My Latest Project

[Mi Chica]

Finally approaching the finish (?) line on the rebuild that has interfered with my fishing the last MANY months. Of course it got started with the usual...hmm, with a little work this could make a decent boat for my fishing. Hmm, nice lines. And so the pain begins, lol. To be fair, at a casual glance she didn't look too bad, other than a seized engine and seized corroded leg. it was only when I got into the clean-up that I began discovering the scope of the job.
She is an old hand laid 22 foot Sangster (Dolphin) 302 powered with a Merc 1 drive
If anyone is interested I have kept a running total of expenditures plus jobs identified and completed.
I have attached a few pics that show some of the monsters.

 

[JAC]

Wow that wiring looks crazy!!

 

[Degree of Freedom]

can't wait to see the after shots...

 

[Rum Buddies]

yup been there "how bad could it be" was the phrase - 3 years in I'm about to finish my project. It seems its always way worse then you think, I guess fishermen are optimists by nature.

 

[Captain PartyMarty]

I love the rear view mirors, I wonder if they help with parallel parking

 

[Mi Chica]

Wiring? I have pulled over a 150 feet of scrap wire out, this does not include sections where there were 4 or 5 pieces clabbed together within a few feet, or the horn wire that included 8 feet of very light speaker wire.
The mirrors. Quirky for sure, but I refer to them as go faster mirrors and they will be great for parallel parking. LoL
Lots of goofy things including the VHF antenna and radio mounted portside at the table - that must have been really useful- NOT!
Speaking of wiring...it took days to chip out the foam forward that covered the wiring and acted as a perfect moisture trap - this appears to have been done by the mfg. really dumb.
The single worst thing about the whole job was discovering some soft decking (out of the way spot) about three weeks into the project. You guessed it - on further exposure, two bad stringers! At that point I probably should have made it into a lawn ornament but being stubborn I started tearing/exposing/rebuilding and much material later I put the deck back together. One of the interesting discoveries was the original below deck fuel tank that had been shut oft for years (?) had just over 70 litres of water in it. Being poor and cheap, I have been recyclying the tank into stern hatches and covers. When complete I will include pics.

 

[Mi Chica]

After gutting out the shaggy carpet from hull and overhead, removing the foam and cleaning up the wiring forward, reglassed where needed, gelcoated, built a hatched electrical cover, closed in below the helm, installed a couple of lights, and cleaned up/ rebuilt the anchor line storage locker. Decided to leave the table and table seats to make it more comfy for wife should she decide to come out more often. For me, I would have eliminated this and created more room and better seat for fishers. If she doesn't come out regularly, I will make this change later on. Those bench seats were broken up and useless for storage as built so I now have nice storage areas below those seats. Another minor change was to remove all the foam naugahyde bolsters from the boat as they do nothing but trap water and blood, dirt etc. Also installed two burner electric over alcohol stove in hole where a stove had been originally mounted.