The Final Days 1

These final days are upon us and with them brings an element of excitement.
The weekend was spent refreshing the bottom paint and repairing the 
ragged waterline. After sanding the test section we realized that 
wrapping the entire boat in  plastic was the only answer to the mess that
was to come. It was kinda like ripping open a vacume cleaner bag and shaking
it, I'm sure Mike Roe would agree that this would qualify as a "Dirty Job".
 I had an unusual guest helper for this project and It was Suzanne. 
I have to tell you that of all the jobs for Suzanne to volunteer for this was the
dirtyest , nastyest , funkyest thing on my list and yet I heard no complainants 
about anything. " I think Suzanne wants to go boating -- BAD!" 
She even took on the worst two spots on boat, the exhaust pockets, and
kicked  there asses.

I'm being honest these exhaust pockets were full of thick, cracked,  anti-fouling 
that looked like someone put it on with a sock. I was  impressed when she asked
if this was OK . I was real impressed when we painted them.

This is  a shot from the stern, prepped wrapped and ready to be painted. It was
late when we finished on saturday night. So we washed out the dust and decided 
that we would paint it sunday morning.       

I think this part impressed me the most about Suzannes prep job, I'll bet these exhaust
pockets didnt look this good when the boat was built. Check off another thing that has 
bugged me for a long time. 

On monday morning we  got a visit from Xtreme Carpet Cleaners of  Granite City they 
were recomended by a friend who is in the carpet business and he just could'nt  say enough
nice stuff about these guys. After seeing the job they did on my cabin carpets it'll be 
me who also can't say enough nice things about Xtreme Carpet Cleaners. These folks
specialize in stain removal and they are absolute magicians.         

     Before

After

These guys did a great job on the carpets and  cabin is now complete , I have some

small issues in the dash to correct and some outdrive work to finish up on and

I'll be looking  for a ride to the river. The next few days should be interesting

as far as final inspection and last minute details.

Next up : Final Days 2  

Details - Details - Details

Another week has passed and the river is looking more and more friendly
to launch the boat. The outdrive that we are waiting for will have a tracking number
as of  tomorrow and it will be a relief to be able to keep an eye on its shipping  progress.
The dash is completely in and is really very complimentary to all the other changes
and upgrades. We did add a couple of small details as we final assembled the dash
and that was indicator lamps for power  for the Ipad and Iphone power station and
ventilation blower as well as the fire suppression systems. I am most pleased by the fact that
I did fix something that has never worked in the boat since the day we bought it.
That is the light strip that glows through the dash and lights up the toggle switch
function strip, that has always bugged me and I'm glad it's fixed. 
The interior is fully in and Suzanne has begun the task of cleaning and detailing 
the interior. Digging a years worth of dust out of the nooks and crannies will not be
a  quick job.  It is a job that we are thrilled is here as it means that completion is at 
hand. 
Dennis and Matt have rebuilt the gimbals replacing the continuity cabling and bushings,
steering pivot pins, upper seals, bell housing pivots and a whole huge box of gaskets and 
seals. These guys do great work, it's so hard to find this kind of quality in workmanship 
these days.  

I'm sure you remember how awful these gimbals  were before Dennis started on them
here we are now waiting for drives, these are so nice it's almost a shame to put them 
in the river. But the river is our playground and things that go in the river don't always
come out the way you put them in. This kind of quality work sure gives underwater
components a fighting chance.

Several months ago I started the dash project and it too is now finished and I just couldn't 
be more satisfied. With all the electronics in place the dash has a newer more contemporary  
look and the added plus that several items that were broken and didn't work , some never
did are now repaired and off my list of things to do.

       
So the final things yet to come are drives , props , freshen up the waterline edge,
a massive detail job including a final coat of wax and Billy with the trailer as we have
now set our sights on late week , next week for launch, weather permitting and
river levels allowing.   

Several small items are left to finish once the boat is in her slip at Alton. 

But it is just Details-Details-Details , and it's the labor we love.


Next Up: The Final Days  
    

Every Little Thing

Last week was a week of sorting out all the unfinished details. The time  was
needed and well used, decisions have been made and a plan has emerged.
With time slipping away (boating season) Suzanne and I have decided that we 
will run the gauge panels that we have for now and revisit this issue in the fall
or in the off season. Dennis and I are on a mission for upper drive gears. My
job is to clean and paint the gimbal housings, as well as the bell housings and
steering forks. Once done we will be reassembling drives and doing final cleaning 
add some touch up paint at the waterline and we should then be making preparations
to go to the water. ( Sounds easy ? ) ( ha-ha)

In the meantime I still have a list of every little thing that you can imagine.

It all ranges from carpet cleaning to test running  the engines. With a whole lot
of little things in between.

So here we go to the home stretch and to the wire, hang on friends it's going to be close.

Wow, got a little carried away didn't I ? I suppose that this whole project has become 
something of a very long car ride and now we're in that slap happy state that we find
ourselves in at the end of the trip.That is pretty much my condition now. 

            

As you can see from the photos above its a lot of little things and the little things make a

huge difference to me . The top photo is a light fixture that was problematic forever and 

is now being replaced. 2nd photo down is the cabin carpet , it's pretty dirty from  all the foot 

traffic during the headliner replacement, I'd say its borderline at best but we will see.

Last but not least are two photos of the antifouling on my boat, the uneven lines and 

lack of sanding at the top edge has always drove me nuts. I have to say that it seems 

to me that if you do bottom paint and all that shows is the 2" inches above the 

waterline you should be sure as anything  that those 2" are as perfect as possible.

Nice sharp lines and well sanded would be a good start. 

I almost started getting up on my soapbox, but rather I'll just post my work photos of 

the repaired line and the quality that I expect will be no greater than my own capabilities. 

PS : Oldman river has seen fit to give me another week or so of work time as the river level

has been dropped in anticipation of  increased volume from the upper pool. I not sure 

about you but where I'm from that's  preparing for highwater and highwater is a flood. 

Well we all hope thats not the case.

    

Next Up : Details -- Details -- Details  

  

      

Tough Decisions

There are times in our lives when the stars and the planets just don't align, Those are 
the moments that we wish to be relieved of the burden of decision making. 
At times the decisions are easy and the tasks are hard, sometimes just the opposite.
These past few days with the Fuelishness is definitely the latter of the two. 
I have tough decisions to make. Several weeks ago as the holiday approached I kinda 
knew that the planets were going to have to align perfectly to get us in the water. 
Being always the optimist (" the glass is half full ") I never let my spirit drop in the
face of each problem that has confronted me. But now I must face the final issues that 
are keeping me from finishing my project and getting the Fuelishness in her dock.
Whats left is a mix of areas , the first one is the dash, yea the dash, Didn't we all think 
that was in our past. I certainly did. As my son Dylan would say " Your Dash is a Fail Dad" 
And he would be right, But it's not the fault of the vendor , this just may an application
that Hydro dip may not be suited for or a possible product failure. No matter the answer
it is a setback that will really affect launch date. So now I have choices, do I re-run the
hyro-dip and pray for better results? or do some sort of art & paint process here at my shop?
or send the existing panels to Livorisi Marine to copied in real carbon fiber? 
See I told you this would not be easy. And there is one more choice that I didn't mention 
because it just doesn't seem to be much of an option and that would be to just run the
peeling panels. 

This is what happened when I snugged up the screws, the clear coat flaked off around
the screw holes. Those panels we so nice, this is just a shame, And  a real setback in the
program as well, because I have no true explanation that will help me find a solution to 
this problem. time will tell, I'm sure.

The next big book of choices has been the drives , but I'm happy to say that as I write
this post some finalization has come to relieve me at a time when relief is a very welcome
thing. A new set of drives are being prepped to be shipped to Illinois as I write this and 
we should see them in the coming week or so. My friend Dennis is feeling much better
lately and has the transom housings completely under control. Even though there were
many questions choices surrounding the drives, it didn't stress me out as much as some
of the other stuff, and that's because someone I trust is giving me all the information to 
make good informed decisions. 

The past week has not been a total load of crap, no sir. In fact Scott from VIP came to visit
and really put the icing on the cake. He installed the cockpit interior that we had stashed
away earlier in the project. Scott meticulously installed the drivers seat making sure that
drop out mechanism worked smooth like butter and each piece fit the next and all the 
double stitch seams were in perfect alignment. Just cant say enough good stuff about
Scott and Cheryl from VIP. Take a look and you'll see what I'm talking about.

So as you can see it's taking shape and that alone puts the wind in my sails.
And as far as the tough decisions go, I've got my work cut out for me.


Up Next: Every Little Thing