decks are all glassed, cover is off...

finally, about 5 months of living under that cover working on the decks and its done!! Areas were recored and faired and every inch got a layer of 15oz biaxial fabric. attached is three photos of the boat. one is a small deck repair on the flybridge, the other two are of the outside, one right after the cover came off and the other after handrails that were attached to the flybridge were removed as well as the tape trim. My good friend dan lee has been helping me a bunch with everything, specially all the wood work on the outside. Im really excited to finish that up and start painting the topsides. meanwhile the hull is telling me to sand it with 800Grit and buff it.. need to do some gelcoat repairs on it because I dont want to paint the whole hull. BA

new core

here are two shots of the new core on the port side of bye all. the core material is douglas fir end grain. I used a chop saw and cut them to .650. I used west system 105/205 with the 406 add. its solid now. doing the same on the starboard aft quater and any other spot that contains over 15% moisture reading.

core removed

here are two photos of the decks with an area of the core removed. the next step is to prep it for epoxy and cut new core to fit. my biggest problem right now is the tempature.. epoxy needs 40 degrees to cure and at night it will be too cold and wont kick. looks like ive got to wait a few days... this weekend this section will be done.

deck repair

So I spend the winter removing the teak decks off BYE ALL, now that they are gone I ran a moisture meter over the core to see what I really had. I found alot of wet wood so I took the ol skillsaw and opened up the top layer or 1/8 inch glass. I found teak hardwood blocks about 4 inches sq. A few peices of plywood too. First I thought I could dry it out, so I put some fans on the decks and about 1 wk later not much improvement. If it was a balsa core it would probably have been rotten, but the end grain balsa would dry much faster then side grain teak. I purchased a 105C kit from midwest supply (5gal of west system) and last night I started with removing some core on the port side by the aft trunk. Ive spoke with Tom H. quiet a bit at Gougeon Brothers. He had many helpful ideas for this project. Im going to buy some half inch ply from home depot and cut it into 4 inch blocks and us the 105/205 with some 406 for bonding the new core to the existing layer of glass. after that I will rebond the top layer of 1/8 inch glass to the new core and do a 12:1 to make a strong structrual bond on the top later of the glass. I will follow up with a single layer of 15oz biaxial cloth and then paint nonskid.

here are a few photos of what ive been doing

short post

my friend dan lee gave me two teak name boards off his trawler that he sold. so i striped the boards down and we put them in the HAAS mill and ta da.. i think im going to paint the inside of the letters white.

the boiler is almost running.. tuchy subject... its taken way to long seeing as winters half overwith and its not going yet... im 5 weeks into a 2 week project. i will be a strict DIY now.. no more hiring work out no matter the task. live a learn i guess..

snow!

we were under a lake effect snow warning all weekend, 30mph winds and 2 feet of snow. I cleaned the boat and continued working on the decks. heres a few photos..

working hard!

Teak deck removal has started. Ive got the port side removed.. I was up in till 12am last night working on it.. 15 degrees outside! brrrr...

so the last two photos are of the decks. the second two photos sue took right after I purchased bye all and the first photos is of the previous owners John & Carrol.. two great people. I'm going to have the framed and put inside the boat with a machined plack dedicated to them.

the work continues, tom frank has been installing the boiler. that is a big job but will be well work it.

time to get to work, I need to update this more often!

take care

livin' in the bubble!

havnt updated in awhile. been real busy. I put the clear cover on that i bought ($700) it was terriable. the tarp slap noise was terriable. It may have been a good cover if I had more time to put it on... maybe ill try it again someday. I kinda lost my shirt bad on this winter cover deal. ive got 3k wraped up into it now. between the metal frame, all the clamps, the clear cover and now the shrink wrap. I should have just had it wraped in the first place. anyways, I had zap shrink wrap it (www.zapawrap.com) those guys did a great job.

now that its all done I can install my wood door and bring the boiler in. yes I bought a oil fired boiler. 74,000 BTU. Tom frank is going to install it with me which should be fun, hoping to learn alot from him. So that should start soon.. the boiler ways 325LBS so it will be alot of fun brining her inside and down into the engine room.

so its lunch time and my food is here.. catch yall later

heres a picture of the wrap.

BUSY!

So i've been living without a head or shower all this time.. dont worry ive still been showering and going to the bathroom... just on my dads boat or the marina restrooms. I havnt really had much time at all between work and sea tech marine school. Now that school is done I have weekends and nights avaiable for working on the boat. with that being said ive decided to re plumb the whole waste system and add a new holding tank (55gal). Attached are some photos, im not finished yet but the hard part of running that PVC under the dinette is done. I got pretty beat up doing it tho.. its a very tight spot. I could just barley squeeze my hips through the hole and then once inside you have to either be on your stomach or back, you CAN NOT turn over under the seats. Very tight! Actually at once point I got stuck and felt very uncomfortable and just kept telling myself "you cant afford to do it any other way just finish the job". I also jumped down onto my knees at one point and landed on a peice of wood with a nail that went 1/4" into my leg. ouch!

Ive decided on some other things aswell. Im going to remove the teak decks and do a non skid awlgrip paint. Then its done and I dont have to worry about the decks at all anymore.

Ive got so much to do I cant even think, im so excited about making it all bight and bristol clean.

My cover comes in hopefully this week.. once thats up the deck work can begin.

Today I hope to leave work a little early to install and wire my 220v heaters. its getting cold and thats most important right now.

Im going to have a computer on the boat full time now and bob found a way to steal wifi so I hope that works.

byeall!

a few pictures

Goodmorning,

Just got into work about a half hour ago. As long as you hit 590N before 7am you can go the normal speeds. Anything after 7 its 15MPH. I finished my Sea Tech Marine schooling. passed. I have a few things I have to take care of before I can send my paperwork to Toledo. (Drug test, Physical) But im happy its finally over and that I passed.

I took the measurements for my winter cover last night, 33W x 56L should do it.. Im going to call today and get the final price for that. I put up a few pictures of the frame. Its gone together pretty well. (koverklampframes.com)

Sunday I woke up to the Roman passing bye, Im laying in bed and I hear all the dock lines screaching and look out the window and see that. I love it. It really sounded like it scraped the side of the spirit of rochester, my father thought the same thing. They moved that scow downriver to hook her up to power so she doesnt sink during the winter. I post some pictures of that aswell. Im sure anyone would rather look at a few pictures then read all this crap.

One step closer

Second to last day of my captains
course today with sea tech marine training. I've been at it about a
month now.. It's been going well, learning alot! I'll be a licensed merchant marine officer to
100 US gross tons. Hopefully in march I'll upgrade
to 200 ton. Spent most my day doing that.. 9-6. Took a shower
at the marinas bathrooms. You don't want to be in there longer than you have to.. It's
cold and very outdated and pretty dirty. Oh well it's a
good reason to get my fresh water tanks cleaned out and working. I think im going to need a new hot water tank. I havnt had much time at all to work on the important things. Between work and class I've been beat. I've been roughing it
for awhile now.. It's not terriable but not comfortable. The boats great and perfect for what I want to do I just need to get all the systems up and running. Heat is another issue, right now I've got 3 heaters running. A west marine cabin heater
in the galley and a Eden pure in the salon that don let me borrow, then a oil heater in the skippers
quaters. It actually keeps the boat warm. I've only turned it down but it's going to be getting colder soon and I need to wire the two 240v 13600 btu wallmouts I bought.

Enough for tonight it's 1045 and im in my extreamly uncomfortable bed typing this on my iPhone. I need a new matress ($450) and the rest of my winter cover ($700) just one problem, I lost the lat/long for my money tree.

Goodnight

first post!

my name is Jakob Van Reenen and this is my blog. Its about life as a liveaboard on my 1981 Albin 43 trawler...

Ive been living aboard for hmm let see... about a month now. I bought the boat up in the 1000 islands, ive known her all my life.. always loved the lines spent alot of time cleaning her as I was younger. John Harris was his name, a great man he was. A crazy Canadian! He bought this boat in 92' I belive, out of Boston MA... her name was "MOONSHADOW". Anyways john brought his new boat to French bay marina in Clayton, N.Y. Where I spent much of my youth growing up. He took many trips, some as far as the bahamas.. I always offered him crazy deals like dollar down dollar a week for life for the boat, i'd start paying now and continue till you pass! then when your done with it you just sign it over john! he always told me, who knows maybe you'll end up with it.

John passed away about 2 years ago now and his daughter put the boat on the market.. I went back and forth with it, sitting on it dreaming about it being mine. The deal went through, spent a few weeks preparing it for the voyage back to Rochester NY, her new home port.

anways a long story short.. John was right, the boat is now mine.. my home. thank you John. RIP