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.

Floors continued...

   Got a good days work in today, it felt pretty good having thought about it all week.  Have come to one dead end after another trying to find decent kauri in useful sizes, so have decided to press on with substitutes and use the real thing  - when I can find it - for the bright finished joinery only.  I used some nice kauri for a couple of cross floors, and regret it now as they'll be painted and hidden under the floorboards ultimately.  Bought some mahogany from BBS which will do the trick, actually it still seems a shame to paint over this, but at least it's readily available.
   First job was to give the rest of the aft floors (one new, one existing) two coats of CPES, and three coats for all the aft ribs as they are a bit average in places.  Next I chiseled and planed away a raised lip at the base of the aft bulkhead.  Any lingering doubts that this was an original feature were erased when I found it was fastened with two stainless screws, one bronze screw, and one copper nail.

Glueing kauri plugs into the midships floor, the engine beds
didn't come this far back.

Two new floors rough-sawn.

   Had an epiphany this week mulling over the engine beds.  The plan is to relocate them to their original position, which was slightly closer together than the later ones.  This was apparent looking at the plugged holes in the planks, and the modifications to the floor timbers.  What was not so apparent is why the aft-most floor was notched for the wider engine beds but didn't seem to have been altered at any point.  The answer finally dawned on me - the original engine beds didn't extend back that far, they stopped one floor further forward.  They would have been lengthened when the Cortina motor went in during the 70's to cope with the extra power.  So, today I plugged the notches in the floor in question.  Also removed the prop shaft and cut out two new mahogany floors to replace the ones that Peter had removed.  These will need final fitting and new bronze bolts.

Owners Past

April 9th.  Took advantage of having a conference in Rotorua and arranged to call on Jado's last owner (in a functioning state, at least), John "JD" Donald of Lake Tarawera.  John has a spectacular spot on the northern side of the lake, a property purchased 70 years ago by his grandfather, with a jetty and mooring where Jado was once kept.  He was very generous with his time, leafing through piles of photos and giving me a tour of the dozens more on the walls - along with the mounted stag heads!  He thought he may have the tiller - this will be the second one made for Euan in the 80's - but couldn't find it at the time.  It was good to hear first-hand his stories of "Fishing Machine" (as he called her) and her eventual loss.

  From there I had a quick feed in Rotorua then on to Whakatane to see Bill Carter, an expert wooden boatbuilder and custodian of Jado after the storm damage.  Bill had casually hinted that he might have the original  bollard somewhere, and this he duly produced!  He also dug out some photos taken both on Tarawera and after the damage, all very interesting to see how JD had her set up.  Also interesting to hear from JD how little he may have changed her after buying her from Euan.  Stern seat and copper tanks were a complete surprise to him, although he did convert her from tiller steer to a stainless lever mounted in the centre thwart.  Bill also kindly gave me a copy of an older picture of Jado's predecessor - another very similar Vos-built launch with JD's father on board.  All in all a very worthwhile journey.

The original fairlead has been located.  I had always suspected it was with Peter Murton and now have proof - it's on another boat he is advertising for sale!  I have sent the one he included with the boat back down to him (on the 3rd) and am waiting to hear back.  The only other missing deck hardware - now long gone - will be the pair of stern cleats.