Page 4
Some things just happen... like accidents. But a few good things sprung from the accidental meeting of the hull and motor with a tree in the Atchafalaya River. Click below to see the page dedicated to that mishap.
Transom disaster and repair page
But... some say, "When you are given lemons, make lemonade. Well, with the boat on the trailer and not going anywhere for about 3 months, I had plenty of time to do some other things while each step of the transom repair was curing.
I got this idea in my head that my transducers should be able to shoot through the bottom of my hull. So I took the cheaper transducer (the Garmin) and put it in the bottom of the bilge with West System epoxy. It is facing straight down as well, not on an angle or anything. This works flawlessly at any speed and sea condition!!!!
I made a form out of a plastic cup and taped it to the bottom of the boat so the epoxy would not run all over the place. The form also helped keep the transducer level and not on the angle of the boat bottom. The Furuno transducer will join it down there soon!
Sometime before I acquired the boat, the hatches all suffered some kind of damage. The bow hatches must have been stepped on by a heavy fellow to crack them like this...
But when a crack stays there for a few years, this is what happens inside...
I had to peel, chisel, and grind all of that rotten/wet wood out of the hatches. I then cut a piece of 1/2" plywood to fit, soaked it with epoxy, and laminated it into the hatch with some glass mat. Then the other half of the hatch was repositioned. All that remains is the cosmetic repairs which are under way.
The hatch in usable again, but not finished. I put it back on the boat to make it through the summer. When winter comes I'll take it off and finish it.
The underside of this hatch was melted by a halogen fishing light before I owned the boat...
I ground out all of the burnt stuff, and replaced it with some new glass which I cut to fit...
Here is the glass/epoxy in place, but again, finishing will have to wait until things slow down.
Storage is a big issue in any boat, especially a small boat. Uncluttered deck space is very important to me, and it took me two years to figure out that a small cooler would fit perfectly in this front center hatch. This keeps the cooler out from under foot and out of the sun as well which is better for keeping beer cool.
