jfm
Well-known member
Many many congratulations Vas.
I thought of you today when I saw this in Antibes...
I thought of you today when I saw this in Antibes...
MiToS re-built/fit- versilcraft Mystery43
- Thread starter vas
- Start date
D
Deleted User YDKXO
Guest
Vas many congratulations for nearing the end of your massive project and I hope that MitoS turns out to be everything you hoped for
longjohnsilver
Well-known member
Excellent news Vas, we need to see the pics! Also what are we going to do when this thread draws to its natural conclusion 
rbcoomer
Active member
Excellent news Vas, we need to see the pics! Also what are we going to do when this thread draws to its natural conclusion
MiToS II
rafiki_
Well-known member
I'm looking at a Mystere right now that looks like it needs a couple of years attention from Vas
MapisM
Well-known member
Absolutely +1 re. the congratulations.
But with apologies for the o/t, what sort of vessel is the first on the left of the three moored mobos in your pic, J?
If she was designed with the aim of winning a contest for the ugliest thing afloat, they must have achieved such target with flying colors...!
jfm
Well-known member
That's the new 50m Sibelle. Just launched by Heesen and utterly different from any other Heesen ever. Been there a couple of weeks. All alloy. The old Sibelle, one of the "standard" 44m heesen series, is in port too and actively for sale http://www.boatinternational.com/yachts/news/heesen-launches-50m-custom-superyacht-sibelle--22779
vas
Well-known member
a big thank you to everyone for their best wishes and appreciation!
Realised that I haven't actually posted any pics since I got double shift on working throughout August, apologies but it simply wasn't possible to work 14h a day and have any energy to sort pics, resize, rename, upload and post...
Just back from the maiden voyage with the family and various friends and trying to recover from all the stress and tiredness of the last month.
So, picking up where I stopped reporting, I'm continuing today with hopefully a couple of posts with the refit progress and I'll post a new thread with the maiden voyage with lots of pics.
So, at the end of the first week of August and since capital controls meant there was no way I could get the real thing (coppercoat) for MiToS I picked up from the local epoxy/ carbon/mat and general composites co the necessary bits to coat the below waterline part of the hull. Concept is that even if it doesn't work, there's no harm made and no awful dust or mess to sand, just another 3-4 coats of copper impregnated epoxy to protect the hull. A jet wash later and a sanding I can apply the real thing when I can.
Started with the transom (small and easily manageable part of the hull) so after some careful masking I got it going.
First issue is WHERE should I draw the waterline!
Remember everything was stripped, boat had internal alterations, new heavish things installed all over the place:
So after some serious head scratching and calculations based on the way the boat was on the hard, simulating the slight bow high placement and considering that the internal salon and cabin decks should be v.close to level, I came up with a couple of points one on the transom and one on the bow. Joining them is not something you can do easily though. A laser spirit level and a decent tripod later, I was getting closer... However 13m long boat means a circa 10m long waterline and a decent 6-7m distance from the middle to get the spirit level and it's laser to do their work. Only bloody laser was so weak that I had to wait for dusk (to almost completely night) in order to mark the grey hull... Nice!
Anyway, managed to do the port side (where I had more space and was facing east meaning getting dark earlier) by marking every .5m or so. Getting the masking tape right without looking wavey is not easy either (without having an existing mark to work on that is) but got there at the end. Stbrd side was done by measuring along the waterline and getting the vertical distance to the chine every half a metre and passing them over the other side.
End result was reasonably okay. Mind I was afraid I'm going to get to high up and end up with a problem covering and re painting the hull so opted to err towards the low waterline. As a result MiToS now floats with full water (500lt at the lazarette) and 400lt of fuel out of 1200lt just in front of the engines level to the waterline at transom and around 10cm below the w/l at the bow. Quite happy as I can "lift" the w/l on next liftout and have a reasonably level one.
sanding the gray paint to get a decent key for the copper epoxy:
transom:
rather orangy feel after the 4th coat:
and son posing with his head in the bow thruster tunnel...
Second issue was sorting the copper proportions and getting the application method right was a bit of a pain. Bleeding copper is rather heavy and needs constant stirring and a team of ppl being rather serious on what they are doing. I can sort out the stirring, but having wife, son and a friend all chatting and painting all over the place with no clear method in applying the coats doesn't help. So port side I'll be impressed if it works out well, stbrd side I only got Giannis (the friend who helped me in the delivery trip from Athens 4yrs ago) and I think we did a much better job at it. Did the scoring pad to get the copper out so now we'll wait and see if it works. Considering that materials costed 300euro (epoxy and copper) I'm not too bothered if it fails tbh.
Main heads sink was another chapter that took a lot of time to sort. Space was tight, couldn't fit the resin sink I'd bought for 40mm, so initially decided to do it out of corian. Only when I got the drawing and a template of the space to the fabricator he simply said he couldn't do it! OK, wasn't curved surfaces and rocket science, got pissed off and forgot about it. That was a good year and a half ago. Nearing completion date, I realised I had to do something so resorted to the marble fabricator that did all sorts of odd and complicated things for me at home 10yrs ago. Indeed Costas was a first slightly puzzled but got very much into it. It was mainly the challenge to doing it as it involved slightly slanted surfaces meeting eachother at odd angles and cutting them using exceptional care and accuracy. After an hour long briefing I was called the next day for a check on the cut and loosely assembled bits. Was spot on, gave him the okay to continue sanding, glueing and polishing it. You could see at his face (talking of 55yo experienced marble master working at this workshop since his teens!) that he really enjoyed it, compared to the orthogonal typical, slightly boring work that he gets to repeatedly do. 150euro later (and a large shopping bag full of tasty tomatoes from his organic garden) I had my new sink!
All fitted in place, works pretty well and now just needs a "skirt" under it which will double as a wastepaper basket==winter job.
For the record this is 20mm technomarble, the only marble that had the "right" shade of greyish white matching the (synthetic) 20X20mm mosaic tiles I'd used.
test assembly:
finished article:
fitting in place:
You can spot the holes on the back marble plate, making it much easier to fix compared to the typical ss brackets that he uses. He liked my idea of simply drilling the marble before assembly and he said he's going to use this method from now on.
Yes, I know mirror is missing, not sure I should go for proper glass mirror or perspex mirror. What does the jury think? It is a 12 or 15mm ply but rather well nerved so wont be able to flex about a lot (or most likely not at all...)
Another issue that was left unfinished last summer was the salon sliding doors that I needed replacing. I'd ordered the materials, the alum fabricator built them for me and had them for a whole year in his workshop waiting for me to finish the surface around. Same with the glass, unpaid kept in their workshop for a year, rather embarassed when I realised my mistake...
That meant Alekos painting the same grey hull colour around the aft deck (bench, steps to the bow and surrounding panels, as well as me doing the upholstery inside. So just before 15th of August, I got all the bits done and guys came to install it. Took them a full days work to get it right, but was really worth it!
Mind I'd ordered the same RAL colour that the grey hull was painted for the alu frame and it really matches perfectly. Glazing is 2X4mm securit (if I'm right, or triplex...) with a tinting membrane in the middle.
Only issue that needs addressing is latches to hold the sliding door open as it tends to move about bump one another and be a general nuisance and danger!
Thought of drilling a 5mm hole and using a dowel, wonder if there's something more decent than a simple ss latch bolted on the alu door frame. Any ideas welcomed as always.
Alekos paint with the old door frame in place:
new underlining for the black leatherette (sorry couldn't find pics of the finished article, too busy helping the fitters do their job to take any pics.)
finished article:
As you can imagine there were zilliion of small (and larger) jobs I had to tackle over that month, some not photographed, some are. A sad one that I did document was the thick rubber seating for the el.toilets. They are not that silent, (and I'm not installing Tecma anytime soon!) so thought of utilising a nice thick piece of rubber that a friend gave me at some point. Matched with rubber washers and ss ones one top where the screws bolted it down to the ply, it feels a bit more soft sounding than before/in other boats I've visited.
Rebuilt went as far as restoring the original anchor and aft lights. A bloody difficult job had to get some parts to the machine shop to remove stuck ss bolts on alum casting and undo the ring securing the glass to the fixture. All fine now, could do with a new glass but for the time being I've swapped it with the aft light which has a proper cover securing it in place.
Reached the twenty pics limit and the time I have today so next post will either be late at night or tomorrow.
cheers
V.
Realised that I haven't actually posted any pics since I got double shift on working throughout August, apologies but it simply wasn't possible to work 14h a day and have any energy to sort pics, resize, rename, upload and post...
Just back from the maiden voyage with the family and various friends and trying to recover from all the stress and tiredness of the last month.
So, picking up where I stopped reporting, I'm continuing today with hopefully a couple of posts with the refit progress and I'll post a new thread with the maiden voyage with lots of pics.
So, at the end of the first week of August and since capital controls meant there was no way I could get the real thing (coppercoat) for MiToS I picked up from the local epoxy/ carbon/mat and general composites co the necessary bits to coat the below waterline part of the hull. Concept is that even if it doesn't work, there's no harm made and no awful dust or mess to sand, just another 3-4 coats of copper impregnated epoxy to protect the hull. A jet wash later and a sanding I can apply the real thing when I can.
Started with the transom (small and easily manageable part of the hull) so after some careful masking I got it going.
First issue is WHERE should I draw the waterline!
Remember everything was stripped, boat had internal alterations, new heavish things installed all over the place:
- bow thruster (must be a 50-60kg with the really heavy 7hp 5kW motor and all the paraphernalia.
- desalinator on the lazarette
- hydraulic passarelle 2.7m long
- 1.5m vs 0.9m bathing platform with a must heavier construction
- heads moved from stbrd to port and shifted towards the bow
- SS hardtop (to be constructed with the bank accnt recovers...)
- 80lt calorifier (sp?) still not installed as I wanted to check where/if the boat lists and decide placement.
- various other bits I'm sure I've forgotten
So after some serious head scratching and calculations based on the way the boat was on the hard, simulating the slight bow high placement and considering that the internal salon and cabin decks should be v.close to level, I came up with a couple of points one on the transom and one on the bow. Joining them is not something you can do easily though. A laser spirit level and a decent tripod later, I was getting closer... However 13m long boat means a circa 10m long waterline and a decent 6-7m distance from the middle to get the spirit level and it's laser to do their work. Only bloody laser was so weak that I had to wait for dusk (to almost completely night) in order to mark the grey hull... Nice!
Anyway, managed to do the port side (where I had more space and was facing east meaning getting dark earlier) by marking every .5m or so. Getting the masking tape right without looking wavey is not easy either (without having an existing mark to work on that is) but got there at the end. Stbrd side was done by measuring along the waterline and getting the vertical distance to the chine every half a metre and passing them over the other side.
End result was reasonably okay. Mind I was afraid I'm going to get to high up and end up with a problem covering and re painting the hull so opted to err towards the low waterline. As a result MiToS now floats with full water (500lt at the lazarette) and 400lt of fuel out of 1200lt just in front of the engines level to the waterline at transom and around 10cm below the w/l at the bow. Quite happy as I can "lift" the w/l on next liftout and have a reasonably level one.
sanding the gray paint to get a decent key for the copper epoxy:
transom:
rather orangy feel after the 4th coat:
and son posing with his head in the bow thruster tunnel...
Second issue was sorting the copper proportions and getting the application method right was a bit of a pain. Bleeding copper is rather heavy and needs constant stirring and a team of ppl being rather serious on what they are doing. I can sort out the stirring, but having wife, son and a friend all chatting and painting all over the place with no clear method in applying the coats doesn't help. So port side I'll be impressed if it works out well, stbrd side I only got Giannis (the friend who helped me in the delivery trip from Athens 4yrs ago) and I think we did a much better job at it. Did the scoring pad to get the copper out so now we'll wait and see if it works. Considering that materials costed 300euro (epoxy and copper) I'm not too bothered if it fails tbh.
Main heads sink was another chapter that took a lot of time to sort. Space was tight, couldn't fit the resin sink I'd bought for 40mm, so initially decided to do it out of corian. Only when I got the drawing and a template of the space to the fabricator he simply said he couldn't do it! OK, wasn't curved surfaces and rocket science, got pissed off and forgot about it. That was a good year and a half ago. Nearing completion date, I realised I had to do something so resorted to the marble fabricator that did all sorts of odd and complicated things for me at home 10yrs ago. Indeed Costas was a first slightly puzzled but got very much into it. It was mainly the challenge to doing it as it involved slightly slanted surfaces meeting eachother at odd angles and cutting them using exceptional care and accuracy. After an hour long briefing I was called the next day for a check on the cut and loosely assembled bits. Was spot on, gave him the okay to continue sanding, glueing and polishing it. You could see at his face (talking of 55yo experienced marble master working at this workshop since his teens!) that he really enjoyed it, compared to the orthogonal typical, slightly boring work that he gets to repeatedly do. 150euro later (and a large shopping bag full of tasty tomatoes from his organic garden) I had my new sink!
All fitted in place, works pretty well and now just needs a "skirt" under it which will double as a wastepaper basket==winter job.
For the record this is 20mm technomarble, the only marble that had the "right" shade of greyish white matching the (synthetic) 20X20mm mosaic tiles I'd used.
test assembly:
finished article:
fitting in place:
You can spot the holes on the back marble plate, making it much easier to fix compared to the typical ss brackets that he uses. He liked my idea of simply drilling the marble before assembly and he said he's going to use this method from now on.
Yes, I know mirror is missing, not sure I should go for proper glass mirror or perspex mirror. What does the jury think? It is a 12 or 15mm ply but rather well nerved so wont be able to flex about a lot (or most likely not at all...)
Another issue that was left unfinished last summer was the salon sliding doors that I needed replacing. I'd ordered the materials, the alum fabricator built them for me and had them for a whole year in his workshop waiting for me to finish the surface around. Same with the glass, unpaid kept in their workshop for a year, rather embarassed when I realised my mistake...
That meant Alekos painting the same grey hull colour around the aft deck (bench, steps to the bow and surrounding panels, as well as me doing the upholstery inside. So just before 15th of August, I got all the bits done and guys came to install it. Took them a full days work to get it right, but was really worth it!
Mind I'd ordered the same RAL colour that the grey hull was painted for the alu frame and it really matches perfectly. Glazing is 2X4mm securit (if I'm right, or triplex...) with a tinting membrane in the middle.
Only issue that needs addressing is latches to hold the sliding door open as it tends to move about bump one another and be a general nuisance and danger!
Thought of drilling a 5mm hole and using a dowel, wonder if there's something more decent than a simple ss latch bolted on the alu door frame. Any ideas welcomed as always.
Alekos paint with the old door frame in place:
new underlining for the black leatherette (sorry couldn't find pics of the finished article, too busy helping the fitters do their job to take any pics.)
finished article:
As you can imagine there were zilliion of small (and larger) jobs I had to tackle over that month, some not photographed, some are. A sad one that I did document was the thick rubber seating for the el.toilets. They are not that silent, (and I'm not installing Tecma anytime soon!) so thought of utilising a nice thick piece of rubber that a friend gave me at some point. Matched with rubber washers and ss ones one top where the screws bolted it down to the ply, it feels a bit more soft sounding than before/in other boats I've visited.
Rebuilt went as far as restoring the original anchor and aft lights. A bloody difficult job had to get some parts to the machine shop to remove stuck ss bolts on alum casting and undo the ring securing the glass to the fixture. All fine now, could do with a new glass but for the time being I've swapped it with the aft light which has a proper cover securing it in place.
Reached the twenty pics limit and the time I have today so next post will either be late at night or tomorrow.
cheers
V.
vas
Well-known member
ah, and before everyone starts shouting, a pic from a beautiful Pagasitikos bay yesterday lunchtime taking with my waterproof phone while swimming to get to the coast.
cheers
V.
cheers
V.
petem
Well-known member
Colour scheme looks brilliant Vas. Absolute superb effort to get it this far and back in the water.
Hope you have many happy times aboard.
Hope you have many happy times aboard.
jfm
Well-known member
Wow wow wow, that last picture is amazing Vas. Superlatives fail, but huge respect to you on this achievement, and many congratulations on finally getting to swim off Mitos in a beautiful anchorage.
She really does look stunning in that picture. You got all the detail and colouring just right. I look forward to many more pictures
She really does look stunning in that picture. You got all the detail and colouring just right. I look forward to many more pictures
Portofino
Well-known member
Well said ++1 if I may add ?
wakeup
Active member
Ditto, I wasn't a fan of the black ports when she was on the hard, but looks great now in the water.
The bathing platform looks to be a complete success and OEM not add on.
The bathing platform looks to be a complete success and OEM not add on.
RIN
Well-known member
You deserve it!
Whitelighter
Active member
Wow,
Love how the wood capping rail really stands out even at a distance. Cant wait for the interior finished shots. Im still trying to get my head round all you have done. Sink is excellent too.
You should lend your interior design skills out to some of the current builders...
Love how the wood capping rail really stands out even at a distance. Cant wait for the interior finished shots. Im still trying to get my head round all you have done. Sink is excellent too.
You should lend your interior design skills out to some of the current builders...
kashurst
Well-known member
What an achievement - boat looks brilliant. Congratulations and many happy years sailing in her.
rbcoomer
Active member
Superb! So, so pleased for you to have her on the water - what an achievement :encouragement: As mentioned above, the colours, capping and swim platform etc all look fantastic - what a great result. Enjoy!
davo99
Member
I've been an avid reader of this thread from the start, eagerly awaiting each new installment. Haven't contributed because I've never had anything to say except 'WOW' Now she's in the water and looking so good can I just say
WOW
I can only sit and admire your patience, perseverance and skill in getting back in the water. Thanks for a great thread and here's to more photos of her now.
WOW
I can only sit and admire your patience, perseverance and skill in getting back in the water. Thanks for a great thread and here's to more photos of her now.
Firefly625
Well-known member
ah, and before everyone starts shouting, a pic from a beautiful Pagasitikos bay yesterday lunchtime taking with my waterproof phone while swimming to get to the coast.
cheers
V.
Just superb. Your hard work floating and looking great, what immense satisfaction you must have and well deserved. Thank you for posting a picture of MiToS where she belongs.
alt
Well-known member
WOW, that's all I can say. I can't believe a person could have so much patience. You sir, a book could be written about!
If I ever make it down your way, i'll be sure to deliver you a bottle of something nice... you deserve it.
If I ever make it down your way, i'll be sure to deliver you a bottle of something nice... you deserve it.