Steering

I think I touched on this in an earlier post.  Sorry if I am repeating myself.

I had planned on using cable steering for Teleflex (SeaStar), and so steamed off in that direction and had a keyway cut in the rudder shaft for the tillar such that the tillar arm was low down on the shaft.  My intention had been to feed the steering cable under the stringer and use the stringer to secure the cable.

Then the opportunity came to get Hydraulic steering as "payment" for some engineering work.  The steering comes from Ultraflex (it wasn't them or their agents I was working for).  They have steering setups for inboards and outboards.  The steering for inboards is a fairly traditional hydraulic cylinder secured at one end.  The end of the ram is them secured to the tillar.  This setup makes for quite a long bit of kit.  With the way my tillar was fitted, ie pointing fore / aft I plain couldn't get this to work.  Had I not already fitted the tillar I could have had the key way machined such that the tillar arm pointed athwart ship and then the ram could have run fore / aft.

So then I started looking at the outboard steering setups.  It took a couple of goes and some thinking, but I became convinced that this would work.  I drew it all up in CAD and moved things around and the angles seemed to work.  I suggested this to the Steering supplier but they could see how I could make it work.  Not to be deterred I went ahead and ordered a full system of "Outboard" hydraulic. steering.

By this time the only thing I wasn't sure off was exactly how I was going to mount the ram to the boat.

Here is mock up number 1.

Bit of an aerial shot of the setup.  As I have mentioned elsewhere I mockup my brackets with ply before getting them laser cut out of 316 SS. The Ram is only in generally the right place here.  You can see I had to extend the tillar arm a little to make the maths work

The thing I didn't like about this solution was once the RAM was in places, it was going to be difficult to make any form of adjustment.

I also had interference issues, hence the Z shaped bracket.

I did find pictures of someone else who had used this approach, but I wasn't happy with it.  Then I had this idea. The black "horns" came with the RAM. When mounted on an outboard they have some spacer to match the width of the outboards steering tube.  It basically make the setup almost identical to an outboard.  The threaded rod gives me pretty much infinte adjustment.

Here is they finished install. You'll note the Ram is a bit closer to the tillar.  I had the stainless tillar extension cut and then when checking my maths later I decided it was the wrong length / holes in the wrong place.  I spent three days going around in circles before ending up 1mm from where I started.

Update on the strut / shaft hole issue

While investigating the issue with the placement of the strut and shaft hole, I also discovered the water intake is completely in the wrong place.  I tried to get it out with the intention of relocating it, but after about 5 minutes of bashing the hell out of it with a rubber mallet and finding it was just laughing at me, I have for the time being given up on that, and worst case I will just put a blank cap on it.

So after reviewing the maths etc I have come to the conclusion I will have to move the strut and re drill the shaft hole.  The was quite a physiological blow, and I have to confess visions of a chainsaw swam into the recesses of my mind.  Anyway shook all that off and made the first decision, which was do I turn it back over to deal with it, or jack it up on blocks and deal with it with the hull the right way up.  Upside down has appeal because it gives more working space and gravity is on your side, but the cons are building another frame to support it and assembling 20 odd bodies to do the lifting an flipping, and then getting them all back a month later to turn it over again.

So in the end I elected to do it with the hull the right way up so I jacked the boat back up on blocks to give me about 450mm of working room underneath and took a look at the problem.

In the case of the shaft hole I routered a flat about 180mm long by 90mm wide and glued a 4mm piece of ply into it.  The photo below was just after gluing, the piece of timber coning down is just a brace to hold it while the glue sets.

I have already since shaped it with sander and done some filling, its pretty close to fair.  Then I'll strip back the paint a bit further an put a fibre glass patch over the whole lot.  Shouldn't be able tell there was ever a hole there.  I still haven't decided exactly how I am going to fill in the remainder of the shaft hole. I'll probably glue in a piece of solid wood.

For the strut base I did basically the same thing.  Routered a new flat 60mm aft of the current one and glued in a filler block.  To do this routing I mad a jig that fits to the shape of the hull. I also had to make a larger sled for to bolt to my trim router to bridge the gap.  With this I was able to easily router the new flats.  After the filler block was done I tilted the jig by 2 degrees and routed the new angle for the strut base. The photo below is with te new angle in place,  The block at the bottom is filling the 60mm and has been faired back to the hull.

This is my test piece when I was developing the jig, but it illustrates well the sled that I bolted to my trim router

Here is the new strut pad getting close to finished, its a bit hard to see from the photos by the 60mm gap created by shifting the strut back has been filled and faired and then the raised end of the filler block has been faired to the rest of the hull.  I don't have a photo that shows it, but after the fairing was completed I sanded back to bare wood around the pad and then glassed over the whole thing.  In fact todays mission is to final fairing / sanding reading for undercoat.

Engine installation

I have been working slowly towards installing the engine, mostly collecting bits and figuring out how to secure it to the stringer.  I made up some engine logs out of scrap wood, I made brackets out of plywood and then gave it a go.

Its a little hard to see from the photo but the bracket that the front engine mount is sitting on is just plywood.  I design brackets on a CAD program, then print them out, stick them to the ply wood and cut them out with the band saw.  I reiterate the process until I get the design perfected and then send them out to be laser cut out of 316 Stainless and welded up.  Anyway this first attempt was a dismal failure, the design of the engine logs around where the transmission bolts up was completely wrong, and there was part of frame 3 in the way.  So not to worry I pulled it out and had a rethink

So I had a it of a rethink, the front bracket for the engine mount was fine, but just needed to be rebated in. Then I cut the step off.  It looks much better, and fitted much better but still not quite right.  At this stage I decided to stop and wait for some parts to arrive.  I had the shaft log, and associated parts coming from the states.

Placing these part in the boat gave me my first inkling of the trouble I was in. I had until this point assumed that the flange was going to be at least 100mm further aft than where it looks like sitting.  It was at this time I revisited the plans and started to worry.  I discovered that the strut is about 40mm further forward than it should be and the wrong angle.  Its 14 degrees instead of 16 degrees.  To be fair I knew it was the wrong angle but I had never done the maths on what effect it had.  The shaft should have been coming out through frame 2.  So in all its about 150mm too far forward.

Below are a couple of shots of the trial fits. At the moment I am investigating moving the strut pad, and drilling a new shaft hole. This is going to be challenge now that the boat is the right way up.

Rudder installation

	After getting the rudder port in, I moved on to installing the rudder. This was pretty easy. Had to get some machining done to the shaft for a key way. That was pretty expensive.
Then it as just a simple matter of bolting in the top bracket, and then sliding the rudder up into the port. The rudder is offset to one side by about an 1" to allow the prop shaft to be dropped if required without removing the rudder.

Exhaust ports

So in an earlier post I put a picture of my exhaust ports.  These have now been fitted.  It was a pretty simple job, They are sealed in with 3M 4200, man that stuff is sticky.  I masked everything up and still managed to get it everywhere.

The process as pretty simply.  I made a skid for my trim router that turns it into a "power" compass.  Then drilled a hole in the centre of the port location.  A bolt then acted a the centre point.  You will note I didn't cut the full circle, this is because the bit that gets cut out also is supporting the router.  One mistake I did make was I should have started and stopped at 12 o'clock, not 3'o'clock, the centre piece sorted of twisted out under the weight of the router. I had to support it.

The port is held in by 4 x M5 threaded rods that are welded into the port.  These ports have flaps and I nearly got caught out in that the position of the threaded rods around the circumference of the port where not consistent between the two ports.

Painting the interior

I agonized over this for quite a while.  One of the first things that struck me after turning the boat over was that it actually looked quite pretty, the combination of the dark mahagony structural members against the light colour of the plywood.

For a start I cleaned up all the little plastic nails that were sticking out on the inside.  Did this with a combination of the oscillating saw with a blade and then followed up again with a sanding pad.

From there I gave the inside two coats of the penetrating epoxy to seal it.  It stayed like that for quite a while while I started building all the deck framing. I should really have painted it first as the deck framing made painting a bit awkward in places.

The deck framing s fun to do, it was a nice change to get away from painting, which I am not that geat at and get back to wood working, which I am not much better at, but enjoy a whole lot more.  So the above two shots are with the framing in place, but still a lot of tidy up work to be done.

It was at this point I decided I couldn't put off painting any more and so started to research what others had done.  One of the surprising things I found is a lot of people use "Garage floor" paint. The reasoning is that its hard wearing, used to dealing with water, much cheaper than marine paint, and almost none of the hull interior will be visible when its finished.  

So I found a suplier here in NZ of a "water bourne" 2 part epoxy.  It came in various colours including clear but in the end I settled for "battleship grey".  It was great stuff to work with,  mixed pot life is about 3 hours, its can be brushed, rolled or sprayed, covers easily,  had to be a little careful not to apply to thick or it did run.

I started of brush coating it, which as fine but VERY VERY slow, getting into all the surfaces took for ever so I decide to investigate spraying it.  I ended up buy a cheap HVLP spray system ($NZ50).  HVLP is high volume, low presure.  It worked really well, absolutely no paint mist in the air, no overspray, didn't mask anything out, and super quick.  Took a couple of sessions to get the technique sorted but after that I could cover large areas in a matter of minutes.  Really impressed with the spray system, especially considering it was so cheap.  I'll update the tools pages with details of it soon.

So I ended up applying 2 coats.

  

April Update

Progress feels very slow at the moment.

The Hull

Rudder Port

The hole for the rudder has been moved. This was a bit tedious.  Patched the outside with 6mm ply, then sanded the area down for both the new and old area.  Then a layer of fibre glass.  I have yet to paint the area.  After that it was a simple matter to finally fit the rudder port.  This has been sealed in with 3M 4200 sealant.  According to the instructions this stuff can be removed if required but it wont be a fun job.

Raw Water Pickup

Next came the installation of the raw water pickup.  I really wish I had done this will the boat was still upside down.  I had to free hand router the notch for it to sit into.  I practised this on the bench a couple of times and got pretty good, but doing it lying on my back under the boat was a different story.  It still came out alright, and I guess aside from here no-one will ever see it.  You can see a bit of a mark on the paint to the left of the pickup, this is from a dribble of resin I used to coat the hole after I cut it.  I still need to clean this up properly.

Drain Bungs

I have also installed the drain bungs.  That was a reasonably simply job.  It a long way to dril through, there is about 16mm of skin, then the framing.  The hole is about 70mm deep.  I got the bungs which a chromed brass from a local chandlery.  I bought them on line with raw water intake.  There are ok but aren't exactly what was advertised.  The raw water pickup was miles off what was advertised.  The description called them brass, but it showed a picture of something that was chromed.  Bit of a con.

Rudder

I have also fitted the rudder, this was after all why I jacked the boat up in the first place.  I had to send it out for some machining, it needed a couple of key ways for the tiller arm, and for the haft to be cut shorter.  It was quite expensive to get done, but I think value for money. You can see the rudder sticking out the bottom in the above photo.



Fuel Tank

I found a marine fuel tank on TradeMe and one the auction for about $250, which is somewhere between a 1/3rd and a 1/2 of what they cost new.  I have it sitting in the back of the boat, but I am not entirely sure its going to work.  One concern I do have is that the exhausts will run under the tank and I am not sure if there are any issues with this.

Exhaust Ports

My exhaust ports arrived today.  Pretty stoked with them.  Only minor complaint is they didn't come with a rubber gasket.

The Engine

Heat Exchanger

I have had some brackets made to hold the heat exchanger, but alas found that with the heat exchanger mounted in them the hoses interfered with the transmission mount, so I have had to order some extensions to them to get them out of the way. The welding was done by a friend at the station, he has done a nice job.  I hope to receive the extensions in the next day or so and get him to fix it all up. Its a bit hard to see in the following photo.

Dip Stick

As part of fitting the manifolds the dip stick had to be moved.  So I cut of the old bracket and bent / cut it to fit an existing bolt hole around the corner.  Thankfully the tube itself could rotate in its hole to the new position and then Joe welded the retaining bracket back on.  That has worked out very well.

Plumbing

I have the plumbing under control now, I bought a bunch of fittings that I need,  I still need a few more but I should be able to complete about 90% of both the raw water and coolant side of the system with what I have.  Stainless plumbing stuff is not cheap.

Engine Mounts

I have purchased the front engine mounts which is allowed me to start mocking up the engine logs.  I am going to have to make so landing brackets for the front mounts to sit on.  The only other way is to make the logs very wide (about 100mm).  I have most of this in my head, but will post some pictures as it develops.

General

Been doing a lot of thinking about the following which are all the things that are coming up soon

• Steering
• Electrical
• Wet Exhausts
• Rear Cockpit fit-out

Raising the keel

So in order to "move" the rudder hole and then eventually fit the rudder I needed to raise the keel by 350mm.  So this weekend my brother and I set about this. Was a bit precarious but we got there with no damage to the boat or ourselves 

Photos aren't great. Taken at night with an iPhone.

Engine rotation

I have been making steady progress with marinising my engine, and have reached the point where I was ready to permanently assemble the transmission on to the engine. This is where I have come unstuck.

The 71C transmission is a hydraulic pump, these pumps will only work if the pump is rotating in the correct direction. To accommodate this you can undo a couple of bolts on the front of the transmission and rotate the casting. This allow the transmission to be used for engines that rotate either way.

Now I read the instructions a while back and saw that this could be done, but misunderstood the purpose. I had also read that on the 71C the input and output shaft rotate in the same direction when in forward.  

Cut a long story short I thought you could set the rotation to suit your prop. But no, you must set the rotation so that the pump is normally  operated in forward , long term running in reverse will wreck the box.

So I'm my case the engine is "left handed" it runs anticlockwise when viewed from the flywheel end. This means I need a LH prop.

I don't have a prop yet so the prop isn't a big deal. But to counter prop walk the idea is to offset the rudder in the opposite direction. Regrettably I have already drilled a hole in the hull to suit a RH prop. So I will have to block that hole and drill another.

Finally some photos