On Board with Mark Corke

Yanmar Armstrong bracket

 

This rather uninspired picture is an Armstrong bracket on the back of what I believe is a Parker 25. Normally these boats have an outboard on the back of them which is bolted onto a 'normal' Armstrong bracket but in this case what we are looking at is the prototype of a new bracket with a Yanmar diesel engine inside which drives through a stern drive unit. Thus the bracket and engine can be bolted onto the back of almost any boat that normally has an outboard replacing the traditional outboards with the economy of diesel power. I have to say that I have never been a big fan of any sort of bracket on the back of a boat as I think that they spoil the lines of the vessel but what is interesting about this concept is that Armstrong in partnership with Yanmar, both experts in their own fields, have taken a couple of bits of technology that have been around for a long time and made something new out of it. According to the press release this engine is a 260 hp but it is understood that eventually power units will be available from 170 up to 370 hp so this should mean that the potential market could be quite large. As yet this is the only one that has been made and installed and it is in Florida but I am hoping to test it the next time I head down that way. I'll keep you posted.

 

Beckson hatch upgrade

 

 
The original sole looking aft.

 

When I built Mallard my gaff rigged cutter I was never quite sure how to finish off the sole of the cockpit. On the one hand the cockpit needed to be water tight but on the other hand I also needed to have access for essential maintenance to the stuffing box and primary fuel filter. The other problem was that the cockpit sole was very close to the water line so rigging up the drains so that they would be self draining also became something of a headache, on a larger boat with more free-board the sole is higher and the water can run through drains and exit the boat above the waterline. This was not possible on Mallard so in the end I connected both drains to an inch and quarter sea cock in the bottom of the boat. This worked well enough but it meant that the sea cock had to remain open even when I was not on the boat and this made me nervous not least because if the clamps let go or the sea cock failed water would flood in and the boat would sink. I thought about the problem for several years not quite sure what to do. Finally I came up with the solution that you see in the following pictures, the old sole was completely removed and a now marine plywood sole installed. Two Beckson watertight hatches were fitted to allow continued access to the area under the cockpit and the drains were routed to a self contained sump pump which keeps the cockpit dry and means that the large sea cock can be dispensed with allow me to sleep easier at night.

 Of course every boat will be different and if the hatches are installed in a cored fiberglass deck then I would recommend scooping out some of the core after the cut out has been made and filling with a thicken epoxy to prevent water from migrating into the core material.

 One final point and that is to carefully think through the install before you go cutting into anything; will the hatch interfere with anything above and below decks, will it weaken the boat and do I have the necessary skill set and tools to enable me to complete the installation in professional manner.

 

Here's how I went about it in words and pictures.

 

 

Step one was to remove the old drains, which were big, mostly because they incorporate a non return ball valve to prevent water from sloshing back up into the cockpit.

 

The next step was probably the most time consuming of the whole project for me, it was certainly the messiest. Using a Fein multimaster I cut out the existing sole but left the bearers in place as I would need these later to support the new sole.

 

Once the old sole was out of the way I was able to accurately measure for the new half inch marine plywood that would make up the new section. I then cut this out with a circular saw with a fine tooth blade but I could have used a jigsaw. To allow a little room for the epoxy and also to make sure that the ply would not get jammed in I allowed an eighth of an inch clearance all the way around.

 

Drier dinghy

I have lost count of the amount of times that I have walked down the docks at my local yacht club only to see at almost all of the dinghies half full of water. It is not only frustrating to have to pump out the dinghy before you row out to the yacht but if the dinghy is left too long it may sink. All sorts of pumps and scoops have been used over the years and I have found by experimentation that a household dustpan works very well at getting the water out. A dustpan will hold several pints at a scoop and the blade or flat bottom edge of the pan will scrape out nearly all of the water before resorting to a sponge for the last final drops.

This past week we have had almost constant rain up here in New England so there is some anxiety as to whether or not the boat will still have it's gunwales above water the next time I go down to the club. Add an outboard into the mix and things get even more fraught. The weight hanging on the transom added to any weight of water in the boat can have disastrous effects and should the dinghy go down the motor will be drowned and could be lost along with the dinghy.

Enter the Swedish made Drainman, a simple yet clever device which really works. Simple in the extreme it is a concertina type pump restrained between a webbing strap. Connected to the suck side of the pump is a goodly length of clear plastic piping with at the bitter end a stainless steel spring and eye bolt. The weight of the eye bolt keeps the hose in the water and the spring, which also adds additional weight works as a filter to stop the hose sucking up detritus and other gunge from the bottom of the dinghy. The strop is then attached between the dinghy and the dock and movement of the boat compresses and releases the pump sucking the water from the dinghy, ingenious. I only wish I thought of it. Jamestown Distributors have them on sale right not for $70 which is $30 off the regular price.

Simple perhaps, but effective and highly recommended.

 

Self centering bits

I have been installing a couple of Beckson hatches when I have had some spare time during the last few days as part of the upgrade to the cockpit on Mallard. A full story will be with you in a day or two as I want to walk you through the project from start to finish. But in the mean time I wanted to show this short video. It shows me using some self centering bits which are great for this type of work as the bit, as the name suggests finds the center of a countersunk hole. I apologise for the rather poor quality of the this video as I had very little room in the boat to set up the tripod, but I think you'll get the idea.

Red Lead

 

One of the great things about old boat shops is the smell. As soon as you walk through the door, the floorboards creak and you get hit by that smell of pine tar and varnish. OK so maybe I am romanticizing just a bit and those kind of boat shops are few and far between now and you are most likely to get hit by the smell of styrene of the latest Sundecker 42 being built as you walk through the door of an industrial unit that just happens to make boats. But the fact remains that there are boat builders out there that continue to use traditional materials. There are good reasons for this; on a traditional wooden boat the whole structure continues to move and 'work' as it travels through the water. Modern materials such as epoxy, fiberglass and two part paints are marvelous materials but they do not hold up when applied to something like a lapstrake or carvel cruiser. What is needed is something better suited to the substrate that can expand and contract with the changing seasons and the natural movement of the boat.

Years ago when I started building boats all the frames, planking lands and just about everything else that was sure to get wet was liberally coated with red lead paint. This coating was and still is the best defense against the ravishes of time and weather and for all those areas that would be impossible to gain access to once the boat was constructed. Environmental and other concerns have made many of these old time paints and compounds hard to come by but they are available I am happy to report from Kirby paints in New Bedford, Massachusetts. Red lead primer at $225 a gallon is far from cheap but the chances are that in many cases it will only be applied once after which it will be left to do it's job for years to come. Red lead can be used for all sorts of things, of course you need to be aware of the health hazards but it is unsurpassed for protection and as an undercoater on both wood and metal. It is perfect for steel keels and centerboards and the timbers in the bilge.

I need to add that I am not being paid to write this I am just enthusiastic about the products which come from a small firm that has been in the same family for the last 150 years or so and is today I understand run by George Kirby the forth. In addition to the red lead they make white lead paste and traditional boat enamels. Their website is basic by many standards but they do publish prices and have an on-line color chart so  you can see what they do offer. You can buy direct or you can order their products from Jamestown Distributors  who seem to be about the only other stockist of their products.

Handy holes

 

At some time or another everyone has to drill some holes in their boats whether it be for cables, hoses or some other thing. There are a bunch of ways out there to do it, but in truth all too often boat owners and boatyards pick up and use the first drill that they can lay their hands on.  The two shown above are the cheap spade bit on the left, and what is known as a forstner bit on the right. Both are intended, and were designed for wood but that is where the similarity ends. The spade bit. even when new and sharp, does an ineffective  job as it does not so much cut as scrape. The forstner bit on the other hand  probably cuts the best hole you can get - in almost any material other than metal. If possible every hole should be backed up on the underside with some scrap to prevent tearout which is especially noticeable with the spade type bit.

The picture below shows a three quarter inch hole that I had to drill yesterday through a plywood bulkhead using a forstner bit.  I think you would agree that even from the picture you can see that it is very clean and neat.

A forstner bit does work on fiberglass, but like the spade bit produces clouds of dust as the complete hole is reduced to waste, so when you go up to a 2 inch hole things start to get a very dusty and nasty. When working with fiberglass I like to use a proper hole saw as it only cuts out the perimeter.  It does a great job for not too much money  and will even produce a neat cut out when not backed up on the waste side.

 
It can be a pain in the neck sometimes trying to remove the disc that gets stuck inside the saw, but I have found that the 5 inch diameter saw is great for making plywood discs from scraps that can be used as backing plates to through hulls and sea cocks. Just coat them with epoxy before installation and they last for years. One final tip and that is to only buy the hole saws and other expensive bits as you need them. You can buy kits but you always end up paying for sizes that you will rarely if ever need.  Avoid those cheap hole saws from the dollar store.  The teeth are too fine and will burn up on the first hole.  Save your money - they are junk!