Alright, so I haven't blogged since March.....if it counts for anything, I've been thinking about blogging. Basically all we've done all Summer is work, work, work. We were either in Canada working on Fifer (the new boat, 68 1/2 foot 1928 motor yacht), or here stateside working on Molly (the 1957 Owens Flagship Cruiser that we have owned for 4 years--ready to sell now). It was an uphill battle for everything--and while I can't say for certain that we've won the war, I feel like we've made it across a couple of battlefields at least.
Since we do everything ourselves, you just have to sort of start the work and keep on going until completion. Vince handles the mechanicals, and I handle the bright work and trim. Ben helps a lot on the bright work, but since he had a job this Summer, it was mostly up to me. This goes both for Fifer and Molly--on Fifer we have gotten the engines placed into the boat the Summer, along with the transmissions. This week the shafting and props should be installed. There is also a pesky leak along the garboard that will be fixed.
When I say, "engines installed," it really oversimplifies the whole process that went down. Transporting the engines was the first step. 3 tons a piece, they were sitting for several years in the back of a tire warehouse some miles away from the shipyard where Fifer currently resides. It's not like you can rent a U-Haul and move the engines yourself--3 ton engines, and 1 ton transmissions take heavy-hauling equipment. We managed to find a shipping outfit that was willing to move the engines at a price that we could afford, and the man in charge of the move was aptly named, "Justin Case"....Justin Case, indeed. We made the move of the engines to the shipyard for less than $300. We also emptied the storage unit full of parts/pieces/and equipment as well, moving all the contents to Tom-Mac (shipyard). I found out after the engines got to the yard on the back of the semi-truck flatbed that they had been "teetering" a little around corners. That was a moment I was glad I had thought beating the truck to the yard would be better than following it. I would have crapped my pants watching that.
The engines sat on the docks for a few weeks after we moved them there. We spent a weekend steam-cleaning the engine compartment and bilges to get ready for the engines to be installed. Vince bought a steam cleaner last year for a couple of hundred bucks on Craigslist. It was pretty much toast, so he spent a few months rebuilding it, getting it back together. It took a LONG time to clean out 80 years on oil and sludge out of Fifer! It had definitely never been done before, but in order to properly clean the compartment for painting there was no other way. Once clean, it was easy to apply the paint. I spent hours and hours huffing paint this Summer, I can't say it was a particularly effective or enjoyable way to get high. It looked great, and we felt really good about putting the engines in for another 80 years (hopefully).
We hauled Fifer and had the engine installed via a huge crane--through a nicely (albeit small) hole that had been cut through the roof. Vince, me, Ben, Tom (shipyard owner) and another yard worker put both of the transmission units and one of the engines into the boat in about 4 hours one afternoon. It was amazing that we were actually able to do it, as the crane was at it's weight limit to boom (extending mechanism) the engine into place--so movement forward or backward was accomplished by pulling the boat up the rails, or sending the boat the other direction down the rails. It was one of those moments where you were halfway into something, and you realize that you have to figure out how to get 'er done. You do it because you don't have any other choice. It's kind of how we've been doing everything these days. Every second of this task was absolutely awesome and exciting. I loved it.
Once the engine had been installed, we felt comfortable letting Tom and the rest of the yard guys handle installing the second engine. That was done the next week....so...mission accomplished and on-time for that goal. The rest of the things we are doing seem to be falling into place..well, for the most part, anyway.
Molly was one hell of a lot of work. This little boat has been so much fun for so many years. We have been working on her for the past 4 years. We originally acquired the boat for my father, so that he and his girlfriend could stay on it when they visited Washington from Sacramento. We worked to get it up to standard for cruising and living aboard for a few days here and there. She was in pretty good shape to begin with, but her paint and varnish had been neglected for many years. We hauled her out a couple of times the first 2 years we had her, the second time taking her down to bare mahogany and returning her from white to her original color-scheme of beige and red. Every year we have worked hard to get her ready for the Wooden Boat Festival in Port Townsend every end of Summer, consistently bringing her to a higher level. Well, this year we really kicked it up a few notches. Vince completely stripped down the engine, taking apart the entire cooling system and removing all the old paint from the engine. He cleaned and polished everything--making sure all the gaskets on all the parts were replaced. After he was all finished, he applied a beautiful new coat of red paint. We also rebuilt the troublesome old carburetor--that little sucker had us chugging back and forth from Port Townsend last year on a wing and a prayer. Vince also steam-cleaned the engine compartment of Molly, and her bilges....once again, I was in charge of painting the bilges. This time I used turpentine and linseed oil. Huffing that in the hot Summer sun DID get me high. Less brain cells....goody. Thinking is troublesome, anyway, who needs it?
One would think that all this was enough. It wasn't. I had ripped out the carpets last Winter, so I figured that I would refinish the mahogany plywood floors--just sand, bleach and coat them with varnish. I attempted to sand them and after taking an hour to do about 1 foot of floor I decided that I didn't want to spent the next 50 years creating sawdust. I headed to the hardware store in search of the elusive chemical stripper that would solve all of my old-floor-varnish woes. Now, I have extensive experience with these fantastic wonders of chemical superiority. I had one product that I loved called "Speed-o-Matic"...this crap was the real deal. It had more health warnings than your bottle of Viagra! If you were unfortunate enough (or stupid enough) to get it onto your skin, the chemical burns that you received would serve as a long-lasting reminder that you had to suffer for your love of wooden boats. And burn....don't forget the burn. Well, the bastards discontinued "Speed-o-Matic"---some dumb ass probably sued Jasco for their well-deserved chemical burns. Pissed.me.off. It seems like in this fantastic country where nobody works or gets their hands dirty anymore, people look to eliminate any *dangerous* products. Hey, dangerous WORKS! I'd rather have a kick-ass product that takes 5 minutes to strip the paint, rather than working with some namby-pamby remover that takes HOURS, or might not even work at all. Call me stupid, I like products that work. So, the quest was on for something that could work, hopefully as well as my favorite poison.
As I wandered the aisles for my little mom 'n' pop hardware store a couple of blocks from the marina, I found several options--I grabbed them all in the smallest bottle I could find. I was going to test them ALL out and figure out the best one. They all touted their attributes for removing paint and varnish, but their labels didn't have nearly the "danger" factor I was looking for. It dawned on me that one of the old duffers who worked at the hardware store might have some helpful knowledge. I ambled up to one especially grizzled-up oldster who looked (to me, at least) to be handy. I asked him if he had any recommendations about what I should use--and that I wanted something that REALLY worked. He informed me that the can of something called, "Dad's," innocently enough, was what I really wanted. He went on to affirm my idea that the more health warnings that were on the bottle, the better the product worked.
I bought a gallon, and marched back down to the boat with a new energy. They had included a handy spray bottle to apply the stuff, which had great appeal---this way you didn't have to brush it on. This would eliminate any potential contact for chemical burn. I opened the spray bottle and poured the toxic crap into the obviously too-small hole of the bottle. I got to test the chemical burn potential right off the bat! Oh, yeah, this stuff should work..OUCH! When I put it on the floor it was love at first burn.....it took SECONDS to strip it right down to the wood. Awesome. That opened the floodgates of stupid. "If it takes the varnish off the floor so fast, maybe I can do the WHOLE INTERIOR". That's what started the insanity 3 weeks before the Wooden Boat Festival. I started taking apart the interior, removing doors, panels, windows and everything else in the quest for perfection.....
More tomorrow--including, but not limited to: "Nobody will buy my cool stuff--oh, yeah, we're in a Depression!"......downsizing is very difficult if you can't get rid of your stuff......
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