louisderry
Well-Known Member
I'm quite lucky at the moment my girlfriend still has her place so I'm going back and forth working on the boat and only stopping on it when I need to.
I'm finding it hard but I'm enjoying the challenge even if I am sleep deprived and covered in paint
Problems I've faced so far ! here we go haha! :encouragement: I suppose this will be useful for some.
Leaks in the deck wood - water was coming through the deck wood screw holes in corners where rain built up / puddled, meaning the half berths were damp water was slowly leaking though and one of the lockers was filled with water.
I Removed all of the wooden planks , coated the self tapper holes with Marine grade Sikaflex, the screws also and added circle beams around every hole. This has worked a treat! I've had no problems so far oh and don't forget a re-varnish.
Pluming leaks and water filled lockers! - Most of the plumping on the boat was quite old so all of the piping joints where leaky under pressure meaning water needed to be drained and pipes chopped back to a newer points to which new jubilee clips could be added. This has stopped all of the leaks on both the head (ew) and the sink pipes.
Hole in the deck - There was a giant hole in the boat on the deck where I think wires had once been or a pole of some sort.
I had to use an Epoxy 2 part filler (West System Epoxy) to fill it but of course the once you put it in the hole it'd just fall straight out into the interior of the boat so I had to firstly use a sheet of fiberglass to keep it all in.
Heating - Heating the boat, where to begin with this subject. At first I was using a 500w Dimplex Frost Heater great for keeping the frost away but not great if you want lounge around in your pants. There was a fan heater on the boat but it made a hell of a noise, sparked and just didn't look safe. I ended up buying a Silentnight Benross PTC Heater, 1800 Watt which is great but brings the same problem, noise it was less but still annoying when watching movies. So now I'm installing 180w tube heaters in the berths to keep them nice and toasty and then using a oil heater under the table. If this still isn't warm enough i'll use good quality / safe electric blankets to have it nice and snug.
Sail Gate My jib sail wouldn't come down, I had all manor of people trying to get the thing down but it was stuck like a bastard! eventually it was decided that someone would have to climb up and take a look but on another day. We rapped the sail up back as good as possible so it was almost like it had been properly reeled back in and added a load of ties just in-case. In the middle of the night recently it got damn windy and the sail got pulled out ever so slightly by morning a few feet had come loose and then hey presto just as the 30mph winds were hitting my sail comes out and hell breaks loose. The sail shredded and was making a noise like a machine gun so some people helped me eventually get the entire thing down ripped to shreds. I'm not going to lie it was a scary experience as it was the first time I'd seen the force of sail when it all goes wrong haha! Apparently this can happen at sea so at least i'd know what to do (shudder).
There's plenty of other stuff I've had to fix and learn but in all honesty its hard but I'm still enjoying it. I could Imagine some people would really struggle but as long as you take your time and don't start more than 1 or 2 projects at once you wont be over whelmed.
The community of people offering advice and help is great and the chandlers are also awesome so , so far all is good!
I'm finding it hard but I'm enjoying the challenge even if I am sleep deprived and covered in paint
Problems I've faced so far ! here we go haha! :encouragement: I suppose this will be useful for some.
Leaks in the deck wood - water was coming through the deck wood screw holes in corners where rain built up / puddled, meaning the half berths were damp water was slowly leaking though and one of the lockers was filled with water.
I Removed all of the wooden planks , coated the self tapper holes with Marine grade Sikaflex, the screws also and added circle beams around every hole. This has worked a treat! I've had no problems so far oh and don't forget a re-varnish.
Pluming leaks and water filled lockers! - Most of the plumping on the boat was quite old so all of the piping joints where leaky under pressure meaning water needed to be drained and pipes chopped back to a newer points to which new jubilee clips could be added. This has stopped all of the leaks on both the head (ew) and the sink pipes.
Hole in the deck - There was a giant hole in the boat on the deck where I think wires had once been or a pole of some sort.
I had to use an Epoxy 2 part filler (West System Epoxy) to fill it but of course the once you put it in the hole it'd just fall straight out into the interior of the boat so I had to firstly use a sheet of fiberglass to keep it all in.
Heating - Heating the boat, where to begin with this subject. At first I was using a 500w Dimplex Frost Heater great for keeping the frost away but not great if you want lounge around in your pants. There was a fan heater on the boat but it made a hell of a noise, sparked and just didn't look safe. I ended up buying a Silentnight Benross PTC Heater, 1800 Watt which is great but brings the same problem, noise it was less but still annoying when watching movies. So now I'm installing 180w tube heaters in the berths to keep them nice and toasty and then using a oil heater under the table. If this still isn't warm enough i'll use good quality / safe electric blankets to have it nice and snug.
Sail Gate My jib sail wouldn't come down, I had all manor of people trying to get the thing down but it was stuck like a bastard! eventually it was decided that someone would have to climb up and take a look but on another day. We rapped the sail up back as good as possible so it was almost like it had been properly reeled back in and added a load of ties just in-case. In the middle of the night recently it got damn windy and the sail got pulled out ever so slightly by morning a few feet had come loose and then hey presto just as the 30mph winds were hitting my sail comes out and hell breaks loose. The sail shredded and was making a noise like a machine gun so some people helped me eventually get the entire thing down ripped to shreds. I'm not going to lie it was a scary experience as it was the first time I'd seen the force of sail when it all goes wrong haha! Apparently this can happen at sea so at least i'd know what to do (shudder).
There's plenty of other stuff I've had to fix and learn but in all honesty its hard but I'm still enjoying it. I could Imagine some people would really struggle but as long as you take your time and don't start more than 1 or 2 projects at once you wont be over whelmed.
The community of people offering advice and help is great and the chandlers are also awesome so , so far all is good!
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