A Good Day

   Ahh, twas a very Good Day.  First, I decided to dismantle the Parsons gearbox as it is unbelievably filthy inside and out.  I had previously attacked the casing with paint stripper and a drill-mounted wire brush, but there was still lots of work to do.  Emptied the oil out, really horrible thick brown syrup with a bit of water on top.  The output flange came off easily and once both end plates were persuaded free the entire shaft and all it's associated machinery came out in one piece, leaving the bands and selector mechanism.  The whole housing can now be thoroughly de-loused.  The bands look fine, and brother Al thinks we can match up replacement front/rear seals and bearings from Saeco, an automotive supplier.  This beats sending it to a marine engineer for a  service, I probably saved hundreds.

   Also received a parcel from the postie.  I can hardly believe it, it's Jado's original bow roller!  I've been leaning on Peter Murton to send me this for months, especially once I saw it on the bow of another boat that he was advertising.  Months of unanswered emails and vague promises, and now it's here!

Finally....!

   Yesterday did some more careful work on the central floor, and bought a 400mm auger bit to drill holes for the keel bolts (bought the copper rod for these already).  Sealed the seven rib patches I made last weekend and primed the areas to be patched.

   Today - FINALLY - hired a mate of my brother's (Dave Greenland) to help me stitch all those patches in, and we did eight in four hours.  Not much to show in pictures, but a good acheivement nonetheless.  Four more to cut out, make patches, seal and fit - they work out to about 1.5hrs each all going well.

Ribs continued.

   Yesterday got a full days work in, made seven rib patches in five hours - am either gettting faster or sloppier!  This leaves four to go, but can't do those until I find some sucker to lean on the end of a dolly as I can't cut into adjacent frames. 
   Starting making up the critical central cross-floor, this will be trickier than the others as it has stopped dado joints for the engine beds and gear linkage mount, plus an angled hole for the prop shaft, and a hole for the keel bolt, also at a slight angle to avoid the shaft.  The ends are notched to take in the ends of the ribs, and there are pieces screwed to it to support a small step in the floorboards.  Will look nice when it's done, however long that takes....

Holiday update

On June 6th my wife Kaori went to Japan for 10 days, so I had some leave from work to look after the kids...and work on the boat.  Didn't get as much done as I'd hoped due to being pretty sick for the first couple of days, and the weather being very bleak, but as of yesterday I had bolted/riveted in the new aft floors, repaired all the existing ones, sanded and primed the forward sections of the interior, made three new floors out of mahogany and sealed all these plus the remaining ribs and other odds and ends.

Three new floors, looking glorious in sealed mahogany, just
 resting in place for the photo opportunity.



   One more major cross-floor to do, although I won't pull that one until the others are all fastened in, then the three laminated ones will come out for good and Jado will be structurally and cosmetically much closer to her 1958 spec. There's also a little floor all the way forward which Peter Murton replaced, it looks like he put it adjacent to the original one and then removed that, I'll redo this one, too, as the keel bolt should pass through it and not beside it.


Under the junk...two new kauri floors.



  Having riveted in the outer ends of some of the floors I fancied that I could do the same feat with the rib patches.  Not really, I spent an hour doing one yesterday, it was no fun at all.  The main difference is that the patches need to be held in place while holes are drilled and the initial nails are driven in, and this proved very frustrating.  Will have to get some help as I keep finding more cracked ribs as I clean them up.  There's at least seven more to make.  When these are finally done it's just the engine beds to design and fit, then she'll be ready to turn over and strip!

Mechanical Update

Tuesday June 1.  Have been secretly working on the little 100E motor at work, mostly stripping, cleaning and reassembling as the engine is apparently a good runner.  Little hiccups - mucked about with oil pumps trying to get the stock ones to fit with a stock sump (the ones on the engine had been altered to fit over a Ford 10 crossmember) to no avail, finally realised that the oil pump had been mounted at 90 degrees to it's original position.  Had this all sorted and even put the required 4 pints of water in the sump to see what baffles might be needed, then decided the modified bits were better for the job.  Cute little Lees exhaust manifold wouldn't fit over the 100E side cover with it's breather valve in the way, so back to my sidevalve benefactor Martin Healey for a Ford 10 side cover and intake manifold.  He also found a MkI Escort carburettor which is a big improvement on the old Solex.

   Parsons box has been cleaned up with paint stripper and does fit (!) behind the motor, will only need a few holes re-drilled, and the input shaft re-made.

   Bought some castors and made a simple mobile stand for engine and gearbox, lengthwise pieces are the same size and distance apart as the planned engine beds, so this will allow me to fabricate the front mount and set everything up as though it was in the boat.

Riveting News

Sunday 30/5.  My old musical compadre and almost the only person I know who is keen on boats (having done a circumnavigation in his yacht "Triton" with wife Jean) Jim Cardow was kind enough to come and help rivet in a few rib patches.  We are probably a third of the way there with these patches, although I do keep finding more cracks as I clean up other ribs....  In a perfect world the boat would be re-ribbed but that is well outside the scope of my abilities/budget/time/energy.