The start of a nice project (clipper 30ft)

Well, the boat is out of the water, engine is out .... tanks are in need of replacing ... Diesel and water steel tanks are leaking ... I am thinking of polypropylene tanks .... the engine is out already .... we will do a service on the engine ... replace all hoses ... replace skin fittings and valves .... cleanup bilge ... paint it ... I am thinking of flowcoat? .... What do people think?*Putting bow thruster in now that it's out
Comments/advice are very welcome.

Good luck with that Erik. If I might qualify my comment re painting bilges on the other thread, in your case where everything is stripped out and you can get at things easier to clean the re-coat the bilge and engine-room walls, then yes - worth doing, and I think Flow-coat would be a good choice. For US readers, that's a type of easily applied gel-coat like finish (with hardener) which is very resilient, water proof and easy to work with, and a lot cheaper than 2 pack paints.
Hey Erik, you have your boat out at the same marina as me, going by the name of the travel-lift. Horizon Shores, Meridien Marinas.....?

Erik,
How was your engine removed from the boat?

What about BilgeKote?

Steve , Clark
The engine is midship, yes single, there are 3 big hatches in the main cabin that lift out, the engine fits through there ..... took the davit off .... than a little franna crane went though the back door and lifted it .... the width of the back door is just the width of the engine ... lucky hey ....
Yes Peter we are there ... which arm are you on? I noticed most of your timber is painted, is this correct? Would love to come and have a look

Don't know if we have bilgekote here in oz ... never heard of .... you apply a primer first?

Peter, did Bruce Forsythe painted yours? *He's doing the tanks and bilge and bowthruster for me ....

Erik,Get your top coat and read what they say about primers. I believe in primers but every coating is different. I'm frequently not one to follow directions but do so w primers. I use
Interlux Pre-Kote and love the stuff.
I see you've got a 4cyl Lehman 90hp. Can you give us some speed and rpm numbers??


Eric Henning


-- Edited by nomadwilly on Sunday 16th of January 2011 06:13:15 PM

I am thinking of doing the railings with teakseal colour protector .... anyone experience with this? It is non oil product that you wipe on. www.fixtech.com.au for info
Lots of people are pro for the flow-coat for the bilge ......

Yes Eric, Lehman ... I think it's 80 hp ..... don't know much about them .... the previous owner said at around 2200 revs , sits at 6 knots ... but how do you measure that with tide and wind?I had it up to 8 knots ....
We're cleaning it up now ..... will do a test run and check for leaks*

shipshape wrote:

Yes Eric, Lehman ... I think it's 80 hp ..... don't know much about them .... the previous owner said at around 2200 revs , sits at 6 knots ... but how do you measure that with tide and wind?
I had it up to 8 knots ....
We're cleaning it up now ..... will do a test run and check for leaks*

Click to expand...

Seems 2200 is quite allot for that engine.* One of our paving crews has that engine on a paving machine that went 12,000 hours without MOH.* Don't know how much longer it ran.* They ran it 15-1600 rpm.* Maybe the boat wasn.t propped right.

*

Great little engine. I had one on my last boat. Loud as hell but a FL120 with two less cylinders.

You probably right ... I think 2200 is full speed 8 - 9 *knots ... it's more likely to be 1700 revs for the 6 knots .... I will get back to you when shipshape is back afloat ....*

Hi Erik, I'm on J arm - J11, and yes, Bruce Forsythe did the hull 2 pack International Snow White, and did a great job. I did the rest. PM me your email and mobile phone, and we could probably arrange to meet so you could see over her. At present she sits idle, rarin' to go but for the wait to get a new tranny oil cooler fitted which carked it a couple of weeks ago.

"Seems 2200 is quite allot for that engine."

"Maybe the boat wasn't*propped right."


Being a 2500rpm engine it's obviously 300rpm down.


"but how do you measure that with tide and wind?"


Go on a course where the tide and wind are more or less stable. Observe your GPS speed until you've got a good average of steady readings * * *....turn around 180 degrees and go in the opposite direction. If you go 7 knots one way and 8 knots the other you're going 7.5 knots. Still not really accurate but quite close. Before we went to Alaska I wanted to go into Lake Washington. They have a measured mile marked off on one of the floating bridges. Timing one's self over a measured mile at various engine speeds in lakes w basically no current can be very accurate. Observe your speed on a time/distance speed chart. Take a Power Squadron course.

Damn, make that a new heat exchanger and exhaust knuckle as well - at least I now know why she lost coolant as well. Better than a head gasket blown, I guess. She did not overheat fortunately. Must have happened just as we were getting into her berth last trip - lucky.

Rusty tanks removed .... bilge empty and ready to clean and paint , rails being scraped of .... to reveal the raw teak railings

Erik,
If you are going to fit plastic tanks try Atlas tanks.
they do a lot of standard sizes but also custom build.
Good design and reasonably priced.
The big problem with these as fuel tanks is they don't have a small water sump built in.
That is the beauty of having steel or Al tanks built.
They may do a sump on request as it wouldn't have to be very big.
Say about 100 mm square and about 150 deep with a 1/2" fitting for a drain.
Gotta have my 2 c worth.
Looks like you have a nice little project going there , how long you think you will be out of the water?

Benn

Thanks for that input Benn, that's great info ...We think should be ready in 3 weeks (tanks in, motor in, new skin fittings, bow-thruster, new anchor winch and railings done and anti-foul) *This is phase 1 and next year a new coat of paint.

When I did my bilge in the fuel lazarette. It was suggested to use TSP or tri sodium phospate to clean it with. Did it. 5 years and the paint is still on.

SD
*

I would certainly agree with Benn re the Atlas tanks. I got them for water tank replacement, and they went in well. Two stock shapes/sizes fitted in the lazarette well. If they are ok for fuel, or have a fuel grade synthetic tank, then I'd definitely go for that, although they would need extra supports. The lack of a water/debris sump would not matter much if the fuel take-offs are from the base of the tank, rather than with pick-ups from the top. Mine are set up like that and it works well, continually removing any water and muck, yet I only have to replace the filters about every 5 yrs, and never get more than a tablespoonfull of water from the separator on the primary filter. With the uncertainty of future diesel types, possible biodiesel with additives which might corrode alloy, fibreglass etc, and your bitter experience with rusting out, they seem the way to go.

They do good fuel tanks with baffles and what ever inlets and outlets you desire.
Living on the Sunshine Coast I just buzz down to the factory and have a chat with the boys/girls
Atlas will weld on flanges or mounts if desired so that you can screw or bolt them to some form of frame work.
I recently had them make me up a holding tank about 220 lts with a couple of flanges for attaching to bulkhead and floor in Eng Rm.
Bfore they made it they e-mailed me a drawing to make sure they had it right.

Don't discount the importance of having a sump on your fuel tanks.
Most of our fuel is supplied by waterside bowsers that have a high chance of leakage* to their storage tanks,so allways be checkin for water in your fuel

Benn

-- Edited by Tidahapah on Thursday 20th of January 2011 07:04:31 AM

What do we think about a black hull ? did some quick drawing ..... thinking of painting hull back and the rest silver ....

Erik,
Just a short comment.
You will regret it during the summer, especially if you head any further north.
Even the late winter is pretty warm.
I had alwasy thought of painting my boat hull dark green . But this same reason has always held me back.

Benn

-- Edited by Tidahapah on Sunday 30th of January 2011 06:44:12 AM

Black would be hotter, and might fade - silver too glarey I think. I rather like the Nordhavn grey for the hull, but the other half didn't....ho...hum...

Old Stone wrote:

Erik - Dark hulls are very attractive, but every little scratch and piece of dried salt water shows. Tough decision. Very impressive job you've been doing in the bilge!

Click to expand...

Erik,

Ours is a dark green hull and tan or off white topsides*and we live in North Carolina.* During the summer time we get in the mid to upper*90's for long periods of time with high humidity.*

I really don't see the differences that some folks are claiming.* Is the hull warm to the touch*inside when in the direct sun, yes but I had a white sailboat before and so was the hull on that boat.* Does my AC struggle in 90+ weather?* Not really it works all day as did the AC on the sailboat.** But the difference is that this boat with the proper AC unit keeps cooler than the sailboat did.** The key also is to have the windows covered.* This eliminates a lot of the heat inside.

Mmmmm thanks guys .... hard to convince my wife NOT to go black .... JD, she likes what you wrote ...

I suppose white hulls are a bit of a tradition here in Qld.
When I suggested to Bert (the boat builder) when we were building Tidahapah that I wanted to paint the hull dark green his reply was ok, but when it leave this yard it will be white after that it is up to you.
I had dark green trim on my cap rails for the first 10 years but have now even changed that to white because of the attention the dark paint to keep it good and not lift off under the heat.

In would still like to have a nice glossy dark green hull but experience tells me No.

Benn

-- Edited by Tidahapah on Monday 31st of January 2011 05:20:55 AM

Comments from my lady :**Is it right to say ... if you scratch a white hull it makes a black mark ... if you scratch a black hull it leaves a white mark ....* with our main cabin not touching the hull .... we have the walkaround to isolate it ... and the aft deck to separate *the back .... it's only the front cabin that is potentially suffering from the black hull ... but the sun is never straight on it .... so she thinks it might not matter to much .. the heath ... windows ... that she agrees .... and also with the salt water on the black ... but that's just a bit more cleaning for the hubbie .... black is not easy to spot ... silver not good either .... but she claims that a white boat is not easy to see in the whites of the ocean ..... and for that, we should paint it bright orange ....*Do you guys understand how difficult it is ... living with her ??? .... But ... I love her .....*

Erik, our first boat was a 20 ft Tasman trailer yacht, and when we bought her, she had a rich red hull, which had been 2 packed over the original dark red wine-coloured gelcoat. She looked fantastic, and I have to say, I had the deck and cabin-top 2 packed white because the gelcoat was cactus a few yrs later, and when we sold her the red hull still looked just as good. A good 2 pack paint will definitely outlast a similar colour gelcoat, so if you want colour - go for colour. I agree the effect re heat getting inside is minimal - dark is hotter to the touch, but does not penetrate all that far in, especially through cored fibreglass, the main heat comes in through the windows as someone else said. Your car is a good example. I have had white and dark cars and not having a sunroof, and keeping as much sun as possibe from getting through the glass is the main thing. Then the air-con does the rest. On a boat the one place not to have dark is the deck, for reason of heat on bare feet. That is the one place you do notice it.

engine serviced ... cleaned ... repainted ... ready to be installed again ....