It takes a while but I get it done. I test fit this piece of cardboard at least a dozen times. I finally cut it out of plywood and oh shoot what is that....more space?  Ah crap!  What.. why didn't I see that before? What I saw was the space from the "rope" locker bulkhead to the bottom of the new rope locker floor.  Hmmm...I could use that space! So I scrap all my nicely cut cardboard and plywood and start again.

Nice try now do it again!

 This time I make a piece that will go from the bottom of the rope locker bulkhead to the hull. As you can see from the picture I drilled holes in it to allow water to flow and air. I want lots of airflow so the chain and rope can dry out and not allow mold to grow. Another benefit of this piece is it will act as a support for the chain pipe that is running down below the rope locker bulkhead

Whats left to finish this project? Test the new piece of wood for fit. Drill some holes in it. Coat it with epoxy, Then install it.  Remove the temped in place pipe, bond the plywood that the toilet flange mounts to the hull.(Yes it is a toilet flange) screw and bond the toilet flange to the wood. Glue up all the pipe, get some fresh air. Mount the chain hawser hole thingy on deck. Cut a new opening on the port side of the bowsprit for the rope to go down into the chain locker. Put the rope in the chain locker BUT remenber to tie the end off to the samson post. (The last one is very important...I can see me letting the anchor go and the rope speeds out of the chain locker and the end speeds out also over the side into the depths! "Oh Honey I don't want to anchor, lets find a marina.") Install the anchor in the bow roller and see if I need chocks for it. (I bet I do.) etc, etc, etc....you get the idea. I have to go, I'm tired just thinking about all this.

PS. I went to the boat last night (12-19-12) and test fit the "new" wood pieces for the chain and rope lockers. They fit fine so I will epoxy them at home. I'll post pictures when I am done.

Engine stuff and paint

If you follow the blog you know I bought a used Yanmar 3JH3E 40 hp engine that had about 243 hours on it. I was able to get it for a good price due to the heat exchanger rusting out.  The overall shape of the engine is great shape. I had to save up to order the parts I needed and received them about a month ago.

 I did install the heat exchanger to use as a lifting point for doing the engine pan mock up. I recently installed all the miscellaneous pieces on the engine to see what was missing. I still need a few bolts and a hose or two.
Yesterday when I finished the mocked up pan I took off a few pieces of the engine to de-rust them and give them a new coat of paint. You can tell where the petcocks for draining water is on the engine by where the rust is. It really is not bad, but I wanted to nip it in the bud before it becomes an issue in a few years.

Here is a picture of the few pieces I took off and painted. I sanded the rust off and used Jasco to prep the metal then painted it with industrial Rustoleum in a bright silver then will spray them again with a grayer color that better matches the Yanmar color. The Yanmar dealer wanted $16 a can.....no thanks.

By the way the coupling (upper right corner) is off the propeller shaft not the engine. The engine has a torque limiter. Does anyone know if I can remove the torque limiter and put a regular coupling on instead?

Engine Pan Mock up Completed!

I have finished the engine pan mock up. I hope it will stop me from having to do many test fit lifts with the engine. I still have to figure out the correct height and angle . But I did get it somewhat close as I had measured the shaft/couping location.

Here is the "finished" mock up. Some of the cuts are too long. I took measurements while the motor was sitting on the mock up to be able to keep the cutting to a minimum. The picture of the yellow paper has the final dimensions.

I will have to cut the aft outboard sides of the pan a little to get the engine mounts to fit. But that is no big deal and it usually has to be done anyway.
I'm so excited to be close to dropping in the motor. I was planning on running the engine at home before I dropped it in the boat. But I don't think I will do that...we'll see. If all goes well I will start laying out the cuts tomorrow on the boat and maybe get some of them cut.

Whats up with the engine? Will I ever get it installed?

Just an update on how the engine replacement is going on. If you recall I bought a used Yanmar 3JH3E 40 hp engine. It had low hours on it but needed a new heat exchanger.

Well now I have the heat exchanger and am only missing a hose and a couple of bolts.
 

We removed the old engine. It went really well as I was expecting it to be difficult. But it was far from that. (My wife says I worry to much.)

Deena de-greased, sanded, prepped and painted the engine room. (Yeah, that's my wife, loves to work on the boat! Lucky Me!!)

I took a bunch of measurements and made a mock up of the engine room liner out of plywood. I know normally people make mock ups of the engine. My engine was at home, so the mock up is of the liner! I have the "small" engine liner used for the Volvo MD-11 engine.

Above is a full size drawing I made in CAD taped to the plywood.

Here I have cut out the liner opening.

Here is the sides of the liner in CAD taped to the plywood.

Here is the liner "top" and sides.

Now with the bottom. Ready to start hacking on it.

 

Right now I am tweaking the mocked up liner to see where I have to make cuts as the engine is just a tad too wide at the transmission and the oil dipstick tube. I am trying to make it so I can go make all the cuts on the boat, glass the cuts in, then cut lower the engine with a minimum of fuss. I will use 1/2"aluminium plate as the base mounting plate and as any spacers I will need. Bud Taplin sent me a CD on mounting a Beta engine. Bud sells Beta engines at a really great price made for the Westsails, but it was a bit out of my budget. Bud has helped me a bit  figuring out my install, needless to say he has been a blessing.

 

Here is a picture of my lift at home that I use to raise and lower, raise and lower, raise and lower.... the motor as I test fit the liner.

A little giant ladder, a tow sling and a come-a-long = engine lift.

 

Here is a picture of the engine on the "liner" I'm getting close to having it fit. I am just having a hard time figuring out the correct angle of the engine so it lines up with the propeller shaft. I know I can figure that out in the boat and it is just a matter of getting the right spacers in. I really hope to set the motor in before the new year....we'll see.

Mast Support-Fix it before it becomes a problem

A bit of fact is that the Westsail 32 sailboats came with deck stepped masts. The mast sits on a 2" layer of plywood between layers of fiberglass. Below that is the hardwood mast support in the cabin. This goes from the underside of the deck to the cabin sole. Under the cabin sole is a hardwood block that extends down to the top of the ballast which is encased in resin. There is the head  (bathroom) bulkhead (wall) right at the mast support....why is this important? Well the bulkheads when installed are not installed tight to the deck. There is a bit of space there about 1/2". Some builders use foam to keep this space. There is a deck beam right at the bulkhead that has screws into the bulkhead. But they are not strong enough to keep the deck from sagging....they will bend.
So this whole setup is supposed to keep the mast at the height the designer wanted it. But what happens over time when the boat is sailed the deck beam relaxes and the deck drops down a bit. No problem one would think. It will only go so far. True...but this is not a good thing as the rigging gets loose, etc. OK now onto the fix for Nellie Jo....



Misty Blue before I bought her. Wasn't she lovely with the tarp, deck box and pink 3 wheel bike all on deck!

Way back when in June of this year Bud Taplin did the survey on Nellie Jo (Misty Blue back then) when I was thinking of buying her. (See the picture above.) When he went below he first noticed that the deck curve at the mast was still curved. He noted in his survey how to keep this curve.

 A Westsail 32 37 years old should have a dished in deck if she had been sailed much. Guess what Nellie Jo still has her curve which means she was not sailed very much at all. I had another indicator when I looked at the sails and found them to be near new with no, I repeat NO broken stitching on any of them. I am pretty sure they are the factory sails.

So Bud says to keep the deck from dishing refer to page A-19 of his service manual. So I did and found the solution. (Isn't it nice to have an up to date service manual on a 1975 boat!) I ordered the bolts, nuts and washers from Bud and did the install this weekend.  I measured, drilled and installed five bolts through the deck beam into the bulkhead. This allows the weight from the deck to be transferred to the deck beam to the bulkhead. This will  keep Nellie Jo from losing her curve. A girl has to keep her curves...right?

The picture above shows the starboard bolt installed and the blue tape on the port side with the hole locations marked. I did look at the back side to make sure I would not drill into any wires and had access.  The only one I had to be careful with was the one just to the left of the doorway. The mast wiring comes in right there.  I drilled a small pilot hole as deep as the bit would go, about 2 1/2" of the about 5 1/4" I needed. Then drilled the 5/16" hole for the bolts. My 5/16" drill bit was just long enough to push the wood out on the back side but not break through. This worked out fine as I went on the backside (in the head) and drilled out the rest of the holes as I could see when it was almost through. I installed the bolts and put blue locktight on the cap nuts just to be sure they would not come off.

Above is the finished product. They all look fine and should help Nellie Jo keep her curves!

Below are a few shots of the backside cap nuts.

 

 One of the bolts are in the mast wiring box seen above.

 

One more project complete!
Oh, it was too noisy for the wiener dog inside so she sunbathed outside for awhile.

 (Nancy this picture is for you!)

Hawse hole, Hawse pipe or the shiny bronze thingy

I was able to acquire three sets of solid bronze hawse pipes for Nellie Jo. But I need four, mmm. By the way I have to say thanks to a friend who GAVE me the three sets. He, she it wants to remain nameless so nameless it is. So I say to you THANK YOU very much. You know who you are.

I was on the hunt for a fourth set. Everything I read and found said they don't make these any more for the Westsail 32. Now mind you there where two types made. There is a spun bronze (or brass?) version which I have. (Leaky version shown below)

 They are thin and tend to crack over the years as mine are all cracked in several places. Then there are the solid bronze version. (Refer to the shiny picture above.) The solid bronze ones are just that...solid and about 1/8" thick and heavy!  There was a thread on the Westsail Owners Association about hawse pipes that I was participating in. I stated that I needed one more set of them. Well Mr. Westsail himself (Bud Taplin) says he happens to have one set left in his garage. Yippee, the lost set found! I sent him some money and now I have four complete sets! All is well in hawse pipe land!

Or so I thought. Remember I said I have the spun bronze hawse pipes on Nellie Jo? So I take one set off and think it will be a easy job to replace the old with the new solid ones. Oh but naive me shows my face again. I grab the new one and place it over the now hawse pipeless hole in the boat. It sort or rattles around in the opening...what, too small you say? No way these are MADE for THIS boat.

True, but so were the other big ones. Thus there were two sizes of holes they could have drilled. After I calm down and quit bitching about how "every little thing has to be hard" (You know the words if you own a boat...sing along with me...I mean bitch along with me...whatever). Ok I calm down and see that the new one will not cover all the screws holes of the old one...mmmm. This means I can't just seal it up and screw the new one on. Nope I have to do some fiberglass "repair".  I sit, I think, then I run over to my buddy Marty who lives in the Marina on a very nice 42' Hans Christian to ask for help. He asks is the question "Is this just a question or does it require a house call?" "House call please" I respond.  We ramble over and Marty see my dilemma. But Marty being Marty sits quietly and gazes at the opening and the new hawse pipe. He comes up with an idea.
The idea actually solves two problems at the same time. Marty says to make a fiberglass pipe the same ID as the OD of the hawse pipe. Make the fiberglass thick enough that it will match up with the opening on the boat. Then fiberglass this to the openings on both sides. (Fairing it in of course!) This will stop any possible leaks and give me a nice tight hole to slide each half of the hawse pipes into. I like it! (If you can't picture it you will have to wait for the assembly blog.)

Ok now this makes one more project I have to do. Like I said nothing is easy! Good thing I like working on the boat! Now you have to stay tuned to see the second part of this story when I make the fiberglass pipe and then do the install.

Did I mention the hawse pipes are made a bit long...this means I have to carefully grind down the end about a 1/4" or have a machine shop do it.  We'll see what method I use. Everything has to be hard.....sing along with me!

Slow going the last two weeks and the LA harbor boat parade

For the last two weeks I have been sick. This makes it impossible to work on the boat. It sucks that I was sick but it sucks that I could not work on any of the boat projects. Finally yesterday, Saturday I felt human again. Deena and I headed to the boat to watch the Los Angeles boat parade which passes right by our boat. We headed out about 4pm for the parade at 6pm. The parade was celebrating 50 years this year. I think the turnout was a bit light due to the forecasted rain that didn't show up until later that night. I took some pictures of the boats and the LAPD helicopter that was buzzing by. Below are the pictures I took. After the parade about 8pm Deena and I were so tired we decided to sleep on the boat. It was an early night for us.
I have done some small stuff on the boat equipment before I got sick that I'll make another post on. In reality there are a ton of small items that need to be done as well as a bunch of big items.

Enjoy the pics...we enjoyed the parade!