The Lil' Engine

Brought the lil' huffer, our diesel, home from the marina yesterday. Their mechanic up and quit before the service was finished. Just as well. I now know the fuel injection pump requires service. I think it's better to wait until just before I have to fire it up to have that serviced. I'll likely sit in the boat for another 3 yrs at least w/o running.

Our lil' Yammy at home in the shed for the first time

At least the engine is one step closer to getting in the boat. A few minor things I'd like to do to it before I lift it in. Maybe this weekend. Will probably need another body to help.

Had to open up one of the shed doors to back the trailer in and offload the engine. This is what I found inside! :-)

Captain! There be whales here!  :-)

I have to admit. It really is impressive when you get to stand back and see all of it, well sorta all of it! :-)

This pic is from the other day. The wedge of white oak I mentioned that'll go under the keel and between the skeg.

Skeg wedge

I'm going to try to get the skeg installed next week. After that I'm off to Grande Prairie to meet my first Grandson, Connor Daniel Laporte!  :-)  I'll have one more week off when I get home then it's back to work for the gubment so that marks the end of boat building season.  :-(

Standby....

More rudder & skeg

Added some gussets to the rudder to stiffen it up. Some who've seen it on the forums suggested beefing it up. I have the materials so the cost is virtually nil, except for the Stainless Steel welding rods at $4 a pop!

Please no comments on welds. I'm no welder!

Yesterday I cut a wedge from solid white oak, destroying the blade in my benchtop band saw. Ended up giving that away to my Dad! ;-)  Useless for that kind of work. Anywho, I need a variety of fasteners to hold the skeg to the bottom of the keel. Couldn't get exactly what I wanted so I made my own.

Home made stainless steel bolts

I intend to weld these to the backing plate. The skeg, if it ever needs to be removed, will come off the bottom. The studs will stay in place.

I also discovered that I need some back & forth adjustment on the skeg. Because the keel bottom is not exactly level a wedge is required to level the skeg. This causes the bolts to 'lean' aft and don't directly line up with the holes in the skeg. I fashioned a template out of some scrap aluminum for the plasma cutter to cut the slots in the skeg.

Template for adjustment slots in skeg

I still have to figure a way of 'locking it in' position once it's bolted up. Likely some lag screws straight up into the wedge.

Got some bad news on the engine saga. The mechanic who was to service it up and quit. They now have no one to work on it. I'll be picking it up tomorrow and looking for another mechanic. I do know that it's the fuel injection pump that's the issue. If I can get it off myself I can take it for service myself. All the other things I needed done I can do myself.

Off to see the friendly machine shop guy!

Standby....

Angry Pixies

Fusing metals together with lots of angry pixies is fun! I'm no welder mind you. I got a lil' buzz box inverter stick welder from Princess Auto for small jobs. Decided to make a few of my own 'special' modifications to the rudder this morning.

Adding trailing edge rod to rudder

Added another SS rod to the trailing edge of the rudder. It sort of seemed out of place with the ribs just hanging out there. I also added some more rod to the top of the rudder so it'll follow closer to the hull once it's all foamed & glassed.

Lower section ready for foam & fiberglass

I started out under the boat. Leveling the skeg and taking measurements. I have to lower the skeg about 1/2" so I'll have room to lift the lower section of the rudder out of the pintle bearing should it need to be removed. Not a big deal. I have to build a wedge to fill in between the bottom of the keel and the skeg anyways. Just haven't decided what material I'm going to use yet. Probably the white oak I have on hand.

Was a very chilly 2C this morning. Means later starts in the day.

More adventures tomorrow.

Standby....

More Bits & Pieces

Spent part of the morning drilling holes in the skeg for the pintle bearing.

Holes drilled for Pintle Bearing

I must be getting good at this drilling stainless stuff. All 4 holes took me less than 20 mins. Trick is to drill slow and lots of downforce! Oh yeah, plenty of cutting oil helps a lot too!

It Fits!

It even fits! I love it when a plan comes together. Next step was to crawl under the boat and line this thing up. In and out, up and down, I must have been in and under the boat 25 times. Definitely a job needing an extra set of hands. Anywho, drop the backing plate in and a couple of bolts. Crawl back under and put the nuts on. Fack! Backing plate is upside down, none of the holes line up! Fack! Do it all over again tomorrow.

Got a call at lunch to go see the Machine Shop guys about the rudder. Just had to finalize a few details.

Flanges welded on, ribs laid out ready for welding

Matt, the guy in the machine shop is a decent fella. Think he enjoyed this little distraction from the day in day out doldrums of working on broken farm equipment! :-)

Cutting key way in rudder shaft

Little lathe work on the mating flanges

Rudder should be done this afternoon.

Standby...

The Dark Side

If you're squeamish you might want to look away!

The dark and dirty side of boat building that no one wants to talk about!

2 Weeks accumulation of trash

That's just what's been produced in the last two weeks of boat building. Solo cups, chip brushes, sanding discs, peel ply, tape rolls, latex gloves, paint rollers, zip loc bags, popsicle sticks, excess glue, etc.

Every once in awhile the garbage man and I get to chat. He asks how the boat is going, we do a lil' tour. Last time was a couple of weeks ago. He said: "You have the most interesting garbage!" In reference to my boat shed trash. I near pee'd myself laughing!

Nothing else to see here, please disperse!

Cheers!