Hobo's back in the water with the tanks holding fuel and the engine running. Yahoo!
Here are the numbers:
Tank Construction: Includes tax, no transportation $10,529
Engine/Running Gear Rebuild: no transportation costs $12,558
Boat Yard: haul/block/launch, fork lift, crane, some tools and minor parts $4,562
Subcontract Labor: 86 hours $6,240
Stuff: Perf al panels, plywood, parts, more tools, hose, etc $3,800
Ouch $37,689
We were under budget on the subcontract labor but that doesn't take into account the 400 plus hours that Lena and I put in. It's difficult to say what costs were specifically for the tank replacement. The engine rebuild is easy to separate out, but not everything is as cut and dry. We had to replace the existing ceiling and wall panels. There was too much damage trying to remove and then reuse them. How do you do this job and not rebuild/replace the thru-hulls, hoses and some wiring? Another area that took additional resources was the re-configuring of the engine room. With each tank 22” shorter, we removed or modified nine mounting platforms. We could have used the existing ones and saved at least a week but how would it have looked?
Would we do the same thing again? Probably. We didn't feel we had many alternatives. A band-aid approach could have sufficed, but would have been hard to live/cruise with. We also considered the option of handing the project over to someone. We talked to one local yard (Lambs) before hand. They have the ability and resources but at $90/hour and no owner involvement, we estimated the project would have been north of $70,000.
I'd like to thank everyone for the support and coming along for the ride. To think that I initially hesitated to post this project before it was done (think armchair quarterbacks, backseat drivers-you know the potential). What a mistake that would have been. At the end of the day, you guys helped keep us going. Thanks!